It's a Mad Mad Mad World #1

So I want to write about current events and political stuff but I don’t want to suffocate my blog with it so I decided I’d unleash my fury about once a week or so and talk about stories that caught my attention. Ready? Let’s do it.

1.China Issues Report Criticizing US Human Rights. This is just becoming a typical tit for tat kind of thing every year. The US issues its report on China citing the usual lack of freedom of speech/press/movement/religion/politics/torture/repression/etc and China issues its own saying that the US pushes for internet freedom but attacked Wikileaks, that many people are homeless, that there is rampant violent crime, too much money in politics, and some other stuff.
In defense of the US, I think Wikileaks was in the wrong for what it did. I’m all for government transparency but that information was stolen; some of it was classified top secret, and published. That sounds pretty illegal to me. About violent crime, if you aren’t doing what you aren’t supposed to be doing then you’ll be fine. Homelessness? In the big cities I guess it’s a problem but China has homeless people out the yin yang so they got no room to talk. China also blamed “huge civilian casualties” in Iraq and Afghanistan on the US even though numerous reports by many different organizations have proven that the majority of civilian deaths are caused by extremists. China dropped the ball again in its own report. Nice job fellas. You would think that instead of pointing fingers both countries would work on the areas they need improvement. But that makes too much sense for the people in charge so they'll just keep playing their games.

2.Pakistani-US intelligence Freeze- So the Pakistani people are getting riled up because the US is using drone strikes in their territory to kill insurgents that the Pakistani military is too incompetent to handle. That, AND a CIA contractor shot and killed 2 Pakistani men who approached him in an aggressive manner in a busy market district. I’m inclined to side with CIA guy in that situation. And the Pakistani government is using that as leverage to get a little more clout in Washington. They’re mad about alleged civilian casualties in the drone strikes too. But it’s hilarious because it’s Pakistan’s ISI that gives us the intel on where to strike. So either they want us to kill the wrong people on purpose to ferment anti-American feelings in the populace, or they’re just too stupid to know who’s who. Pakistan’s a political mess. Everyone’s corrupt. No one listens to the central government. The left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing and the right hand doesn’t know what the thumb is doing. Pakistan has its head so far up its own ass it can hear the sound of its small intestine as it produces shit. I say scale back the aid money they get until they learn who’s calling the shots or just drop them all together. India is where it's at anyway.

3. US Citizen Detained in North Korea- OMFG. Why won’t people realize that North Korea is not a place where you should go? Especially when you know that they don’t joke around about illegal immigration! Carter and Clinton need to sit this one out. If we quit rescuing these morons that get themselves caught over there the rest of them will realize that it’s not such a good idea. They’re probably going to try to use that guy as a bargaining chip to get some food aid or something. And our government will probably bitch out and give it to them.

4. The US Budget- Sigh….You got Obama and the democrats on one side saying “Hey cool dudes! How about we cut a little bit now but not really?” And then you got Boehner(Ha!) and the republicans saying “No way dude. We’re cutting everything!” So that’s pretty much what’s going on as I understand it. It’s a big mess and these old guys just can’t seem to look into the future and see that we’re still going to be in debt in 15-20 years if they don't something drastic. It’s kind of like my parents and grandparents using up all the gasoline back in the day without thinking that there might not be any left for me. Kind of. Maybe not. The point is there’s no foresight going on. And if the only solution they come up with is to raise taxes I’ll tell you right now, I ain’t paying.

5.NASA Retiring Space Shuttles- Ending on a positive note, they finally decided where the shuttles are going to end up after they’re retired. I’ve seen some concept art for the next generation of spacecraft and they look really awesome. Instead of developing their own ships, NASA is leaving it in the hands of commercial spaceflight companies that are springing up here and there. In 10 years they say you can hitch a joy ride to the moon for like, 100 thousand bucks.

That’s what interested me this week. Let me know if there’s something that should have been on the list. Sometimes I do miss out on some news.