An incredibly loud and strange conversation between two obvious strangers at the grocery store had several people, including myself, watching and wondering what the hell was going on.

“…cottage cheese.”
“Oh, we’re not going there.”
“What’s wrong with cottage cheese?  Put a little pineapple or something on it.  Perfect!”
“Nah.”
“Oh, we wouldn’t get along then.”
“What about a nice steak?”
“See, I couldn’t do that because I don’t eat meat.”
“Houston, we have a problem.”

Godwin’s Law, as it’s called, states:  “As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1.”

When referring to a humorous observation as a law, people tend to take it much more seriously than they should.  Is the adage true?  Well, technically, but no more so than if you were to replace Nazis and Hitler with Puppies and Kittens (In fact, I now decree that version to be Cutaia’s Law).

However, the more widespread this supposed edict becomes, the more people misuse it.  Recently, I saw someone in an online discussion bring up the Nuremberg Trials in an attempt to illustrate that a state of war does not excuse dishonorable actions by those involved.  Immediately, some Wikipedia reading know-it-all showed up with this to say, “Thank you for invoking Godwin’s Law[…]It’s not like that besmirches the honor of the holocaust survivors or anything, you witless turd.”

In the mind of the Godwin’s Law devotees, any mention of Nazis or Hitler is automatically inappropriate to the conversation at hand and somehow belittles the terrible nature of the Holocaust.  It never crosses the minds of these folks that these analogies might possibly be common because, oh I don’t know…World War II was a really huge fucking event in our history about which everyone has a reasonable amount of knowledge?

That’s the issue with accepting the ramifications of such a broad aphorism as absolute truth.  It causes people to avoid actually thinking about what’s being said, instead simply jumping to their own conclusion immediately.

Even worse is when the same people make the leap to Godwin’s Law anytime someone mentions fascism itself.  Fascism, after all, is not a concept unique to Hitler.  It’s a political ideology that comes in many levels of extremity.

There are arguably times when governments and politicians do things that would quite literally be classified as fascist.  The danger behind Godwin’s Law is that its biggest proponents seemingly (and perhaps unknowingly) seek to frighten people out of ever mentioning that possibility.

The Nazis didn’t just appear out of thin air, after all.  There’s a build-up required in order to work a country into a nationalistic, Jew-hating fervor.  Understanding that fact and pointing out trends that hint even slightly towards that direction is in no way a bad thing.  If you ask me, the only thing that would “besmirch the honor of Holocaust survivors” would be to let fear silence you into ever allowing anything even remotely similar to happen again.

A far more useful adage than Godwin’s Law, I would think, is one from philosopher, George Santayana:  “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

People who wish to preserve the memory of the immense evil of the Nazis at the cost of squelching speech about the more minor evils of today’s leaders are doing their cause an incredible disservice.  They’re no more reasonable than puppies chasing their tails around in circles.

Oh, hey, look at that!  Cutaia’s Law…

Each Slurpee machine out there has 4 to 8 little lights on it…one for each flavor.  The machines always indicate that you should not pour any particular flavor when its light is lit.  Of course, whenever I want a cherry flavored Slurpee, the cherry light is always on.  It never fails.

I usually try waiting for a little while, hoping that the light will turn off before someone notices me staring at it, pretending I’m trying to figure out what flavor I want.  But I know what fucking flavor I want.  Cherry.

I’m guessing the lights just indicate when the mix isn’t properly frozen and I don’t really mind drinking a melted Slurpee as long as it’s still cold.  In all honestly, I could probably just pour away and enjoy the cherry goodness.

But then I think to myself, “What if it’s poisonous until the light turns off?”

“I guess I’ll just have banana.”

At 7-11 this morning, I saw a woman standing in the corner of the store, head down, holding a chocolate muffin to her face.  She licked and nibbled away at the top part of the muffin like a squirrel eating an unshelled peanut.  It was very odd.

That’s all I have to say right now.  Go about your business.

I’ve watched this video at least a dozen times since I discovered it two weeks ago and it never fails to make me giggle out loud. I finally decided it was time to pass this joy along to the viewers of my website (all two of you).

Source: Break.com

It’s been two years now and memory-of.com is still sending me e-mails to remind me that I’m dead.  And yes…the perpetually expiring offer to make my memorial website permanant (25% off for a limited time!) is still there.

Through all the hard work you’ve done for Comcast, a Google search of your name no longer places my old Blort™, Frank Eliason probably has a tiny penis, on the first page of results.  In fact, that entry is now 43rd…and we all know that people never get past the third page.

Not everyone has been as lucky as you.  Lauren Cleri still sees a cartoon version of herself performing oral sex on a game show host when she Google’s her name.  Just below Rebekah Sanderlin’s real website is my Blort™ calling her a fucking idiot.  Hell, even a search of “Cloverfield Sucks” keeps me on page two, and I’m pretty sure a lot more people have written about Cloverfield than about you.

So way to go, Frank Eliason!  Your penis has been upgraded from “probably tiny” to “assumably average.”  The Google never lies.

“I want, not for personally for me, but for working Americans, to have a option, that if they don’t like their health insurance, if it’s too expensive, they can’t afford it, if the government can cobble together a cheaper insurance policy that gives the same benefits, I see that as a plus for the folks.”
-Bill O’Reilly

And the supposed “conservatives” continue to show how ignorant they are.  The free market is something that they don’t actually support because they don’t understand a lick of it.  The thing about free-market competition, is that it requires businesses to succeed or fail on their own merits.

What Billy-boy doesn’t seem to get is that the government’s version of “cobbling together” a policy essentially amounts to a room full of bureaucrats pulling numbers out of their asses until enough constituants are happy enough to get them re-elected next year.  When was the last time the government honestly shopped around for a good deal?  The fact is, they don’t have to.  First off, they’re most likely to just go with the company who gave them the biggest campaign contribution.  If that means sacrificing bargains, they know they can always just print more money to “create” a good deal for the end-user…the voters.  The voters, unfortunately, aren’t concerned that these actions end up affecting the future of our economy or about the Federal-Reserve-propelled decline of the dollar, though, because these are less concrete or immediate concepts.

For years, the Democrats and the Republicans have been force-feeding the public an idea that cheaper such-and-such, right this moment, means that the future is in good hands (pay no attention to the trillions of dollars in debt behind the curtain).

This is the bottom line behind why a public “option,” is not a true free-market solution.  The government doesn’t understand or care about things like cost vs. profit (or even breaking-even) because, “Hell!  If we run out of money, we’ll just print more!”  No loans, no bankruptcy, no real accountability…just pass it off to the children!  Governments don’t operate under the same constraints of economic reality that a real business must.

So, Bill…you think your current plan is great for you, yet support a government plan for all us lowly peons out there (way to stick to principles you sycophantic prick), but keep in mind:  When the government “option” accidentally (?) creates a monopoly based on their inexperience with actual business practice and their neverending supply of funny money, what exactly do you think will happen to your wonderful plan?  The government can simply offset unsustainable costs by selling off bits and pieces of our future (i.e. printing money, which is for all intents and purposes a hidden tax) and nobody will be the wiser.  Can your plan say the same?  Or will it suddenly have even less money coming in due to customers jumping ship, while still having to support its remaining members?  Sounds like a recipe for disaster if you ask me.

From the viewpoint of the masses, a public “option” appears to be a perfect solution.  They see all these positives for the proles, but the negatives are too obscure for your average American to consider.  And it’s not socialized medicine, right?  Just more free-market competition!  But as I said, competition only works when all the competitors are playing the same game.  A public option is effectively killing or severely crippling the private sector, not because it’s inherently better, but because it’s not based in any kind of economic reality.

I just can’t wait for Bill O’Reilly’s insurance company to go out of business because it can no longer compete with a mob of thieves who just counterfeit money in order to have the “best” plan out there.  Then after 4 years, everyone can pat themselves on the back, get re-elected, and “keep on fuckin’.”

So, the pills I’ve been taking these last few months have a couple nasty side effects, one of which is that I tend to get fairly tired for a brief period of time each morning.  Rockstar energy drinks help greatly.

This morning, though, I forgot to bring my precious stay-awake elixir and happened to be hit by the worst bout of tiredness I’ve experienced in a long, long time.  All I really remember is 2 hours flying by and some futile attempts to do bits and pieces of work in between nodding off repeatedly, despite my best efforts to keep my eyes open.

At lunch I picked up a triple sized Rockstar, perked up immensely and have since gotten down to business.

The best part of this whole thing was looking over the handwritten notes I had taken while still in my delirious stupor.  The chicken scratches are barely legible remnants of what appear to be a child’s (or drug addict’s) ramblings.  My favorite sections?  “Hospital” became “HStippal,” while “Nebraska Medical Center” somehow transformed into “hexase Nebrsta Nmbra Mede Centre.”

Updates are coming.  A lot has happened since the last time I worked on this ol’ site of mine.  Some good.  Some bad.  Some earthshattering.  I suppose I’ll see you soon.