I knew there was something amiss well over a year ago. There were simply too many stupid people showing up in comments sections and forums. They were commenting on everything and always ignorant, racist and reactionary when they did. The ratio of idiots to normal people was way out of proportion. At one point I even wondered if there was a small group somewhere prolifically covering every political forum and news comments section and being purposefully stupid and repugnant just for the fun of it.
In fact, it was all hinted at several years prior when some of my friends had their email lists hijacked and then weird messages were sent out under their name. I knew that ‘hijacking email lists’ was happening but I couldn’t imagine the reason except for spamming. I also knew that my first blog was ‘pirated’ by Russians or Eastern Europeans but I saw some ugly but only petty purpose in it since they ‘rented out’ my blog’s first (better known) name to advertisers. Basically they stole my on-site address and put up a billboard for rent.
It has gotten worse.
A friend sent me this link (it may not have transferred properly but you can find the article using Google): https://www.buzzfeed.com/charliewarzel/the-terrifying-future-of-fakenewsutm_term=.saYqL13yE&utm_campaign=Content%20Advisor%20Newsletter&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=60684688&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_BhhAULGnTvwRznvhAM9gukGiu3bSQXvE4s8WlyTTs9KCnIQ3L1cWy1QEhiC678wHuPsow_grS4j4MmdS_C6VWlHqQ&_hsmi=60684690#.tbAL46zVP . Look up Buzzfeed and Aviv Ovadyda
It seems the lies are going to ramp up. Fake news – which already rivals REAL news – will grow. The end result? We do not know what to believe. And THEN all hell can break loose. Actually, all hell has already broken loose. See Trump run. See Trump jump. See Trump play.
I write this today because I have a truth to share: my second blog has not been a hit. I get an average of about 50 readers a day. I sometimes approach 100 but I am nowhere near the almost 1100 I used to achieve. Mind you, some of those (how many?) were bots. Still, I believed I had a few hundred readers. I have no idea now.
So, the irony (for me) is that I try to write ONLY what I know to be true even if that declaration applies only to my feelings for that day. This blog may be of no real interest to anyone but what is written is my truth (yes, I use a bit of hyperbole now and then but that’s my style).
THIS guy’s truth is going nowhere. Kim Kardashian reigns supreme because she has a big butt. Does any of this make any sense?
I do not think so. Not to me, anyway.
I am starting to feel as if my continuing writing is somehow enabling a larger destructive force, an evil, diseased and doomed dystopian world of lies and deceit. I am adding volume to a huge pile of crap that is growing stinkier by the day.
One thing is for sure. Those of you on Facebook and other media should seriously consider getting off. It is probably too late. Your images, your words, your identity are all on a foreign database as I write. That cannot be good. And, according to OVADYA, that is enough information for newly developed algorithms and software to put live words and actions onto film that looks and sounds exactly like you.
Dave’s blog is NOT safe from that but it is so NOT popular, the information pirates are unlikely to use it. At least not tomorrow. Why use Dave when they can give Obama a star-speaking role in a puppy-kicking video or doing porn with Hillary. Much more likely will be more fake news that Trump will believe like the fake news Brietbart put out about Sweden last year.
I have techie friends who have hinted at and even prophesied such electronic evil over the last few years (one was so freaked out over twenty years ago, he wouldn’t say key words over a cell phone!) but they were never specific. It was more of a general paranoia. Not anymore. They were right. The slope is downhill and looks pretty dark.
Long way of saying: I may have to alter this blog, this effort at expression once again. I may kill it. I may change it. I may do something else. I do not know. Input welcome. But it is clear that the main purpose of this is simply spleen-venting and even doing that seems to enable (in some way) the dark side of the force. This requires a re-think.
Our Off the Grid Home 
Recent story in Canadian media warning that our next election will involve some bot driven funny business. Your warning is timely.
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Well, I think we have already seen some bot-driven funny business. The Conservative’s Michael Sona and the 2011 Robo calls was a good indicator. And I have sensed the BC Liberals doing the same in various ‘comments’ sections. The ‘lefties’ may be, too, but they are at least better written. Grammar counts in MY politics.
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I still follow your blog. Not that interested in Thailand. Also, don’t. Like it when people base their opinions on ” fake news”. In the fullness of time it will be determined that trump is a good man
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Glad to see you are still here, John. We may disagree but, in the fullness of time, if Trump is revealed as a good man, I will be the first to say how RIGHT you were. in the meantime, as you know, I think otherwise. BUT I have been wrong before. I am sure you have been, too. If you have to acknowledge that Trump was a crook and a charlatan after the fullness has come to pass, I will not gloat nor say, I told you so. Well, maybe once. My main concern is that we both have a chance at fullness. Trump has increased the heat on North Korea.
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Buzzfeed link not working.
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Copying the link didn’t seem to work right so use Google search and look for Buzzfeed and Aviv Ovadya
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In his first year he has made over 2100 false or misleading statements. Oddly he makes no claim to be an ironist nor does he think he speaks in hyperbole. He speaks his ‘truth’ seemingly unaware of his lack of self conscientiousness and of the effect he is having upon those who recognize that they are being played. ‘’You can fool all of the people some of time but one can not fool all of the people all of the time.”
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2100 is a bit of exageration – that’s almost six a day! It would take a genious to contrive and then diisseminate that manyfalse and misleading statements.
Maybe your staement is false and misleading (esp. if you got it from CNN or MSNBC)
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And he’s BACK!!! Outnumbered but still feisty. Glad you are back, John, I really am.
The number I heard was 1200 (exactly three-a-day).
But, to be fair, some of the ‘lies and false statements’ are a bit of hair-splitting and Trump has trouble naturally speaking intelligibly at the best of times so I would, personally, cut him a bit more slack. Let’s just say he lies significantly only ONCE a day for public consumption.
The president ONLY lies once a day to the people. Does that make you proud, John? Seriously. Even if he only lied significantly ten or twenty times, isn’t that too much? And doesn’t all this lying and ‘mistake-making’ make him out to be untrustworthy at the very least? Or incredibly stupid?
Honestly…? I am NOT trying to trap you but what possible explanation is there for so much disingenuous crap from that man’s pouty mouth? One of his first official lies: ‘My inauguration was the largest ever!’ How do you explain that? It simply wasn’t. Why say it? Why argue it later? What the hell?
Please…give me a rationale for all the false (fake) things he said. Even a few…?
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Truth is NOT subjective. It is fact. It is or it is not. Truth is measurable, definable, finite, hard, cold, exact. The problem is the reader. The viewer. The subject. So, if a rock hits a window, that is a fact. But the fact as reported by the viewer or the viewers or the camera recording it is NOT always reduced to simple, factual reporting. It is usually interpreted rather than just reported. It is edited, embellished, run through filters and re imagined. Sometimes it is even translated, for God’s sake! Truth is subjected to so many ‘filters’ before being shared that it is usually no longer 100% true after the first reporting. The old party game of telling a story and passing it round and around until it has been fully distorted proves that. Even Einstein (I think) said the viewer is a force in every event. Trump’s truth has been so vastly distorted by so many liars and apple-polishers that it is fantasy at best and, in Russia’s case, their fantasy planted.
“Could your view be just as false?”
Yep. Hard to tell from the subject’s point of view. Only the rock and window know the truth.
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A number of media organizations such as The New York Times and the Washington Post do fact checking of the POTUS. The investigation of Russian interference into the American electoral process has been called a hoax, a witch hunt, fake news but the special prosecutor’s investigations has yielded Grand Jury indictments. Are indictments fake news?
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Grand Jury indictments to US citizens were not related to Russian interference; indictments to foreign nationals were for incidents that started before Trump even declared (what are the chances they will be brought to US for trial?)
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Trump is being spun when the prosecutors say of his campaign, “unwitting involvement with Russians.”
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What is the alternative? Too not speak up? To live life in fear? But yeah, it doesn’t make much sense when the real news is said to be fake news, and the fake news is said to be real news. From its very beginning, the Murdoch Press was well known as the mouthpiece of conservative government. Foreign interference may well be just the icing on the cake.
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To not speak up? Even thinking people (leftie has become such a pejorative term) get their grammar wrong.
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I often describe myself as a pinko-lefty, bleeding heart tree-hugger with a fondness for whales and spotted owls. I then add; sane, logical and with a three digit IQ. Sometimes I even add: ‘cute as a bug’s ear’. All said with pride. Nothing pejorative in that description to me. .
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🙂
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Oh dear. I’m afraid to even try to have a look at that long link.
I too wonder about the wisdom of being “out there” on the cyber waves…and also think about changing, one way or another, my own blog, or ceasing altogether. And I have far few readers per day than you do. I guess I don’t care. I enjoy writing stuff down, for my own enjoyment and mental exercise. And if somehow my words end up in the wrong hands, well, I can only hope that the minds that are attached to those hands, actually learn something from the words they have lifted. I agree with our dear friend from Down Under, best to speak up; or forever hold one’s piece (peace?), man.
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That is the dilemma: I like writing for my own sake but, if I am honest, I wouldn’t do it if no one read it. And the comments prove at least a few do. Sadly, fifty is a bit low. So, I dunno…..
Plus I am getting more and more eclectic. My topics are all over the map. Is this OTG still? I guess. Going to Thailand is a form of OTG but not the one I imagined when I started this. I could change the title to Babbling in Gibberish but, if the numbers aren’t there, what’s the difference? The only way to ensure more readers is to mention boobs, booze and guns in the title – in that order. Horsepower is number four. Quilting is #5.
Boozed up bimbo with big boobs shot up her husband’s huge horsepower pony car because he ran over her quilts. Now, THAT would get readers. Mostly quilters, probably.
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Maybe. But change the car to a low HP little British car (ie: MGB)
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Interesting observations.
I find that some Blogs have a “prove you’re human” process before comments are posted.( select pictures of windows, cars, wheels, etc. things that AI havent figured out …..yet)
Perhaps something like that here for the comments section?
As for Facebook, Twitter, etc.
UGH.
I signed onto Facebook when it first came into existance and after about a month I realized it wasnt for me.
A total time waster.
I deleted everything and havent been back. Im sure billionaire Mark Zukerberg hasnt noticed I’m gone.
As for Twitter, etc.
Where do people find the time to post inane drivel?
Im too busy to spend time reading and writing what amounts to a daily diary.
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I don’t want my readers to have any kind of barrier to their participation. I LIKE them! So, no ‘prove-you’re-human’ for me.
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I hope to help balance your ratio of idiots to normal people. Not much of significance to add, unless you count the weather. Its snowed every day since I returned – there’s 3 feet of it on the ground! Spring skiing may well extend into the summer.
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Hmmm…guy leaves sunny Caribbean for 3 feet of Canadian snow…which camp to classify…hmmm…
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Well, you won that round. Handily!
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David, it is time for you to come home. You should do a little fishing or trail riding with us or better yet do both! You may also help me walk my dog. These actions will ground you back into tranquility helping the bubble of sanity grow to shield us from the incoming oblivion. When its over the people that can read will appreciate sound advice and even some truth.😊
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Thanks, S&S&D. I will. NOT right away. I have chores lined up the yin and yang but I’ll see if I can get Sal to do them all and I’ll go play. I wonder how that will pan out…?
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Marion Le Pen, supporter of France’s National Front, spoke recently at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in support of Trump’s American First, xenophobic vision of the USA. Are the Republicans turning towards ‘blood and soil’ politics?
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I really do not think that all conservative/GOP types are as mad as the ones currently at the helm. I think we are seeing a bifurcation of the party which is a healthy sign, really. The extremists on the right will hive off, don uniforms and march with guns in their own parades. Like the KKK.. And, maybe the extremists on the left will do something equally as ridiculous (altho I might be on the cusp of that divide) and so we may actually get more choice in our party selections.
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So what accounts for this hive of extreme nationalism that seems to want a country of, a nation of homogeneous views? Aka “I wan’na be like you.” Walk like you, think like you, believe like you, hate like.
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Many of us are not comfortable with rapid change. All of a sudden (past thirty years) we have seen the ascendancy of women in the workplace (and culture) to the extent that more workers are female now. That makes an unemployed guy unhappy and looking for scapegoats. Same response to ‘foreigners’ getting jobs and being promoted (they are better educated, more motivated) and so your ‘basic white guy’ is disappointed at the very least with his loss of ‘standing in the family and community’. Angry more likely. Send half of your ‘manly’ mfg’ing jobs overseas and you have a hostile, ignorant mob of testosteronies coupled with poverty, family disruption and – to some extent – real discrimination (affirmative action, half the politicos chosen based on genitalia and on and on). Backlash is inevitable. Result: drug abuse, KKK-types, homelessness and mass shootings. Massive depression, anger and knee-jerk, un-thinking responses. Is it all an appropriate response? Of course not, but it is a ‘primal’ one. It is lower-brain-stem-lizard stuff.
“What would be a good response?
Well, are 40+ year old guys burdened with outrageous debt more likely to go back to school to learn coding, Mandarin or even finance? Or are they more likely to vote for a ‘throw-back’ who promises to MAKE IT ALL GREAT LIKE BEFORE?
We often decry the unfairness of life and look for scapegoats. The scapegoat of choice for the last thirty years has been white men. ALL white men not just the Robber Barons sociopaths that made it seem like ALL white men. Your basic working class white man has been as much enslaved to the debt-and-elitist based system as many. Especially these past thirty years. They may not have suffered as much as many but they have fallen further in the pecking order. This ‘reaction’ is to be expected. White men have to get it together WITH everyone. NOT against everyone. Until we all learn to cooperate, it is safer to live Off The Grid. Prognosis: we are still worshiping at the feet of competition and cooperation is seen as weak. Power gathering is still the preferred path for women, too (see: Me, too). The battle has just been joined. I do not see blue skies ahead.
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Bravo!
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Well, I do read each post but only comment when I have something good to say. I “discovered” you because of your off the grid book, and continue to follow to learn from your experiences – Margy
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Thanks, ML. I guess that suggests that MORE on OTG is preferable. And there IS more. It’s just that I am somewhat prolific. I try to write everyday ….for a bit…..it’s like an itch. And I can no longer write every day about OTG. How can one keep to OTG when Trump exists in the position he does? Or, one is visiting Thailand? Or Trudeau doffs his shirt for a photo op? Maybe the answer is to start a second blog and keep this one to OTG, ravens and whales?
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