Patriotism is Willful Ignorance

You may see the title of this blog post as despicable. I simply see it as true. To be a patriot, you would have a point of view that favors the place of your birth. By being willfully ignorant, you take notice of that which favors your point of view, while ignoring that which does not. Do you see a problem with my conclusion? To me, the two concepts are synonyms. So call me names. I'm OK with that.

I'll try to offer some obvious support to my quote. If you were a Japanese Citizen in the late 1930s, you saw the United States Navy place a blockade on your small island nation because the US sided with China in a centuries old battle. Your country then attacked a US Naval base that supported the blockade. A blockade of an island nation is clearly an act of war. The United States later ended the war with a nuclear attack on two civilian populations. Yes, the only nation ever to use nuclear weapons (weapons of mass destruction) on a civilian population, now objects to Iran having them. Iran would be but one of a dozen nations in today's world with nuclear weapon capability. How would you, as an American Patriot, state the history of these events? Would it be different than the view of the Japanese Patriot? Is either position true?

Another example would be the Vietnamese Patriot's view of our actions in Vietnam. We supported a corrupt government against a civil uprising. The primary excuse used was an attack on a US Naval vessel in the Gulf of Tonkin. Eye witness reports and the narration given by our acting Secretary of Defense, at the time, Robert McNamara, was that the attack was friendly fire in the fog. You can witness McNamara’s testimony in The Fog of War. A patriot, born in Vietnam, would probably say we had no business interfering in that war. American opinions vary on the involvement of our troupes in Vietnam, but I would guess that a true American Patriot backed that war. “My country, right or wrong, my country.” “United We Stand.”

Move forward to our involvement in the Middle East (starting in Iraq). We are there based on 9/11 and “weapons of mass destruction” in Iraq. George W. Bush has admitted that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and anyone who is not willfully blind, having even a slight knowledge of physics, is aware that the Twin Towers fell by means of demolition. They obviously did not “burn down”. So, God Bless America, where the patriots live in a much rosier world than I do.

“Without Patriots there would be no war.” - The Pacifist

Cheers, Old Buz 3/6/2021

iambloggerbuz.blogspot.com

Born an agnostic and with GOD's help will remain one.

Golden Goose Economics

Golden Goose Economics, in this rant referred to as GGE, is fast becoming the prominent economic theory in The United States of America.  It would best be described as an unsustainable business theory, which only considers short term profits, not long term results.  I am presently a casualty/participant in GGE.  That is, I have sold my soul in order to live. 

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I will give you a short back story.  In 2009 I was diagnosed with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL).  It stayed in the “wait and watch” stage, with little or no symptoms, until late 2018, when the White Nationalist Lymphocytes decided to kill off the other blood cells, both red and the other whites.  This was a good short term decision for the lymphocytes, for they did greatly multiply their number, but at the long term cost of killing their host (me).  Leukemia will do that to you.

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Along comes the cavalry, sort of.  Abbvie (a GGE company) sells a drug known as Ibrutinib for twelve to fourteen thousand dollars a month.  The insurance co-pay on a drug of this price is about three thousand dollars a month.  I am using it.  Why so high?  Stay with me.  We need some history here.  Celera researched and developed the drug.  They sold it a couple of years later to Pharmacyclics for three million dollars*.  A nice profit and well deserved for the R&D given.  In 2011 Johnson & Johnson, after Phase II FDA trials, bought into the GGE program for $975 million dollars*.  Most recently Abbvie saw that J&J and Pharmacyclics had a good GGE program going and in March of 2015 paid them 21 Billion Dollars* for the scam.  Why do I call it a GGE scam?  Because, the developer, Celera, could have sold the drug for $50 a month and made money.

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Now you are asking yourself, “How can this retired guy, a blog writer, living on Social Security pay a three thousand dollar, a month, co-pay?”  I can’t.  A foundation pays the co-pay.  After I turn down the program, the drug supplier calls me and asks, “What is your monthly income?”  I answer the question, with no verification required, and I am told that you qualify for the foundation’s program.  I have no co-pay.  This seemed both easy and fishy to me, so I asked the obvious question, “Who finances this foundation?”  Answer given, “The Pharmaceutical Companies.”  How would the CEO or CFO or a drug company analyze this transaction?  Price a lifesaving drug so that less than 10% of the market can afford it.  Fund a foundation to pay the co-pay.  Get the co-pay back when you sell the drug, plus get the benefit of a “charitable” contribution.  Now your market is 100% of CLL patients.  Who pays for this GGE scam?  Medicare.  Who pays for Medicare?  You, the tax payer, pays for Medicare.  How long can Medicare pay for this program?  Great question.  Put it to a Republican Congress.

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So, I sold my soul to the Devil for the possibility for a slightly longer life.  This is the mother chimp philosophy.  I, long ago, read about an experiment involving a mother chimp and her baby being placed in a large water tank.  As the water in the tank slowly rose, the mother held her baby high.  When the level rose over her nose, she stood on the baby.  Before this incident, she had hoped to be reincarnated as a Trump Train Rider or a Big Pharma CEO (the lowest form of human), but when it was her life, she stood on her baby.  She will be lucky to be reborn as a chimp.  Before I joined the Golden Goose Economics scam, I had hoped to be reincarnated as an ACLU Lawyer.  By joining the Big Pharma program, I think it will be chimp in the next life for me.  I will be demoted from a blog writing, retired motorcycle dealer.  Not much of a step down, but a step down just the same.

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Cheers, Old Buz

Born an agnostic and with God’s help will remain one.

*Source: Wikipedia > ibrutinib > history
  

"Born An Agnostic

“Born an Agnostic and with God’s help, I will remain one.”  I would like to have that on a T-shirt.  For those who would smile, hello.  For those who would look perplexed, the thought could offer a tiny step out of the fog of religion.  My quote is a statement that contradicts itself, as The Bible often contradicts itself.  An agnostic has questions, but few answers.  The religious have answers, but few questions.  I would contend that a questioning mind is a healthy one.  It is less judgmental and more open to new information.

The Atheists that I have encountered contend that there is no God.  I find that statement as close minded as, “There is only one God and He is The God of my bible.”   Intelligent design makes sense to me.  Not the Intelligent Design of the Right Wing Christian, but the idea that the systems that we see in action in our universe, are not random.  A good example of this is DNA, found in all living things.  Even a quick look at this system indicates that it is not random and that the DNA system preceded the survival of the fittest theory.   The DNA of a critter was in place long before it had a chance to survive or fail.  It couldn’t have existed without it.   The word “Intelligent” is problematic.  I think that to the “Intelligent Design Folks” that the word somehow relates to human intelligence, as it does to the Gods of the bibles.  The Gods that I have read about in the bibles don’t have the brain power to design the universe.  They take advice from the tiny human brains that wrote the books. Moses: “God, I don’t think that you should kill all of your people for worshiping false idols.  It will make you look weak when compared to other gods.”  God:  “Yup, Moses, I guess you are right.  Can I just kill half of them?”  You see, Bible Readers are as gullible as Atheists.  You folks who have Faith in your Bible, but haven’t read it, should read it.  There are some good laughs in that book.

So, God did see me born an agnostic and gave me a questioning mind that, I expect will keep me an agnostic.  And if God has chosen to bless America, above all other nations, why didn’t he write His instruction book in English?

 

“We are all living in a miracle.”  “See what is plain to see.  Doubt what is not.” - Daniel

Cheers, Old Buz The Agnostic

Comments are welcome.