Well, here we are. 115 days until the election. I like to count down days, as those of you who hang out with me on Facebook probably already know. It is 60 days until football. (Possibly 425). 167 days until Christmas. 174 days until America swears in Joe Biden. 245 days until Leprechaun Crawl ’21. 353 days until I’m 53. 1220 days until Roger Stone would have gotten out of jail. 1555 days until Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez can run for president.
I could go on and on. Hopefully, I do.
But Roger Stone won’t get a jail sentence. He got commuted. Getting commuted isn’t like getting pardoned – he’s still guilty AF but doesn’t have to do time, because he’s a friend of a despot. The Kim Family must be proud. What’s next? Kill Mary? I wonder if the 40% would even bat an eyelash at that.
No, I don’t. I actually don’t.
But numbers can be a funny thing. About 40% of Americans currently support Donald Trump according to the polls but, really, how many people actually do? I know some Trump supporters that don’t support him, at all, only his party affiliation. I know some Trump supporters that support him simply because he’s the current president. They supported Obama. They supported Bush. They supported Clinton. Of course they support him; he’s the president. Alternately, I know some people that would shrug and say “yeah” when asked if they support the president but might say “who?” when asked if they support Donald Trump. It’s long been said that Trump’s true following is closer to 20% of Americans and, probably, pretty close to 20% absolutely despise him, and somewhere around 20% of Americans float back and forth between the extremes. Another 40% probably couldn’t care less.
Numbers don’t lie, I’ve been told. Except for when they do.
Mark Twain famously quoted someone else when he said there are three levels of lies: lies, damn lies, and statistics. Numbers lie. I mean, not literally, numbers aren’t politicians. The number 7,112,020 can’t look at you and say “OJ didn’t do it” because numbers can’t directly speak, much less lie. The same number, written differently, can tell you that today is 7/11/2020, but it can’t tell you that to your face spouting spittle in all caps. It is in the interpretation of numbers where all lies begin.
I have a good friend, bless his heart, that pours (pores?) over the Covid-19 data daily to prove that the virus ain’t that bad. If the numbers shift, he changes his points of data. One day it could be the infection rate, the next the death rate, the next the recovery rate, and on and on. The numbers tell him one thing – we’re in the middle of pretty serious global pandemic – but the data he chooses, from day to day, can tell him quite another. It’s being blown out of proportion, he might say. We’re being misled, he said once, on a global scale.
I worry about that particular phrasing most of all. It goes back to my theory about conspiracies which, you might recall, is this in a nutshell: there is no possibility of sustained global cooperation to further an insidious agenda. Hell, no two of us can agree on the smallest thing for longer than 10 minutes before it breaks down into an often-heated discussion about whether something is crimson or scarlet. Well, we might both agree to unfriend anyone who tells us it’s cardinal, but that’s another story.
The point is my friend is right, and my friend is wrong. We’re always being misled, on a global scale, by competing forces vying for our attention and dollar. On a local scale, too. The important task, for each of us who think, is to discern. There can be a really serious global pandemic going on and a competing confluence of manipulators utilizing the chaos to partake in agendas (agendi?). And Donald Trump can be an absolute moron and be on the perilous verge of tyrannical clout. More than one thing can be true at once.
Speaking of unfriending and Donald Trump, I have been dropped on FB by at least 3 really good friends recently, ostensibly because of the cad. Nevertheless, I persist.
I could go on and on.
I won’t, for now. I am 2 hours and 15 minutes from having to be at work. It takes me 8 minutes to drive there and about 30 minutes to get ready. I really should be there 10 minutes early. So of the 135 minutes I have left, I have 87 of them to finish this and then walk the dogs. And I just wasted 7 of them typing this paragraph.
I gotta go. Numbers may lie, they may tell the truth, but the numbers of minutes between now and then are always unforgiving. Like dogs that don’t get walks. There is no pardon for that. 😉
Tom Being Tom 
I wouldn’t want to be Facebook friends with a Trump supporter anyway. I just got asked to join the Kayleigh McEnany Fan Club the other day because one of my “friends” is a member. I’m dying to know who it is. At any rate, let’s hope for all our sakes that the numbers in November put an end to this madness.
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I can tell you with all sincerity and honesty that the Fan Club fan was not me. No lie. ✋
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Ah yes, those darn numbers! As for these FB friends, hey, if they like spewing….or should I say supporting the orange idiot, then, meh whatever. Friends don’t judge friends because of political affiliations, that’s how I think anyway. As for my opinion, I sure hope AOC doesn’t run for president, I can’t go from one extreme to another. The speed of that would make me nauseated, like a rollercoaster ride. I don’t like either, I just want to get through 2020 without a major political hangover, lol. Cheers Brother Tom! Oh btw, walk your pups before they start to plot against you….lol.
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Good advice! 🤣
I, for one, am ready for the other extreme. I mean, the extreme opposite of a racist, sexist, aging male ignoramus is a young, liberated, bright, female person of color. AOC checks all the boxes for me. 😉
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For the 1/100th time, Tom, the numbers favoring Biden ignore the most powerful voting bloc in the United States at this moment: Russia. I fully support Joe, of course, but our entire system of laws and norms is irreparably broken. Nothing short of an entire reimagining of the nation will suffice – that is to say, scrap our impotent constitution and start over.
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Hard to argue with that logic, Paul. I might try and save some bits of the old doc – and Joe has my full support as well – but there’s just as likely a chance, if not better, that Donald Trump will be seeing a second term. However, if we can flip the Senate, it won’t last too long.
If it does, what’s left of democracy in this republic will not.
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Civilizations end.
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Amen.
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God I hate numbers. Sure they lie. They are man-made.
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I love numbers as much as I love people.
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Thank you for ending this post with dog photos. They’re the only thing that kept me from slashing my wrists after all that talk about Trump.
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I had to, RG. If I gave into the urge to be only a reflection of my current national environment I would be as ugly as sin.
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Great post! And the pupper is adorable.
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Puppies!!
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Thank you, Peg and Saania!
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I am strongly against the orange idiot in the white house. I am ashamed to say my mother is a Trump supporter and said to me the other day that some day I will be open minded and like him. I said hell no I will never support him. Considering she also thinks he hasn’t done anything wrong with COVID and I have a weak immune system, I asked her if she would still think he is great and support him if I die from COVID and she said no. So for my mother to gain one working brain cell and understand that Trump is a worthless person and is destroying our country, I have to die. It is crazy!!!I I hate to say this, but my mother has always been drawn to pervert men that take advantage of women of any and all ages. I am sorry, I kind got going a little on a rant. I put at least one time in all my recent posts something negative about Trump and COVID. Great job, Tom and I love your dogs!!!
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Thank you, Alyssa! It’s funny how the followers of Trump have co-opted phrases like “open mind” and “common sense” when they seem to lack the least iota of either quality. Any person with an open mind would finally see through the con game. Any person with common sense would realize that Donald Trump represents the worst aspects of not only any leader we’ve ever had, or any American we’ve ever known, but the worst aspects of humanity itself. Every word that describes him describes the basest qualities of mankind. Arrogant. Self-Important. Dishonest. Ignorant. Fear-mongering. Hate-mongering. Sexist. Racist. Authoritarian. Divisive. The worst man for the job? To say the least. The worst possible representative of humanity itself? Exactly.
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Be righteous and walk the dogs. Always walk the dogs. Dogs don’t care about numbers, they just want their exercise. Keep it simple. And when we all get our exercise – whether walking our dogs or however – we have more brain power and energy to fight and resist the current scourge in the White House.
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Eat right, exercise, and be righteous to the dogs. Better advice I’ve never heard. ❤️
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So, how are those Rams looking this year? Mona
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Not to change the subject, Mona? 😏
My honest analysis there, if the games get played at all, is that they will struggle. A lot of “ifs” have to coalesce to get us back to the playoffs this year: Goff must rebound; the offensive line must improve; the running back position must sort itself out; somebody (or bodies) must fill the Brandin Cooks speed receiver role; somebody besides Aaron Donald must get the QB; some very unproven linebackers must step in for the loss of some very proven veterans; the secondary must stay disciplined and healthy, both of which they struggled to do last year; the new offensive coordinator and new defensive coordinator must acclimate to their roles hastily.
With so many question marks it is difficult to see them put together a consistent performance in any single game much less over the course of a 16-game season.
IF there is a season.
It’s hard to imagine, right now, that there will be one at all this year. 🤷
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Speaking from the future, looking backwards, our numbers this day were FANTASTIC! 😎
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They REALLY were that day!
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Hmm, numbers and stats, I know a lot of people are obsessed at the moment, following the figures as though they’re going to give us a revelation. Fact is the lies are everywhere! Maybe that’s why I’ve gone off listening to MSM and our politicians, trump and the rest of the puppets.
Anyway, hope all’s well in your world Tom. Your dog is gorgeous and they don’t lie. Speaking of which, in five minutes time I’m taking my Harry for a walk! Take care. 😍
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Good idea! I unplug most of the day, most days, but I admit to trying to “stay up” as much as possible, too. Difficult to do, and even more difficult not to be swayed by the preponderance of misinformation! Still, I persist. Not too deeply, but (hopefully) just enough. Love to Harry!
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