Week of 10/14/2013

Can Atheists Best Theists?
– by David Matthews 2

When it comes to trying to validate religious beliefs, some people use the most asinine presumptions in their arguments.

One of the biggest is the pompous and self-serving presumptions that morals and values and everything that is good and decent and pure can only come from religion.  Of course when they say “religion”, what they really mean is their specific religious belief; but they don’t want to come off as being “too egotistical” when trying to castigate the “heathens”.  They had might as well claim that the air that we all breathe and the gravity that keeps us on the ground all come from “belief” as well.

Yes, it is really about validating their own egos and their arrogant presumption that they are superior to others.  And in doing so, they actually disprove their own claims.

The ego-driven presumption goes like this: all morality, ethics, values, everything that we consider to be “good”, these things can only come from religious belief.  Since atheists and agnostics and freethinkers do not believe like supposedly “devout” people, then they have no “guide” to what is right and wrong, and therefore cannot help but do evil things.

The presumption operates on the delusional fantasy that supposedly “truly devout” people cannot do the wrong things or break the rules of either society or “laws” of that particular belief.  This fiction then advances the equally delusional argument that if there is crime and perceived lawlessness that “society has turned away from God”.

Let’s start with a little quote from the BBC series “Doctor Who”…

“Good men don’t need rules.”

Simplistic but essentially true.  People that already know what is right and wrong will automatically try to do the former and avoid the latter without the need for a law or a rule to say otherwise.  They won’t do it because a law tells them, but because they believe it themselves in their hearts and minds.

So if goodness and ethics and morality truly come exclusively from religion, then why do we need rules in the first place?  All we would need is “faith”, right?  “Devout” people would automatically not do wrong… if the presumption was true.

That explains why the prisons are just overflowing with atheists and agnostics, right?  Oh, wait, they’re not.  In fact, the vast majority of prisoners consider themselves to be quite religious according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.  Atheists and agnostics make up only a tiny portion of inmates in the correctional facilities.

Well… maybe the rest are just Satanists and other “demon worshipers”, huh?

Uh… nope.  Christians dominate the inmate crowd in America.

Well, let’s look at the champions of faith; the religious leaders that serve as the shining examples of how goodness and morality flows from their belief in that higher power.

Inquisitions, witch trials, anti-abortion terrorism, rampant instances of physical abuse and systematic concealment of molestations… Yeah, not exactly religion at its best.  But if the presumption is to be believed, then none of these things should have happened!

Let’s face it, if you’re part of an institution that did nothing about the Holocaust while it happened around them, that persecuted men for looking into a telescope, that tortured and killed women and small animals out of fear and then did nothing to atone for it, that forced young victims of horrific crimes into silence and shuffled around the perpetrators, then you’re not living up to the claim that your faith somehow brings goodness and decency and morality into the world.

There’s another flaw in the idea that only through religion can one have goodness, and that is in measuring the goodness itself.  Do you do good deeds because of some sense of obligation?  Or do you do it because you believe it is right?

It’s hard to tell, isn’t it?  There’s really no way to tell if a person is doing good because of obligation or because they believe it to be right in their own minds.  We can’t read their minds.  We can only presume their intentions through our own biases.

So is it possible that a theist, despite their fidelity and proud proclamations of their moral superiority, could be denied that supposed spiritual reward, while the hereafter is filled with good-natured but humble atheists and agnostics?

This will blow the minds of some people, but, yes, hypothetically it is possible.

Let’s get brutally honest here… if you’re going to claim that religion is the basis of goodness and decency and morality, then you better make sure that your spiritual house – both personal and institutional – first lives up to the claim.

As a theist myself, I am somewhat embarrassed by the arrogance by those of faith over those that are not blind followers of that faith.  You’re not exactly helping your cause when your pride leads you to make claims that you know you can’t live up to.  Much like the recent Apple iPhone ads, sometimes the best form of advertising is humble demonstration.

Week of 10/07/2013

How Long Can You Live Without Pay?
– by David Matthews 2

So the GOP has once again screwed over the federal government, forcing a “partial shutdown”, throwing tens of thousands of federal employees either out of work or in a financial “null zone”, where they work without getting paid.

Of course the extent of this “partial shutdown” goes far beyond what I just described.  We’re talking parks and museums being shut down, certain agencies not doing their jobs, aid programs being suspended… and, of course, members of Congress still getting their cushy six-figure salaries while they sit on their platitudes.

But I want to take this time to look at the ones that are hurt the most by this shutdown: those federal employees that still have to show up at work, day-in-and-day-out through this whole mess, and yet not get paid.

The script, which has been regurgitated repeatedly, says that we shouldn’t worry about these furloughed employees, because at least they’re still working.  Besides, they’ll get paid for their work when Congress gets their act together, right?  Eventually.

I find this cavalier attitude very annoying, because of all the people affected by the partisan temper tantrum, these are the ones that have the heaviest burden to bear.  They have to come in and work essentially for free; they have no alternative short of quitting their jobs.  And before you cons and neo-cons start flatulating away about how they should do just that, I challenge you to drop your jobs and go find other work in this miserable economy!  You’ll find millions of Forsaken Americans standing in line for jobs that are not there.  (You know; all those people that you slanderously claim “stopped looking”.)

Think about all of the things that go into that “daily grind”.  You get up, get dressed, drive to work or take public transportation, you get your morning coffee, you work, you have lunch, you go back to work, and then you go home.  Simple, right?

Now think about all of the things that involve money.  Getting to and from work isn’t for free.  You have to pay for the gas in your car, not to mention any possible tolls or parking costs.  You have to pay if you want to take public transportation.  Unless the workplace provides it, you’ll have to pay for your morning coffee, not to mention your lunch.

Most folks could carry on for maybe a week or two without money.  But the last time the GOP had an ego-driven temper tantrum that shut down the government, the federal employees had to work without pay for twenty-eight days.  Do you think you could last that long?

You tell me… how can you pay for gas for your car if you don’t have money coming in?  And if you can’t pay for gas, then how can you be expected to show up at work?  Do you think the narcissistic members of the GOP would pony up for gas for those federal employees so they can continue to work without pay?  Do you think the Koch Brothers will do that?  Or the folks at Fox News?

How about food?  Sure you can go without lunch for a while, but how about the other daily meals?  How will you get groceries if you don’t have money coming in?  “Food Pantry”, you say?  Oh, sorry, many of those places have been depleted thanks to the Great Recession.  You know, the economic disaster caused by those “good friends” of the GOP.  Do you honestly expect those federal employees that have to work without pay to simply show up at the local grocery store and get food without paying for it?

And I know what some of you are thinking right now… and I have to ask you what makes you think that every single federal employee in that situation has a credit card to rely on?  And even if they did, what makes you think they could afford to rely on it for any length of time?  The Great Recession has put a hurt on a lot of us these past five years.  If that wasn’t bad enough, the GOP has also engaged in a little game called “sequestration”, which has hurt certain departments.  How many of those employees had to take a pay cut already, or been denied pay raises just so the GOP can satisfy their political egos?  How many of them have already had their personal finances stretched to the limit?

Now… we’re still talking short-term here.  What happens when the shutdown goes beyond the 28-days of the previous shutdown?  Now we’re talking about the lack of money affecting mortgages, rent, loan payments, insurance bills, utility costs, and those aforementioned credit card payments.  We’ve seen how criminally reckless the banks can be when it comes to people missing even one mortgage payment.  How many federal employees have to lose their homes to satisfy the GOP?

And bear in mind these people have to still go to work with all of that on their heads!  The stress of not having bills paid, of having their utilities cut off, of having to go without food or water, of possibly losing their homes, and wonder just how they will be able to get to and from work, all of that weighing on them as they are expected to continue to do their jobs essentially for free!  Oh, they’ll get paid… eventually… when the politicians get their act together… but not right now.

Let’s get brutally honest here… it’s sadistically and damnably sociopathic to demand that tens of thousands of people work for nothing just because some criminally narcissistic politicians like John Boehner and Ted Cruz want to hold the government hostage for their narrow-minded agenda!

And if you’re on the side of these narcissists, then I challenge you to live like these “exempt” employees!  I challenge you to go to and from work without pay for the duration of this shutdown!  No money for gas, no money for food or groceries, no money for bills.  How long do you think you’d hold out, huh?  I seriously doubt many of you would even last a week, never mind twenty-eight days!

The only people that can afford to get by without pay in the federal government are those at the very top.  The very sadists that we elected!  And while some of them have “graciously” decided to forego their pay during the duration of this shutdown, they have the option of doing that, not to mention they have the option to turn this whole matter off by doing their jobs instead of playing petty narcissistic games.

Week of 09/30/2013

The New “Heroic” Traits
– by David Matthews 2

Remember the song “Holding Out For A Hero” by Bonnie Tyler?  She probably gave the best description of what people look for in a traditional hero.  Someone who is good, strong, and maybe even larger-than-life.  The kinds of traits we think that the people we look up to should have.

Unfortunately quite often it’s an “idealized” vision.  The “streetwise Hercules”?  A “white knight on a fiery steed?”  A “Superman”? Someone who is watching out for you all the time from some mysterious place?  I don’t know about the first three, but the last one is often considered to be a stalker.

The problem comes when movie and television producers and creators decide to make these “larger-than-life” figures more “life” than “larger-than”.  If they’re human, then they’re flawed, and some are a lot more flawed than others. 

As a longtime fan of comic books and as a comic book creator, I’ve begun to notice a few “heroic” traits in recent years that really should be addressed.  Keep in mind that a lot of these “traits” are showing up in characters that we’ve known for a long time.  These are the “re-imagined” or “revisited” versions of heroes and heroines that we now see on television, movies, and comics.  This is the attempt to make these heroes and heroines more “life” instead of “larger-than”.

The D-Bag/A-hole Hero – DC’s Green Lantern used to be a heroic figure.  Whether it was “Earth-2’s” Alan Scott, or Hal Jordan, or John Stewart (not to be confused by “that comedian” with a similar name), they were decent guys whom you would see deserving the power and responsibility of being a space enforcer.  But then someone decided to bring in the brain-damaged Guy Gardner, and after that everything pretty much went to hell. 

Okay, fine, Guy Gardner is a jerk, but then someone decided to make him the rule rather than the exception.  So now we have Hal Jordan acting more like “Maverick” from “Top Gun”, cocky, arrogant, and believing himself to be right no matter what.  The Guardians strip him of his ring and he treats it like a great injustice and begs to be given a new one.  Even the “Green Lantern” motion picture shows Hal as being someone best described by his friends as an “A-hole”.

Speaking of, the Guardians themselves, the supposedly oldest and wisest beings in the universe, became a bunch of Munchkin-sized A-holes themselves.  So much so that they had to be overthrown from their place of prominence by the very Corps they created. 

How about the world of Marvel Comics?  Well there’s Cyclops from the X-Men.  Cyclops used to be the “apple-polisher” for the X-Men.  He was the poster child of Charles Xavier’s dream.  But of late he’s really taken the D-bag and A-hole tendencies to the next level.  How much, you ask?  How about he turns evil, murders Charles Xavier, and then has the audacity to tell Magento, his long-time arch-enemy, that he’s better at being a villain because he’s “winning”.  Yeah, you tell him, Charlie Sheen!  I look forward to the day you get your head handed to you and Magneto simply tells you “Welcome to my world.”

The Moody-Brooder – Okay, if we’re talking Batman, I can understand.  He’s a moody rich kid with issues.  “Lots of issues.”  But the idea that a hero needs to be cold and brooding as part of their standard operating procedure is really disturbing, even when it’s their personal life.  Seriously, how do you have a personal life if it’s spent being silent and skulking?  As someone who suffers from that kind of problem in the real world I can tell you that you really don’t have a “personal life” when you’re that way.

The new incarnation of Superman in the “Man of Steel” movie is a moody-brooder.  Captain America in Marvel’s “The Avengers” is a bitter moody-brooder punching exercise bags one right after another.

How bad is this trend?  Well they had Wonder Woman brooding at one point!  The embodiment of truth and beauty spending her time brooding and alone.  And not just in the comics!  In the un-aired pilot TV series by David E. Kelley, Wonder Woman actually set up a secret identity just so she could spend her time being a moody-brooder!

You know what made Spider-Man so popular?  He seems to be having fun!  He’s giving wise-cracks and calling people names, even when he takes things seriously.  (By the way, this is also what drives the popularity of Deadpool, although he’s certainly not a hero, even if he associates himself with them.)  No matter how miserable his life was at the time, no matter how bad the people of New York treated him, no matter how many insults J. Jonah Jameson dished out, Spider-Man was always seen as cheerful and happy.  Maybe it’s a crutch, but it is a crutch that works.

The Neurotic - “Project Alice” in the “Resident Evil” movies collects coins in the post-apocalyptic T-virus zombie world.  Elektra in her own self-titled movie suffers from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, so much so that you wonder how she’s able to leave her home.  Bruce Wayne in the Tim Burton “Batman” movie cannot sleep in bed like a normal person.  He has to sleep upside-down like a bat, which, I understand, can be life-threaening.  Seriously, this takes “flawed” to the next level!

The “Clueless” Super-Intelligent - I don’t know how many times I’ve watched the “Iron Man” movies and see Tony Stark, one of the supposedly smartest men in the world, fail to actually explain what he is up to.  It’s the pompous “I’m so smart I’ve re-written the Periodic Table before breakfast” mindset, which in “Iron Man 2” is really not an exaggeration.

It is one thing to be super-smart, but it’s another to be too smart for your own mouth.  Seriously, how much of “Iron Man 2” could have been shaved off if Tony simply opened his damned mouth and told either the love of his life or his best friend what was really going on with him?  So much damned drama could’ve been avoided!

The Hate-Hero – I’ve considered this the standard hero template for all of the heroes seen in the CW Network, previously known as The WB.  I consider this the “Hate-Hero” rather than the “Anti-Hero” because an anti-hero is someone that ends up being a hero that doesn’t really want to be.  Han Solo in “Star Wars”, for instance, is really an anti-hero.  A “Hate-Hero” on the other hand is someone that seems to have a perverse hatred for the “hero” title and doesn’t want to ever be associated with a hero even though that is precisely who they are and how they operate.

The best example of the Hate-Hero idea is the ten-season TV series known as “Smallville” that appeared first on The WB and then on the CW. 

The initial idea of “Smallville” was that it was supposed to be about Clark Kent before he became Superman and growing up just outside the little Kansas town that the series is named after.  The premise was a good one in the beginning, because they wanted to show the character as he’s growing up and not in the idealized way originally portrayed in the “Superboy” comic series by “Superman” creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster in the 1950’s.  Their “Superboy” was, simply put, “Superman as a boy”, with all of the heroic traits and experience and powers already there.  “Smallville” wanted a different take, so the producers expressly prohibited their “Clark” from doing anything remotely connected to either “Superman” or “Superboy”.  Part of the reason for that was an ongoing lawsuit by the heirs of Siegel and Shuster over the legal rights to “Superboy” and anything associated with it.

This idea was fine for the first four seasons, while Clark Kent was going through high school and just starting to figure out that he’s “not from around here”.  But then after the fourth season, at a point when Clark would show up at the Fortress of Solitude for the first time like in the 1978 movie, and it was expected that he would start to become Superman, the producers decided to turn Clark into a super-powered slacker that positively hated the very idea of being a hero.  He didn’t want to wear a costume.  He even hated capes!  And they continued with that for six seasons.  A superhero with an absolute hatred of everything about being a superhero and a refusal to accept that he is one!  Even one of the seasoned superheroes in a two-part episode made a very blatant note of Clark’s refusal to accept his role.

And it’s not just limited to “Smallville”.  During the same time that “Smallville” was starting, there was a series called “The Birds of Prey” that was set in Tim Burton’s Batman world but where the heroes were expressly forbidden to wear their costumes!  There was the pilot for “Aquaman” where Aquaman didn’t really call himself that.  There’s the current series “Arrow” with Oliver Queen who goes around as “The Hood” and despises the suggestion of calling himself “Green Arrow”.  And there’s a planned series called “Amazon” which is supposed to be like “Smallville” but with Diana as a non-Wonder Woman version of Wonder Woman.

Seriously, this hate-hero concept is probably the worst of the “new heroic traits”, partially because it seems to be the easiest to impose by TV executives that want to scrimp on wardrobe and special effects costs.

Let’s get brutally honest here… the reason why traditional heroes are so memorable is because they are larger-than-life!  Or, at least, larger than our own lives.  When you try to “humanize” them by making them flawed, by making them neurotic, by making them despise their very identity, you tear at one of the core reasons why they are who they are.

Think for a minute about some of the classic heroes.  Did anyone ask if Perseus had a fear of snakes when he fought Medusa?  Did anyone recall the time when Hercules hated his name and feared showing off his super-strength?  Did the Biblical hero Samson hate his hair and wanted to hide it all the time?

Obviously they weren’t.  And that’s part of the reason why we still remember them today.  We don’t remember the flaws.  We only remember who they are and what they did.

Heroes are not just powers and costumes and a catchy code-name.  It’s who they are and what they do.  Heroes are seen as iconic because they don’t appear to be hindered by the flaws and human failings that the rest of us suffer from.  And in doing so, they encourage us to transcend our own flaws and failings and hold ourselves up to a higher standard.  They reflect our ideals of who we all could become.  While giving them flaws may make for good drama, and as a writer I can certainly appreciate that, writers and producers have to remember that what makes these people heroes goes beyond the failings that limit the rest of us.

 

Week of 09/23/2013

No, Syria Was NOT Ours To Solve
– by David Matthews 2

Well it appears that we just dodged a bullet concerning the mess with Syria.

Instead of dropping bombs and firing missiles, we’re sending diplomats and firing off terms to negotiate how Russia will handle Syria’s weapons of mass destruction.  The guys that helped make the mess and encouraged the mess are supposedly going to oversee cleaning up the mess.

That’s good.  That’s called responsibility.  You’d think that the cons and neo-cons would be all for that, right?

So we should be breathing a sigh of relief right now.  We’re not having to get involved in yet another Middle East conflict.  We’re not having to put planes in the air and firing off missiles and hearing the daily body count from the air-fluffed ego-driven media.

Have you noticed that the price of gasoline has dropped since we backed away from the brink?  Big Oil doesn’t have the excuse to pilfer the average American like they’ve been doing with every Middle East crisis.  Some sheik stubs his toe and the price at the pump goes up a few pennies per gallon.  Some warlord threatens to unleash hell and gas prices soar.  But now that we’re not bombing, the prices are going down.

That’s good, right?

Hey, we defied the script!  That is not easy to do!  This is the same script that drove us into Iraq.  That told us that we had to get involved with Libya.  That tells us that we need to confront North Korea whenever their egomaniacal leadership feels a little neglected.  That always looks for new battles for us to fight around the world and tells us that “only we” can fight these battles.  “Only we” can save the world.  “Only we” can “police” it.

We actually said “No” to that script!  We told the FoxNews “experts” and the bloodlust chickenhawks to go pound sand.  Good for us!  That’s long overdue!

Well now we have to hear the whining from those behind the script.  The people that were denied their self-promised “blood and treasure”.

They tell us that Syria should have been “ours” to solve.  That we “should have” been the ones to step in and held their strongman to account for his criminal acts.  After all, it was President Barack Obama that drew that supposed “red line” and promised action if Syria’s thug Bashar Assad used chemical weapons on his own people.  “The world” supposedly turned to the United States for action, not Russia.  And what did we do?  We handed it off to Russia, the very country that supplied Assad with his weapons and then blocked any action from the United Nations.

It was “ours to win” say the defenders of the script.  How dare Obama deprive them of their “win”!

No, they’re wrong.  Dead wrong. 

Let’s get brutally honest here… Syria was never “ours to win”.  And it was never “ours to win” for many reasons.

First of all, what the hell were we supposed to “win” anyway?  At least with Iraq, the script argued that there was oil.  Granted, any promise of oil was thrown down the toilet later on, but at least there was supposedly something for America to gain with Iraq.

What are we supposed to gain in Syria?  Huh?  Is there some sort of hidden cache of money?  Maybe the body of Jimmy Hoffa?  Amelia Earhart’s plane?  Joseph Smith’s Golden Plates?

Remember all of those “weapons of mass destruction” that the people behind the script swore on a stack of bibles were in Iraq ten years ago?  How many did we actually find?  Try one.  And it was one that we didn’t even know Saddam Hussein had!

So what is it that we would have “won”?

Ego.  That is all that we would have “won”.

This was all so a gang of preening former soldiers can bring in a paycheck as “military advisors” to Fox News; second-guessing the actual generals and armchair-quarterbacking foreign policy from the comforts of their cushy special interest offices.  It’s so chickenhawk politicians can beat their chests and preach like dimestore ministers about “American Exceptionalism” and “Manifest Destiny”, all the while complaining that Obama wasn’t “doing enough”.

The argument could have been made that Syria was “our” conflict to join in… back when it was a simple act of revolt against Assad’s rule.  Back when the chief organizers and encouragers of that revolt were pushing for a more democratic system of government… you know, the kind of system that we here in America pretend to share with that whole “American Exceptionalism” delusion.

Unfortunately for us, at that time, the people behind the same script were telling us that the revolt was a “bad thing”.  It seems these supposed “experts” can’t tell the difference between the Arab Spring – the people behind the push for more-secular democratic governing in the Middle East – and the Muslim Brotherhood, who want Islamic-dominated theocracies.  So when the Arab Spring people were pushing the Middle East towards more-secular democracies, the people behind the script were saying “No!  These are Muslim Brotherhood people!  We hate these people!  We can’t let them win!”

So we sat on our hands when the revolt was one we could have made a difference in.  And now that it’s become a mess, the script changes and now we are “supposed” to get involved.

Isn’t it funny how the people behind the script were telling us not to get involved when it could have really mattered, then turned around and told us we “needed” to get involved when it became a huge fuster-cluck.  It’s almost as if they really want America to fail, doesn’t it?  After all, it would be on Obama’s head if it did, right?  You know, the Nobel Peace Prize recipient being dragged into yet another military conflict.

But, thankfully, we don’t have to worry about that now, because we’ve passed the burden off to the Russians. 

Let’s have the Chippendale-wannabe Vlad Putin put his and his country’s reputations on the line in the global arena for once.  If he fails, then at least the people behind the script will be ready, willing, and eager to say “We told you so”.  And then the next time trouble raises its ugly head, Putin won’t be so eager to complain about America’s self-appointed role as the world’s policeman.

Week of 09/16/2013

Microsoft’s Ending Era of Ballmer Blunders
– by David Matthews 2

So Microsoft strongman Steve Ballmer is heading out the door… eventually.

It hasn’t happened by the time of this article, and it probably won’t happen for a few more months, but he will be gone at some point in 2014.

Steve Ballmer took over the reins of the software giant from founder Bill Gates in 2006, even though he held the “title” of “Chief Executive Officer” as far back as 2000.  And since then, Microsoft has… well it’s floundered.

Oh, sure, the entity known as “Microsoft” is making money, but it’s really not the tech powerhouse that it was in the preceding decade.  They’ve expanded beyond just doing software and some PC-related devices.  Now they’re doing whole tablet computers and cellphones.  And yet people would rather buy an iPad or an iPhone or play with PlayStation than get anything with a Microsoft name attached to it.

Now, granted, the anti-Microsoft and the Cult of the Apple extremists (and they are legion) will have all sorts of things to say about the company that “The Better Bill” built, and none of them good.  That is to be expected.  But I’m not in that crowd.  I don’t buy the script that says “Microsoft stole everything from everyone and they’re nothing more than technological parasites”.  If that is your personal malfunction with the company, then so be it.

On the other hand, I’m not an MS Purist either.  I’m not one of those people that worship all things Microsoft.  I wouldn’t be writing this kind of article if that were the case.  Microsoft is a company, nothing more.  It is not a church, it is not the end-all-be-all deity behind the Internet, and it is far from being infallible.  They provide a decent operating system, an Office suite that sets the bar for everyone else, and every so often they come up with a pretty good game like Halo.

If anything, Ballmer’s run of Microsoft has been more treading water than trying to advance any kind of a vision of how Microsoft sees itself helping society.  And that exposes pretty much the fundamental difference between Ballmer and Gates.  With Gates you had some kind of vision, like the kind seen in his book “The Road Ahead”.  With Ballmer you just have… well, whatever Microsoft has at the time.

Ballmer thinks that his letdown was with Windows Vista, but… let’s get brutally honest here… that was just the tip of the iceberg concerning the Ballmer Blunders.  His failings are numerous.

But let’s start with that one.

Windows Vista: Where to begin with this?  The concept was good, but the “successor to XP” was clearly not ready for prime time when it was released.  Yes, that’s par for Windows, but you would think that these guys would have learned by now.

Then there are the multiple versions of Vista, including a version that was Vista in name only.  Why the hell would people want a Vista-lite system that is “Vista” in name only?  Granted, not all computers can handle the new toys, but that’s been par for years now.  It means you wait until you can get the faster computer that can handle the new operating system.  Why was that so hard to comprehend, Steve?

Then, instead of trying to get into the good graces and make it into a workable operating system that people would embrace, Ballmer and Microsoft simply write the whole operating system off and told people “Just wait until Windows 7!”

No!  Wrong!  You don’t convince people they need to embrace the new operating system and then throw it under the bus!

That brings us right to the next Ballmer Blunder, which made throwing Vista under the bus even more of an insult…

Throwing Windows XP Under The Bus: So not long after Vista came out, Ballmer decided it was time for PC users to stop using all of those previous operating systems and embrace the new shiny.  He wanted to kill Windows XP right then and there.  People had to switch and switch right then and there.

Of course the PC community revolted and they petitioned Ballmer to relent, so Ballmer gave the XP crowd six more years.  But they shouldn’t even have had to petition!  This was just a stupid idea from the get-go.  You don’t convince people to upgrade by forcing them to!

Speaking of the premature death of XP…

Recession? What Recession? Here’s a little tip for the folks in the tech world… when you are in a global recession; when your job, your bank account, and your home are all in danger, you are not going to be looking to buy new computers with all-new operating systems simply because the CEO of Microsoft says so.

Businesses that are afraid they won’t be around any longer will not spend money on new computers.  Department heads that are afraid they will be out of a job soon will not request money to get new computers.  Parents that may or may not have a roof over their heads will not spend money to get new computers.  Schools that discover their budgets are about to be slashed to the bone because houses are falling into foreclosure like dominos will not spend money to get new computers.  You are simply going to make do with what you have until you can afford to do otherwise.

If all of these things do not factor into your heads, then you fail basic economics.

Throwing Windows 7 Under The Bus: So we went from XP to Vista.  Vista was buggy, so Ballmer throws it under the bus and launches Windows 7.  Then, before anyone can get used to Windows 7, Ballmer launches Windows 8, which is so different from all of the previous operating systems that it makes the changes in Windows 7 from Vista trivial.

So if you want people to abandon XP, why shove a completely different operating system down our gullets, Steve?  Windows 7 was workable.  You get more people to play with it, you get more companies to develop software for it, and you get people to like it and they’ll stop playing with XP.

Then there is…

Throwing The Desktop Under The Bus: What is it with Steve and throwing things under the bus?  Every previous incarnation of Windows operated with a desktop and a “Start” button.  You turn on the computer and you’re greeted to a desktop with a nice wallpaper image and widgets and your favorite icons and a “Start” button to access the rest of the programs. 

Now, with Windows 8, you start inside the “Start” menu itself.  The “desktop” exists only as a novelty item.  Well isn’t that just mighty generous of Microsoft to do that for us “old timers”, huh?  All of those people that spent thirteen years or so designing wallpapers and desktop icons and desktop themes can still have their little nostalgia moments while the rest of the computer is made to work like an oversized cellphone!  I can’t even dignify it by comparing it to a “smartphone” because it would give the pretense of there being something “smart” about the decision!

Surface… and Surface? There are actually two computer systems named “Surface” that Microsoft came up with, but only one of them is actually good.

The first “Surface” system was a super-smart literal active desktop.  And I don’t mean “desktop” like in Windows XP.  I mean “desktop” as in an actual surface that you put stuff on top.  You put your digital camera on it, and it downloads the pictures from the camera so you can display them and stretch them and move them about.  You put your cellphone on it and you can share documents or contact lists or even make phone calls all without having to pick the phone back up.

This isn’t science fiction.  This is real!

And yet the only place where you see it right now are TV shows like “Hawaii Five-O”.

Then there is the other “Surface”.  The table laptop system with the stupid commercials.

That brings me to…

The Dancing Dumb@sses! Pop quiz: you’re promoting your first-ever actual hardware product and you’re wanting to out-do your competition that has been doing this since the 1980’s.  How do you showcase all of the new features in your new combination laptop and tablet computer?

If you’re Steve Ballmer, you hire a bunch of dancing dumb@sses to prance around to a techno-beat to show off the least-attractive feature… the “clickable” keyboard.

Seriously, Steve, were you even awake when the ad guys asked to go ahead with this?

Xbox and Blu-Ray: Okay, I know you guys bet on the wrong video format.  You bet the farm on the HD DVD format instead of Blu-Ray for your Xbox 360 game system, and you blew it.  But why didn’t you admit failure and come up with a Blu-Ray accessory?  Instead, you try to tell people that they would much rather download movies instead of playing them on a disc loaded with more than just movies.

Then there is…

Kinect: There is a basic rule that entertainment executives of all mediums apparently do not comprehend, and that is that some gimmicks are not universal.  Kinect is one of those gimmicks.  It’s a nice motion-and-voice-detection system, but that doesn’t mean you can translate every single game into one.  Some times you need a good old-fashioned joystick, not standing around pretending to have one.

DRM: This is a rip-off from birth. I understand that Ballmer hates open-source, but this obsession with Digital Rights Management really puts the screws to all Microsoft users.

For Office users, DRM means you don’t really “own” your copy of Microsoft Office like you did with earlier versions.  You are now leasing it with a year-to-year license.  It’s not even on your computer anymore.  It’s on the “cloud”, which means you have to be online to use it.  Sucks to be you if your Internet provider is bad.

It gets worse for the new Xbox One.  For a while you needed to be online all the time in order to use the system, but apparently Microsoft relented, or so they say.  It’s still a few months away from actual release, so we won’t know until then whether Microsoft will make the same mistakes as Diablo III and SimCity.  They’re certainly not winning any support with the gaming crowd.

All of these things are Ballmer Blunders, folks.  They are all part of the eventual transformation from a company that provided things to better the human condition to one that is simply fixated on making their profit margins.  From a company led by a man with a vision to one that is led by a man looking to make money and worrying about the future when it happens.

One can only hope that after Ballmer leaves, that Microsoft would be put in charge of someone with a vision again.  Someone that will see technology and not just wonder how they can monetize it to the extreme.  Maybe that’s asking too much in today’s pervasive and persistent parasitic philosophy of plunder, but if Microsoft wants to continue to survive, never mind regain its status as a tech titan, then it certainly needs someone that can dream instead of just someone that can count money.