Sensory Overload?

This past week, I sat and watched about 20 minutes of video-clips over the Democratic Socialist Convention held recently.  In the midst of this....some guy got around to letting folks know that he was 'prone to sensory overload'. 

I sat and stopped the clip and thought about what he was attempting to say, or maybe what he meant to say.  It's bothered me a good bit over the week, and I come back to that topic for this essay.

There a fair number of folks who think they are exceptionally bright, but when a 1962 repair manual is given to them for some broken farm implement....this super intellectual  guy falls apart. In simple terms, handling the knowledge and using common sense strategies wasn't something  brought up in college.

So are we producing intellectual PhD idiots with value?  Yes.

Go take a 1968 gumball machine and ask this sensory overload character to examine it for an hour and explain how it works.  He'd have a problem.

But here's the positive....this guy will at least admit overload.

Should this guy even be attending a convention like this?  Well, that has bothered me as well. Normally, hookers and booze matter more at political conventions. That would have taken your mind off stupid political talks.

Another Example of a Mass Shooting

Around 20 June 1994, on Fairchild Air Force Base, Washington-state....a mass shooting took place, involving Dean Mellberg (age 20). 

Dean had shown at the base clinic, armed with a MK-90 (basically a AK-47).....around 3 pm in the afternoon.  When the smoke had cleared, he'd killed five individuals, and wounded 22 others.

Dean's basic story?  This is rather interesting.  Around age 18, he'd enlisted in the Air Force and gone to basic training.  Dean had trouble with virtually everyone that he came in contact with, and at some point.....they sent Dean for a mental eval, and the doctor wrote in strong language that Dean needed to be removed from the service.  In simple words, a personality disorder existed. 

Maybe if they'd held the guy for a week or two.....they might even have reached the point where he'd be noted as paranoid schizophrenic or bi-polar.  But no....the paperwork got shuffled around, and they kept Dean in basic training.  He would actually graduate and be sent off to aircraft mechanic's school.

When he graduated from mechanic's school....he was sent to Fairchild AFB, Washington.  There....he moved into the barracks.  Now the second episode comes up....the room-mate sends a note to the commander and strongly suggests that Dean is not sane. The commander actually does send Dean over to the clinic for a mandatory eval.   Remember, this isn't the first eval.....it's really the second.

So here in clinic....two doctors exam Dean and come to this remarkable conclusion.....Dean is not just a little bit crazy.....he is dangerous-crazy.  They write the recommendation to get Dean out.  But here's the funny thing.....somehow, the hospital is convinced to send Dean for another eval (down to Texas, to the main Air Force hospital).  They host Dean there for roughly sixteen weeks (yes, an incredible four months of time), and they reach this conclusion....Dean is unfit for service and mentally unstable.  In simple terms....he's a threat to just about anyone who knows him.

Whathen it's apparent that Dean will be thrown out....his parents get involved.  So they use their Congressman to push the Air Force along with this diagnosis that they'd had for a number of years....that Dean was suffering from some minor form of autism.  So a Air Force board met, and the three folks decided that autism was good enough for them, and dumped the recommendations from Fairchild, and the Texas hospital.

But rather than part with Dean there at the Texas Air Force hospital....they make the decision to send Dean back onto duty (just not at Fairchild)....so he's ordered to Mountain Home AFB, Idaho.  But here is this twist to the story.....they've heard about Dean, and conversed with folks who know the background on the guy.  They refuse to accept him.  Yes, this is the part of the story.....they weren't going to allow him on Mountain Home.

So Dean gets shifted....to Canon AFB, NM.  Dean arrives there and lasts around five weeks.  Then....shockingly enough, the new commander asks for another mental eval (number four).

This time, the eval sticks, and Dean is removed from duty....with just a plain discharge.  What happens over the next month?  Dean travels around the west, and even gets up into Alaska.  Then he decides to come back to Fairchild....for revenge. 

Dean would die that afternoon....shot by a Senior Airman on duty. 

A nutcase from day one?  Just based on the comments at basic training....he wasn't sane enough to be in the general public.  As far as I can tell....no one has gone back to his years in high school or talked with people who knew him in that period.  That might reveal more of the story.

What the Air Force did after this?  They changed forms for psychological review, and you had to check certain boxes.....which would indicate treatment only, or dismissal only.  That was it. 

Dean being unbalanced?  I would go and suggest after reading two differing accounts of the story....that Dean was prone to violent encounters, and probably lived in some type of imaginary world. 

Here's the thing though.....four different groups of doctors came to the same position....Dean wasn't safe or balanced. 

When Social Media Becomes a Public Utility

I'm one of those people who think eventually (probably before the November 2020 election) that all social media 'giants' will be put into a public utility situation, with oversight by Trump-appointed audit people.

It'll be argued by the Democrats and fought, but I think most Americans agree....it has reached the point of a utility operation.

So here's the curious thing....do you know of any utility that runs freely or untaxed?  There are none.  So somewhere in the midst of this transformation, either by government directive (to pay for the oversight) or by the media companies themselves....there's going to be some fee situation. 

The odds that a Facebook account or Twitter account will cost you $4.99 per month?  You might be lucky in the beginning, and this only amounts to a yearly cost of $15.   Even government taxation might amount to $1 a month from each user.  And if the federal guys could get that.....state folks ought to be able to drag 25-cents into their revenue pot as well. 

But this brings up this curious idea....would a cost situation start to eliminate or limit users?  What's the point where you say....'enough' and quit?  $4.99 a month, $7.99 a month, or $9.99 a month? 

Would you have juvenile ratings where kids under the age of sixteen can't see or hear anything unless it's stamped approved-for-juveniles?  That's very possible. 

Regulation that would eventually kill the industry?  I could see over the next ten years....tons of regulation occurring, with fines being dumped on Facebook and Twitter....and eventually making the monthly fee upwards to $30. 

So settle back and wait for this landscape to really morph overnight.