The Opinionated Bastard

I'm back! I'll be posting later in the week my take on the last few months of Brookings reports, and my take on the DOD report. In the meantime, about me and where I've been: I've been job hunting since about February of this year. Since what I do is high-end internet development, you might think that would be a breeze, but I had some handicaps. * I couldn't use the internet to advertise that I was available because I didn't want my employer to know I was looking. * I'm a pretty high-end guy. I'm the person you hire not to “put your business on the web”, but to transform your business in such a way that you completely crush your competitors by streamlining your entire business model. So I'd reached the point in my career where the sort of job I was looking for wasn't the sort of job that is advertised; they're the kind of jobs that you can only find via an executive recruiter, and I didn't know any. Basically, I'm in the 6-figure tier now. I had just realized I needed to change my whole approach and start working with executive recruiters, when I happened upon [PACE Anti-Piracy](http://www.paceap.com). They're sort of the locksmiths of the computer industry. So I'm now the Director of Web Services for them. I started there August 1st, but if you know how it goes when you start a new job, you'll know I haven't really had time until now to poke my head above water. So blogging has been a ways down on the list lately, especially because they had deployed a new version of the website the day before I got there... It's now getting to the point at work where all the fires are put out, so I can start planning the next stages of development. So that means I can start blogging again instead of coming home exhausted. Currently, I'm living temporarily in Cupertino for 90 days while I convince my new bosses that yes, I am awesome, and yes I can accomplish things without them watching me. Then I can go back to Flagstaff. It's a little tough being without my wife, and living in what I call Consumerland. Luckily, another ex-Marketocracy employee had recently started at Apple, so I'm living with him for the duration. So that helps prevent me from being too lonely. Anyways, that's the news, and that's why I haven't been blogging much.

My editor at [The Noise](http://www.thenoise.us) seems to be unable to receive email consistently, so this month's rant didn't make it in. Sigh. Well, here it is for you internet readers at any rate. ###Jumping Over Brooms Yet another group of people is attempting to screw up marriage. Now that there are idiots on both sides, I can vent with impunity, and you’ll know I’m an equal opportunity bastard. This makes me very happy. We’ve forgotten what marriage really means. Let’s go back, back to the good old days when everyone lived in caves. When Zoog got caught sneaking into Moog’s cave, the members of the local tribe would get together and make a broom. At the nightly bonfire, Zoog and Moog would jump over the broom. This meant that Zoog no longer had to sneak into Moog’s cave because now everyone knew that Zoog and Moog were a couple. Moog and Zoog got to keep the broom. (Really, I’m not making this up, this is how Irish people used to get hitched.) Things really haven’t changed very much. Sure, now we give vacuum cleaners and fondue sets instead of brooms, but same-old same-old really. Yet in the big picture this whole jumping-over-brooms thing is completely messed up. That’s because Moog and Zoog ruined it for everyone when they invited tribal chief Kahuna, to watch them jump over the broom. Kahuna saw how much fun everyone was having and immediately thought “There’s got to be a way I can make some more seashells on this”. You can always count on the government to mess up a good thing. Now after you jump over a broom, you have to register the fact that you jumped over a broom with the government, and _this costs you money_. If you want to throw the broom on a bonfire, you have to register _that_ with the government, and this _costs you even more money_ and you have to talk to _lawyers_. Because you’ve jumped over a broom, the government _charges you more in taxes_, and you can’t complain because if your spouse hears you, they’ll think you don’t believe they’re worth the extra money every year. The government’s not the only group to screw up broom jumping. People only do as much work as they have to, and so while they could have said “the person who we’ll stick with your debts when you die, so they might as well be on your health insurance”, they called that “your spouse”. So this simple act of jumping over a broom now has all sorts of extra legal baggage attached to it. No one even knows how much baggage is attached to it, because like I said, people are sloppy, so they used “married” in a lot of situations where it might not be appropriate. No one, not even the Supreme Court. Meanwhile, gay people, who have been jumping over brooms for years have been feeling left out. They want in. I’m sorry, but anyone who says “I’d like to pay more in taxes, please” must be a complete idiot. I’ve thought that about the Democratic presidential candidates for years; now I’ll have to lump gay people into that category as well. Never give the government more money then you have to. I know, I know. You think somehow, if you have the government register all this broom jumping, that instead of having to fill out 20 different forms, you’ll only have to file 1 with the government. I don’t know where you got this delusion that the government is there to make your life easier, but its just wrong. If you all had just asked me, I would have told you. It doesn’t help. Instead of filling out 20 different forms that say “I’d like this person to make this sort of decision for me” you have to fill out 20 different forms that say “I’m married to this person, so they can make this decision for me”. At the end of the day, its the same thing. You’d actually be better off going to a lawyer and having him craft a piece of paper that says “Moog good. Me like Moog. Signed, Zoog” than you are getting the government involved. Because if you get the government involved, somehow its going to end up costing you a lot more money. The mistake gay people are making is thinking that broom jumping and marriage are the same thing. They’re not. Being married is the government tax on broom jumping. The government pretends to give “married” people privileges, but if you talk to any lawyer, you’ll find out that’s a lie. So gay marriage would be a disaster for gays, and it would be a disaster for the rest of us as well, because we have all these sloppy definitions in our society where we used “married” and we should have used something else. Bottom line, more taxes on gays, more lawyers, more paperwork for everyone. So I’m against it, because while I could care less about _other peoples_ sex lives, anything that means I have to do more paperwork is bad. Plus somehow whenever someone says that other people are going to have to pay more taxes, it really means that _I_ have to pay more taxes. Perhaps gay people feel that if gay broom jumping was officially recognized by the government that they’d get more love and respect from the rest of us. Guys, this is a capitalist society. If you want more love and respect from the rest of us, its very simple. Give us money. Otherwise, we’ll treat you like everyone else. As you’ve noticed, that’s not so great, but if you think the government would be any better, go wait in line at the Motor Vehicle Department. Which brings us to the next group of idiots. The Proposition 107 people. These people are so worried that the government might recognize gay broom jumping that they want to amend the state constitution. A moment’s reflection on the capability of lawyers to argue should have convinced them this was a bad idea; I suspect that if we called it the “Protect Broom Jumping Amendment” everyone would realize exactly how stupid this is. Would me and my wife need a note from our doctor saying that her “fun bits” were different than my “fun bits” before we could register our broom jumping with the state? Bottom line: More paperwork, more lawyers, and we don’t even get to stick gay people with a higher tax bill. These people have to be _even stupider_ than the gay marriage people. So both of you: Leave broom jumping alone, or I’ll come over there and smack you silly.