Politics

During the 2016 elections (and still today), I thought Trump would be better for the country than Hillary Clinton. You may disagree and say Hillary would have been better than Trump, and that's okay. I respect that. However, this last week has proven rough for both Trump and Clinton. Trump has had these calls for impeachment and Hillary's emails have gone farther than thought.

But why do we have to fight with political parties? President Washington said that parties would be the undoing of the nation. President Lincoln said that a house divided wouldn't stand. Don't believe them? Flip the channel to Fox News and come back to me later. 

Veterans

In the light of memorial day, we stop to remember the fallen ones. We show appreciation for the veterans in this country. However, I have noticed a big problem with this country: our veterans are being ignored.

In 1941, my grandpa went off to war at 17. He lied of his age to be a serviceman on the USS Andrew Jackson, a ship that was sent to Iwo Jima.

During the darkest 31 days of his life, he tried to escape on a smaller boat. He was stopped cold in his tracks, given a gun, and pushed out on the island. He survived the whole thing, but died as a result of alcoholism which he turned to when nobody was willing to help him. My dad never met him and I never met him. In fact, this story is one that my uncle confessed to us.

We honor the dead, but we fail to acknowledge those who survive the wars. We only see that they have been through hell and back once they die on the field and neglect those that made it out. To all the veterans of my country, I thank you so much for the time you sacrificed to fight for what you believed in. I hope we make the necessary changes to help you through PTSD, depression, etc.

North Korea

"Rocket Man," as Trump calls Kim Jong Un, has lost his mind. He has ICBM capabilities, claims the US has declared war, hell, he even has teenage sex slaves! They are a nuclear threat and going to cause a war. But what happened to cause all this insanity? We have to get to the roots of the plant to find all that out. Even then, it's too confusing, so I will try to explain.

During the Korean War, the US ended up dropping "approximately 635,000 tons of explosives on North Korea (that's more in three years than during the entire Pacific theater of World War II), including 32,000 tons of napalm, according to historian Charles Armstrong."

Kim Il-sung ended up being remembered as a god and his family believed to be the only ones that could save them from the evil of the US. Children there are raised with that ideology, so Kim Jong-il probably raised Jong-un with the mentality he was raised in.

So bias and grudges are what will cause a nuclear war. Good to know.

As always, I'm David and these are the First World Problems.

(Sorry for the rushed article. I had more, but my phone has started crashing at least once everyday. This is the best I could come up with, seeing how as I write this, I am still in school with short time.)

Source: http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/26/asia/north-korea-united-states-relationship/index.html

Terrorism

Today is the 16th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. My heart goes out to the children who cried when they learned that daddy wasn't coming home, the men and women who lost their significant others as the 4 planes crashed, and those who lost friends forever on that day. It truly was one of the worst (if not THE worst) attack on US soil. I may not have any blood connection to those families, but I always cry whenever my history class (or US Gov. since I became a senior) shows the videos.

At 8:46 and 9:03 AM Eastern Time, the planes crashed into the buildings. Mass confusion and lots of questions ran across the minds of bystanders. Cries of, "What just happened?" and "Was this an accident?" were swiftly put to rest as the second Boeing crashed into the second tower. The 3rd plane crashed into the Pentagon, raising any eyebrows that weren't already risen.

At 9:59 AM, the South Tower collapsed, followed by the collapse of the North Tower at 10:28 AM. The 7 World Trade Center followed at 5:21 PM due to fires ignited when the North Tower collapsed. Many conspiracy theories surround the fall of 7WTC, I personally think those conspiracy theories were caused by clickbait.

As the 4th plane in Shanksville Pennsylvania speedily came towards the next destination, presumably the White House, passengers regained control of the plane and crashed it into the ground. They will forever rest as heroes.

But why would the terrorists do such a terrible thing? The short answer: they hate us. The longer answer, found in the Wikipedia article Motives for the September 11 attacks, is the following:
In Osama Bin Laden's November 2002 'Letter to America', he explicitly stated that al-Qaeda's motives for their attacks include: Western support for attacking Muslims in Somalia, supporting Russian atrocities against Muslims in Chechnya, supporting the Indian oppression against Muslims in Kashmir, the Jewish aggression against Muslims in Lebanon, the presence of US troops in Saudi Arabia, US support of Israel, and sanctions against Iraq."

This is not where all this ended. We have ISIS (the terrorist organization, not the mobile wallet app that renamed to Softcard upon discovering the organization) and several Homebrew terrorist organizations. Please let terrorism end. Just because I sin differently from you doesn't mean we should kill each other.

This was a hard topic to cover. I hope I have raised awareness to the few who don't think it is a threat. If not, may this article honor the names of those who died.

As usual, I'm David and these are the First World Problems

Clipart found at http://clipart-library.com/data_images/281077.jpg

Smoking and Vaping

This topic really hits home for me. I have an uncle who has terminal lung cancer, and knowing this, has decided to give up and smoke for the rest of his life. As a result, his death is going to be sooner (and more painful) than it should have been.

Smoking, the act of lighting tobacco and nicotine wrapped in paper and putting it in your mouth, is highly carcinogenic and addicting. We've known this since the 1950s when Richard Doll researched this. He studied lung cancer patients from 20 hospitals in London, having originally thought tarmac and car exhaust were to blame. All this was thrown out the window when he realized that the patients were linked in the fact that they all smoked cigarettes. He said, "The risk of developing the disease increases in proportion to the amount smoked. It may be 50 as great among those who smoke 25 or more cigarettes a day as among non-smokers." (1)

As I did the research for this article, I found that among 4,000 chemicals, at least 43 of which are carcinogenic. Some of these dangerous compounds include nicotine (duh), tar, carbon monoxide (knew that too), hydrogen cyanide, ARSENIC, the list goes on and on. (2)

Going back to my uncle, he has probably smoked enough cigarettes to equal a burning building from the golden age of asbestos (not scientifically proven, but very likely). This could lead you into thinking twice about that cigarette and switching to vaping. Don't.

As bad as it sounds to have tar in your lungs when you smoke, you could be breathing in antifreeze when you vape. (3) Yes, the ingredient propylene glycol (also knownknown as PG) can also be found in antifreeze (check the label) and fog machine juice, the latter one I know thanks to stage crew and how much we used it in Viewmont High Schools production of Brigadoon.

But what exactly is propylene glycol? "Propylene glycol (often referred to as PG) is the third 'product' in a chemical process beginning with propene, a byproduct of fossil fuel (oil refining and natural gas processing) and also found in nature as a byproduct of fermentation." (4)

So my final message about all this, don't smoke. We all know the problems it brings, yet most people don't think it will happen to them. Please don't cause your family the same pain my uncle has. Don't smoke, don't vape.

As always, I'm David and these are the First World Problems

Sources: Wikipedia - Richard Doll (1)

quitsmokingsupport.com (2)

ATSDR (3)

Dr. Axe (4)

Hello, First World.

Hello. For starters, this is not a blog about my phone battery, I love my country, and my real name is not Jason Blooey. It's David. For those of you who don't know my last name, I'll reveal it when I'm 18 (yeah, I'm a filthy millennial, depending on your interpretation of the range). As for those who know my last name, keep it to yourself for now. I live in Centerville Utah in the United States of America. My grandfather was an accidental Marine on Iwo Jima on the USS Andrew Jackson and is my personal hero. May he rest in peace. My father is the leads singer and co-founder of the Runes Project. You might hear him on the Mer and Mikki Show in Liverpool.

Now that you know a little about myself, lemme tell you about what this blog will be about.

You have undoubtedly heard the phrase first world problems, explaining how horrible life is to someone who knows nothing of third world countries. For example, the screen on my Google Pixel won't rotate, my dad's iPhone 7 doesn't have a headphone jack, etc. I will not write articles about this and that my life is terrible. No, I will be talking about the problems of this first world nation. For example, Antifa, the Clintons, the National Debt, etc.

I am aware that I will get hate from the public. I don't like it, but there is not too much I can do. If you don't like what I say, get off my blog. (Can't stress that enough.)

So I hope you guys enjoy my stupid rants about the country and how we can fix it.

***"No animals were harmed in the making of this blog. Several thousands of electrons, however, we're greatly inconvenienced."***