Just Answer the Question!

Just Answer the Question!  That's all I want from you, a simple yes or no, or a here is the info you need.  Don't imply I'm the Idiot because if I have to ask, maybe your published information is not as intuitive or informative as you think!

That is my theme today and today's motivation may help me resurrecting my cathartic rantings.

I hate when you are dealing with say an event organizer and you ask a question, and the reply is something like "everything you need is right in the event notification" or words to that effect. 

First off if it was easy as you think, I would not have had to ask anything, second, this does not actually answer my question! 

 If you want to tell me to look harder at the information, fine, but also tell me exactly where to look or just answer my F'ing! question!

That's it for today! Check back soon for new updates.

Welcome To the Club

By: Annoyed With Things

It is a day I need to ponder the strangeness of the universe when I find myself in agreement with Spike Lee.  Now I like his movies and consider them entertaining and provocative.  I like that he likes the Knicks – my dad’s team.  The admiration pretty much stops right there.  One of the things I don’t like about Spike Lee and many other supposed voices in the black community is that I am tired of being called a racist just because I don’t agree with a particular political position or I don’t believe in a vast racist conspiracy trying to keep people down.

One of the very best things about the military is that, in my experience anyway, personnel actions – opportunities, promotions, schooling, etc., are primarily based on merit.  If you work harder, study more and go the extra mile, you will be promoted through the ranks faster than your peers and will be offered opportunities not offered to others.  I served under commanding officers and supervisors of every color, male and female.  Some were good, some were great and some just horrible but it had nothing to do with what they looked like or what part of the country they were from.

Now back to my comments.  I am not a racist.  I believe people should be held accountable for their actions.  Opportunities should be based on hard work and merit – but luck impacts us all.  We all have good days and bad days.  So I am glad to finally see that Spike Lee can admit at least some of the people disappointed in President Obama might not be racists (article here).  Can you believe the arrogance and inflexibility inherent in that concept?  To finally admit that people might be motivated by something more than the President’s race as if that was the thing that was driving opposition to his positions in the first place.  Perhaps we are not all racists; perhaps just a bit more than 50% of the voters don’t like the direction the country is going and just do not like the President’s agenda. 

I hope this is the first sign of progress – Spike Lee admitting the possibility that some people who are against President Obama’s vision of America might not be motivated by race but rather by self-interest or a simple difference of opinion.  Welcome to the club, most of us have been saying that all along.  Not all issues are so black and white.

Should the President Care If We Don’t?

By Annoyed With Things

I am not an Obama Basher per se.  I don’t like most of his politics and I think he is mostly an empty suit when it comes to being hawkish with American foreign policy, but I don’t hate him.  Essentially, unless there are blips in the news or he does something particularly annoying, I don’t pay much attention to him at all.  So today when I realized he, as the sitting Commander in Chief of our armed forces, was not in any way, commemorating the anniversary today, June 6^th (article on schedule here), I was all set to open fire and let him have it with both metaphoric barrels.  But then I realized that no one seemed to be commemorating the day’s events outside of the military and its veterans, how incredibly sad.  Why Should the President care if the country doesn’t?

I am sure it will get a brief mention on tonight’s news.  They will have some stock footage from the day’s events so long ago, and the obligatory footage of someone laying a wreath at a memorial with TAPS heard in the background, and that will be it, on to the next thing. 

I am not going to tell you what happened on this date, go look it up for yourself and shame on you if you don’t already know.  If you are in the military or you are a veteran you know.  Today across the globe, at every unit large and small, in every service, the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force and Coast Guard, some unit commander or senior enlisted leader will step forward before their comrades in arms and ask them to bow their heads for a moment of silence and remembrance.  Because we swore to never forget, even if everyone else does.  The You Tube video below is probably the best commemoration speech for this event that there ever will be.  Watch it and try not to weep.  If today’s events are going by the boards in just 68 years, after we swore to never forget, I wonder how long a shelf life September 11^th will have. – unless of course you’re a military, police, fire or EMS family, then you think about it every day.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=eEIqdcHbc8I&noredirect=1