Comfortably Numb: Technological Enslavement and America's Future

There was a movie that came out back in 1987. It was called “The Running Man” starring the current governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger. Interestingly, it took place in the year 2017, not exactly far off from our time. The premise was a game show that criminals would fight for their life through, ultimately with the chance of winning their freedom and a substantial cash award. It was a live show, where the numb and entranced masses cheered for blood, even taking bets on who would get killed first.

I mention this movie because I find it interesting and relative to our time. We have not come quite to that point in entertainment, but we are getting closer. Society in 2017 in the movie basically was reminiscent of a police state, where the government pacified the masses of people with these kinds of shows that were both outrageous and violent. The economy of the world has collapsed and the government is the ultimate authority on cultural activity, and all the while no one seems to care.

My generation and the generations behind me are pacified now. Everyone is worried about getting the newest BlackBerry or iPhone and new “apps” and no one really is paying that much attention to what is going on around them. Life is a party for many of them, and the majority does not have any interest whatsoever in current events. They drink, go to clubs, listen to music, fuss around on their cell phone, play video games, watch TV (not the news though), and they meander around worrying about the most trivial of things. Many of them are plugged into their MP3 players whenever they are going to and coming from classes or work, making any kind of human contact impossible. Human avoidance is one of the symptoms of what has evolved over the past ten years and if you have not noticed this behavior I suggest you take another look around.

Meanwhile, this country’s economy is going to hell. The Chinese hold an exorbitant amount of American debt. Iran is in the process of getting a nuclear weapon. A planned overhaul to the healthcare system for the worst was narrowly dodged but now being brought back to the forefront. Cap and trade is still being talked about. The Federal government is looking to pass another “jobs” bill to compliment the one that busted last year. Unemployment is still in double digits.

And yet, we are concerned about our cell phones, Tiger Woods, Kanye West, Taylor Swift, Jersey Shore, and any other slew of popular culture/technological mind entrancements that has enslaved this country. I am of the firm belief that while technology has its benefits, it will eventually be one of the causes of our downfall.

How many hours do you spend a day in front of a screen? It could be any screen: computer, cell phone, television, PDA, take your pick. One study from Ball State University concluded that on average Americans spend eight hours a day in front of a screen of some kind. Eight hours. That is one third of a day. And this is not considering people under the age of 18 mind you.

Pacification.

We as a country are fascinated with the trivial and are losing sight of the important things. For example, 54% of the eligible voting population voted in 2008. This was a presidential year, and half of America could really give a damn. But I bet they could tell you the latest happenings in popular culture. Do not even get me started on the off-year elections.

While everyone is so preoccupied with their newest and popular gadgets, music, and entertainment (no matter how bad and trashy the entertainment is becoming), things continue to get worse in this country and no one seems to care. They may acknowledge that something is wrong, but you will not see much action from these people. They are too busy to be bothered. And when apathy continues to the rule the day is when the problems become unsolvable.

“The Running Man” shows a population of people so preoccupied with glorified, outrageous entertainment that they cease to care the world they live in has fallen apart. And that is where we may be heading if we are not careful.

2017 may not be so far off after all.

The Mang
Conservative Capo of Youngstown

Here's to the Single People: Valentine's Edition

It is Valentine’s Day again. There is twenty some inches of snow on the ground, it is cold and unbearable outside, but nonetheless, that has not stopped Valentine’s Day from coming back again. A tremendous day for lovers, an awkward day for those who have been going out for a three weeks and are not sure how to celebrate, and a single person’s worst nightmare.

Valentine’s Day is what it is—a day for lovers. At least, that is what the card, flower, candy, and PajamaGram companies work hard to make you believe. After all of the commercials advertising the importance of Valentine’s Day (the flowers, the chocolates, the jewelry, the cards, etc.), it is completely understandable how people can feel extremely depressed on Valentine’s Day.

So in honor of all the single people out there who have to put up with this day (even when they might try to avoid it at all costs), I dedicate the following songs.





















Happy Valentines Day,

The Mang
Conservative Capo of Youngstown

Good Music is Timeless. Today's Music and Yesterday's

Last night The Who performed at the Super Bowl. I was actually pretty ecstatic to see them live, because they typically have forgone doing live shows (barring any kind of future tour they may do if that ever happens). And at the age they are at, and minus Keith Moon and John Entwistle, that is completely understandable. The Who may not be what they used to be, but certainly they still rock hard to songs that are actually enjoyable.

There are of course the critics. They can be broken down into two distinct groups. You have the people that are the original fans who are complaining because the band does not sound as good as it used to and that the lineup has changed. I know a few of these people and they present a legitimate argument. No, the band is not the same, and no they do not sound as good. Fine—with age, that is to be expected. If you can do 1/10th of what any of those guys do with a guitar or a drum at 60+, I would be seriously surprised.

Then you have the younger generation, probably anyone a part of Generation Y and forward. I do not include Generation X because that generation at least knows who these bands are. These people do not care for this kind of music, nor do they really appreciate or know what decent music is because mainstream music producers have loaded the airwaves with crap. They have been trained to listen to this crap. This is the generation that has grown up with rap music, grunge, boy bands, spoiled and overexposed teen queens (Simpson and Spears), and maybe caught the tail end of music from the 80s, if they were lucky enough.

If you have not already noticed the disdain I have for music of the current generation, then please take note of it now. I do not claim it as my own. I was fortunate enough to have been exposed to real music, and breaking out the vinyl is looking better and better as the years go on.

The problem you have is the music of today is not great. Rap music is not great, but rock today leaves a lot to be desired. As a genre, rap is a sorry excuse for music. It is neither timeless (a true sign of good music) or original. I am a fan of G-Funk and Gangster Rap to an extent, but since the mid-90s, rap music has been overrated. When was the last time you popped in a Nelly CD or a Tupac CD? How about Dr. Dre? I bet it has been a long time. For the most part, this music is not timeless.

Rock music today seems to all sound the same. I will tip my hat to the grunge scene, but overall it is a letdown. The genre lacks the major bands and groups. We do not have the John Mellencamps, the Van Halens, or the CCRs today. We have a lot of bands, but most of them are nothing to write home about. The number of rock songs in the top 50 has declined substantially between the 70s and today if that is any indication of things. A few of those top hits recently were covers of versions of songs done years ago. Some of these hits were not even original and likely made the top 50 because they have been done before.

In place of rock, we get a lot of single act pop groups and rap that seem to be glorified by the mainstream for whatever reason that may be. None of the music is timeless. When was the last time you popped in a CD from the early or mid 90s? If you actually have done so, I am willing to bet it was grunge related. I doubt you popped in a CD by Mariah Carey, Seal, Ace of Base, or any other slew of popular music that fell by the wayside and became cliché.

Good music is timeless. That is why Sinatra is still popular. That is why the Beatles are still popular. And yes, that is why The Who is still extremely popular today, even in their old age and less than stellar physical abilities. These kinds of groups had tremendous abilities and musicianship that has long been gone from the modern music of today. The songs these artists composed and performed are extremely memorable and definitely repeatable, and there were volumes upon volumes of good music over the period from 1950 to the early 1990s. There was a sense of originality and uniqueness that you do not find today.

And that is why I would pay decent money to see The Who as compared to a band like Nickelback any day of the week.

The Mang
Conservative Capo of Youngstown

The Obama Posters: Stylistically Communist With Comparisons

***NOTE***. Before jumping to any conclusions about our thought process here over at Mang Now!, we encourage you to first look at the image comparisons preceding this introduction to better understand our point of view and where we are deriving these opinions to follow. We do not, nor have we ever, believed the Obama Administration is communist, but we find it very intriguing that stylistically these posters are extremely similar.

I realize this article is coming late—almost an entire year late. But having been combing through political articles lately, I again came across this item that I wanted to discuss back in 2008 but have never got around to writing about until now.

The Obama Poster is something that is very familiar. We have seen this poster before at many places. Stores hung them up, restaurants put them in their windows, and people who were generally fans of Obama when he was running for office had them plastered everywhere. It was hard to not see at least one of these posters while walking down the street. At Ohio State, they were everywhere.

It is a peculiar poster and one that interested me greatly: the angle of the face, where the eyes were pointing, the use of the colors, and the overall feel of how it jumped out at me. I never liked this poster, and in fact it creeped me out. But it did intrigue me. I had seen it before, and though I had already determined long ago what the poster was similar too, I am only now writing about this because it popped back into my mind.

The reality is I HAVE seen this poster before, or at least the style. Two individuals in history were notorious for having this style of poster: Che Guevara and Vladimir Lenin. The comparisons of these images are downright creepy, because the similarities are unbelievably close. It was why the Obama poster made a shiver run up my spine, because the Obama Campaign has employed posters that were inherently communist in style.

You might be thinking a poster itself cannot be inherently communist unless it is in fact a communist poster. But if you look at historical political posters in America, you would find very few that are similar in style to the Obama poster. In contrast, if you were to look at posters from Soviet Russia and from communist/socialist states in South America, you would find posters very reminiscent of the style of Obama’s poster.

What does this mean? Well, that is something I will let you judge for yourself. If you look at the colors, the style, where the eyes are pointing, the expression, they all are extremely similar. Granted, not all communist posters are like this and some are completely different, particularly in different countries.

However, it is either coincidence that these posters happen to be alike or someone was doing their homework and came to a determination they wanted to make the posters of this style.

I do not know, but all I can present here is a comparison for you to evaluate.

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The Mang
Conservative Capo of Youngstown

Technology and Dating: Better or Worse Off Than We Were?

It has been a little while since last writing, but it has been a busy few weeks. Actually, it has been a very busy couple of weeks. There is a lot to talk about with the economy and the government, but though these are important issues (and certainly they need monitored closely and I encourage you to do so), I wanted to write about something else tonight.

Things are not simple today. That is not the same as saying things are difficult, because difficult times transcend decades and generations. Things are always difficult. What I am talking about is generally, things are complicated and not simple anymore. Even though we have advanced technologically and are more connected than we ever have been in history, the reality is things are more complicated than ever. Are we better for it? It is hard to say.

People are plugged in constantly. They are either on their computer, their cell phone, their iPod, their Bluetooth, BlackBerry, or any other electronic device constantly. Whilst partaking in such activities, you then have to deal with the barrage of updates for all of these devices that are supposed to “make your experience more enjoyable”, whatever that means.

Socially, there are countless mediums. Email, text messages, Facebook (and other social networking sites), cell phones, video chat (Skype), instant messaging, and so on. The ways to communicate are endless, and bearing that in mind, your ability to keep up with each of these forms of communication is necessary because while some people prefer one way of communication, others will prefer another way. And for there being so many ways to communicate, it has become completely impersonal as time has gone on.

Example? Let us examine the singles scene and dating/going out/hooking up and compare different decades so we can see the effects of communication/technology.

1980s. Your primary means of communication in the 80s was a land line phone. For those of you who already forget what those are, the phones plugged into your wall and did not drop calls. As a result, your only option for communication was by phone and phone alone. If you wanted to ask someone out, you would ask for their phone number. Yes, simple I know. You call the house, they pick up, you go out. Simple. Calls would occur between morning and 11:00PM (unless you didn’t have other people living in the house or you were perfectly fine waking everyone up). You would have to wait to call back the next day. There was great comfort in this, and it actually worked to the advantage of people because it forced them to wait and was not instantaneous. You can learn a lot about someone from their reactions to waiting.

1990s. Advent of the cell phone. Email was catching on, but the phone was the primary means of communication still, and it was not acceptable to ask people out by email or Facebook (which strangely seems to becoming more accepted today, God help all of us). The cell phone probably was the greatest invention for dating and going out, because it really did make communication easier without a.) having to tie up the phone line at the house and b.) having your family probably within earshot of your conversation. But again, this was very simple, because the phone (even in cellular form) was still the primary means of communication in the 90s. It, did however, open the door for instantaneous communication, which continues to pose problems.

2000s. This is where things have become complicated. Email is now officially a norm. Texting has become just as big as talking on the phone. You have vast social networking sites which are cool but at the same time one more communication you need to keep track of. Video chatting is becoming more widespread as computers have improved. You still have your cell phone, but with limitless capabilities. Online dating sites are becoming a regular thing for many people and serve as a primary means of communicating with people to go out with. Of course, this is without so much as knowing how much of that information on that person’s page is true or knowing the character of that person that you could at least get a glimpse at in person.

Amidst all of this in the 2000s, we are dealing with instantaneous communication. I have had some friends freak out when a girl or guy does not return their text message right away. I have also had friends completely give up because the other person did not respond to a phone call, only to find out later that the girl sent a message on Facebook. And then you have these damn games people play with texting. You know what I am talking about too.

And did I mention that unless you are completely disconnected from the world of Facebook (and few this day and age are), the person you are going out with pretty much knows who you talk to on Facebook, what you are doing, when you are on, who your friends are, etc. etc. etc. And that has been a big problem for some people I know, even when there was no basis for getting into a fight.

People also forget that it was only ten years ago when waiting until the next day to hear back was normal.

I put the question to you: Is this better than it used to be? Be honest here. You might legitimately find this to make things 100% easier, but from my own experiences and the experiences of people I know, this seems to be a point of frustration that keeps turning up. For me, it comes down to this: one or two ways of primary communication or twenty? Personally, I know which one is less aggravating. Unfortunately, the “crazy train” that is technology is not making things any simpler.

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The Mang

Conservative Capo of Youngstown

Pressing the Panic Button: Brown Turns Massachusetts Red, Democrats Scrambling

My father made the comment that this was perhaps the most important election in recent history—more important than 2008, 2006, or even 2000. January 19th, 2009 will forever be remembered as the day the American people stood up in a singular voice and said NO to extreme liberalism in government. And that stand was made in the heart of liberalism, Massachusetts. For the first time in over 30 years, a Republican in the form of Scott Brown has taken a Senate seat.

This was not a victory for Republicans, but a victory for the people of the United States. Yes, a Republican claimed victory to a seat long held by the famous and storied Ted Kennedy, but it was the independents that prevailed this day. Without the independent vote, no Republican would have won in Massachusetts. The fact so many independents and Democrats came out to vote for a Republican against a long standing tradition of Democratic politics speaks volumes for the times we are living in. They may not be thrilled with the Republican Party, but this goes to show you the alternative is not well received or even outright hated.

The people of Massachusetts, like their fellow countrymen in New Jersey and Virginia, have stared into the abyss of liberalism, and decisively decided that now is the time to step back from the edge. This was never about Scott Brown or Martha Coakley, but it was all about the control of the Senate and what a Democratic victory would entail—passage of a healthcare takeover that majority of Americans are staunchly against and passage of Cap and Tax were enough to scare the blue out of (and the red into) Massachusetts.


Pressing the Panic Button

Finger pointing and blame has ensued at the commencement of the Scott Brown era. Obama is blaming Bush, Congress in blaming Coakley, and Coakley is blaming Obama and Congress. No one is claiming on the left that this is a referendum on Democratic policies. No one on the left is willing to admit that maybe the side deals they cut with the unions and other Senators to pass healthcare reform may have driven people back to the right.

The panic button is being pressed, because now the Democratic leadership in Congress has a serious problem. This election, though they will never admit it, has scared a lot of people. A challenge is going to be keeping moderates and blue dogs from backing away from these policies for fear of losing their seats in November.

Another challenge is going to be what to do with the healthcare bill period. Here are some options.

1.) Option one is to drop it entirely, which politically is a bad move, but not the worst move.

2.) Option two is to push this thing through before Brown is seated, which would be political suicide for the Democrats, and is the reason why they will not do it.

3.) Option three is to go back to the drawing board, which would be the best move politically, but they will have to settle for a lot less than what they hoped to achieve. But at least they might keep their jobs.

4.) Option 4 is for the House to try and pass the Senate version of the healthcare bill. While this is possible, it is the opinion of this author that there is too much pride on the side of Pelosi and other notable House Democrats to ever give in, particularly without a public option.

5.) Option 5 is the “nuclear option”. If they have balls enough to try it, so be it, but it would not be a good move politically. They might as well pack up their offices now if they try it.

6.) Option 6 is reconciliation. Reconciliation as a process will cause other problems down the road, maybe not only for healthcare reform, but certainly for other pieces of legislation. This is a possible option they are looking at.

There will be much discussion over the coming days of the ramifications of this election, but no matter how you slice it, this election was a referendum, and undoubtedly is a major turning point that cannot be ignored, no matter how the circumstances are spun by the White House, Congress, or the media.

The Mang
Conservative Capo of Youngstown

For those About the Rock 2010: Time for Political Action, Not Apathy

It is almost officially one year since Obama took office ladies and gentlemen. I suppose this would be considered a milestone for some people, but overall things have turned out like they were expected to have—one big mess.

You have an energy policy that is threatening to take away jobs in the 6th District where I live. You have a healthcare policy that is beyond comprehension. Congress is making side deals and offering bribes to pass this garbage piece of legislation. Unions are getting a free pass on their health plans are going to be exempt from taxes until 2018 while everyone else pays for them. A number of Obama’s appointments have stepped down in shame, but only because the people called him on his poor choices. The stimulus did not stimulate anything but the anger it caused in people.

My Congressman Charlie Wilson leaves a lot to be desired, and if anything has failed to stand up for his constituents. A so-called blue dog Democrat, he has voted with the Democratic Party 98% of the time. So much for being a blue dog. Do not get me started on Congressmen Tim Ryan and Zach Space. Seriously, do not get me started on these two. Zach Space is going to have a difficult time next election, but unfortunately, we are stuck with Tim Ryan until the districts are redrawn or he moves on to something else. I hoped to God he would have run for Senate, but alas we were not that lucky.

The local politics of Mahoning County are as expected, and it is tolerated for the time being. We can do better, and we will do better. I am counting on a good year this year.

I do not know about you folks, but I have been on a slow burn over the last year. Clearly this country is headed down the wrong path. We needed change in 2008, and in 2010 we need reconsideration. You asked for change, and you got change. Now I ask you to reconsider what you asked for initially. We need change in this country, but we do NOT need this kind of change. We do not need to sacrifice everything we hold dear strictly in the name of progress, and if you are uncomfortable with the government trying so swiftly to take over the health system and radically change our energy policies to the detriment of hardworking Americans, I implore you to speak out.

The time for being silent is over and the time to get involved is NOW. You can support a local PAC, a candidate, a Tea Party, or you can help out your local party. If you want to see Scott Brown win in Massachusetts and become a Senator to stop this madness in Congress, by all means send him a few dollars or go online and sign up to make phone calls for him! We can stem the tide of these ideologues, and I am not afraid to call them that because that is what they are.

Today is the day to take back our country, because tomorrow may be too damn late. If these jokers in Congress are willing to have major votes on holidays and in the dead of the night to avoid having people pay attention to what they are doing, then imagine how much farther they will go to get their way.

I am begging you to do SOMETHING, whatever that would be. You are the engines of democracy, not these people down in D.C. right now. It is time to send them a message that they answer to us, not the other way around.

For those about to rock, we salute you,

The Mang
Conservative Capo of Youngstown