I went to a job fair today, one in the city adjacent to the one I live in. My expectations were I would go in, wander around talk to a few people, drop off a resume or two. The reality was close to that.
I’m talking politics here. Are we to the point, in the United States of America, where we have crossed too many lines into a plutocracy? We have a president who is using his executive powers to persecute his opponents over false narratives and the other two branches of government are not checking his activities. I add the major upward siphoning of wealth to the top 1-2% of those who already have more than they can spend in a lifetime, and, hey, that money isn’t coming from just our current pockets; its in the form of ‘deficit’ spending, which just means borrowing from the future. So our kids are going to be saddled with it, all so the wealthy can…what? It doesn’t end well, does it? As I write the other countries are starting to not buy our country’s securities. There may well come a day very soon when there is no more money left to be lent. What happens then? I’m super curious to know what is ahead. Like does the country collapse? Does it split? Or do we go to war? Which, as we all know, is a great way to get rid of debt…if you win.
Have you tried getting a job lately? It’s a tough row to hoe, believe me. There is no interaction with a ‘real’ person anymore. You jump online, upload or, if you have oodles of time before you get your rejection letter, input all the data manually into a form for the job you want and the submit button. A day or two later you get the ‘we are going another direction’ email and move on. I’ve been getting calls by AI bots on my phone, vetting me with questions. I get it, times are hard, HR has no time to go through ten thousand applicants to find the best one. At best they use the bots to get that number down to the top three, at worst, they don’t utilize any filtering at all; zombie jobs are a thing. See? I can bring about any subject back to the undead…
I’ve been thinking a lot about fear the last few years. I see it in the news, in relationships with people; it’s prevalent on a daily if not hourly basis. When I was growing up I was raised on it. Don’t be out after dark or someone will abduct you. Don’t go into that part of town, it’s dangerous and you’ll be mugged. Don’t travel to foreign countries, the people there are savages! That religion is full of suicidal fanatics. That vehicle is dangerous. A whole life built around not doing things due to the potential consequences. Of course, it only takes one bad thing to hit the media and everyone is talking about it. The victim? Oh, they should have known better than to ‘go there’ or ‘do that’. Never mind that a million people went there and did that without incident. Statistically we are in the safest time to be alive than every before. Not everywhere; war still scars our planet as those who have, think they need to have more. Religion still poisons the minds of people who seem to forget the very purpose of religion is peace and caring for your fellow man. Unless you’re Conan and worship Crom.