Politics: It’s Official: We’re Dumb
Just Don’t Tell My Laptop This – It May Never Let Me Hear the Last of It
“The most overlooked advantage of owning a computer is that if they foul up, there’s no law against whacking them around a bit.”
“Want to make your computer go really fast? Throw it out a window.”
– Eric Porterfield, techie (and an apparently often-perturbed one)
This was the week I began talking to my laptop.
Not counting, of course, the too-numerous occasions I’ve ever cussed at it, barked orders at it, and threatened to toss it out with the garbage and replace it with a newer, improved model.
(Anyone who observed me for 24 hours would discover that I have developed a less-than-proud habit of talking to inanimate objects, most often the electronic kind: the TV when it doesn’t change channels fast enough to my liking, the microwave when it overcooks my baked potato to the tenderness of shoe leather, the computer when it does – well – most anything not to my satisfaction, which is often. But I suspect I’m not the only one; a lot of you likely possess this habit, too.)
But this really was the week I began talking (civilly) to my computer, for I installed a software program that now allows me to dictate to it, rather than only fuss, criticize, berate, thunder, and spew expletives at it.
It wasn’t a Dr. Phil show that told me I oughta start conversing with my machine, or a how-to-love-your-laptop self-help paperback I read. I got this software for the prime purpose of enabling me to dictate my columns and other submissions I occasionally write for the paper, thus saving me the time of having to type them and availing me time to do other things.
Half of that equation is valid: This will actually save me time. The other half – availing me time to do other things – should make me nearly fall off my chair laughing, for time is a commodity of which we seemingly have even less and less, particularly in this day and age when we’re surrounded by all these nifty gadgets, machines, and whirly-gigs meant to save us time and avail us more time to do all those things we wanted to do that we thought we’d have more time to do once we acquired those damn time-saving contraptions.
After a brief initial training exercise just after the installation (me training the computer, that is, NOT the other way around), one where I trained the machine to recognize my voice, its inflections and enunciations (my normal reading voice, NOT the ranting, cursing voice it’s become so accustomed to), I was able to begin dictating words and sentences into a headset microphone and watch as the words – practically to perfection – were typed out on the white screen in front of me. Look ma, no hands!
What convenience! What utility! I should have bought this thing and gone vocal years ago.
This is, after all, the future of computing: Hands-free computing, where we dictate emails, compose documents and spreadsheets, even open web browsers and navigate websites, all with little or no dependence on a keyboard or mouse.
The only drawback to installing this, that I can figure so far, is that it devours an enormous chunk – 2 gigs – of my system’s capacity. Such is the price of improvement.
And so it comes with slight unease that I sit down this week to dictate the following news to my smart, if sometimes difficult and recalcitrant, computer:
Miami is populated by the dumb, dumber and dumbest.
This I already knew. You knew it. We’ve all known it. But it’s taken Travel + Leisure magazine, in its year-end survey of America’s Favorite Cities, to wave this determination under our noses like a chagrined pet owner chastising her sheepish dog for doing his business on the living room carpet, grasping him firmly by his neck and reproachfully waving the paper towel-ful of doggie doo-doo under his snout.
The shit smells bad, Greater Miami, and you own it. We all own it.
And now the whole world knows we own it.
“MIAMI IS RUDE AND CAN’T DRIVE, SAYS YET ANOTHER TRAVEL AND LEISURE SURVEY,” proclaimed none other than the widely-read The Huffington Post.
“While bad weather may explain crabbiness in some cities,” the travel mag observes in awarding us #2 Rudest American City (#1 is the Big Apple), “Miami can’t use that excuse.” (“Hilariously, Miamians themselves ranked the city the most rude of all, meaning we’re not even bothering to pretend anymore,” commented HuffPo.)
Of the rudeness, the mag says visitors are “willing to shrug it off, though, as long as they are whooping it up in one of the city’s many loud settings, such as its bar scene or its raucous New Year’s Eve.”
Visitors, take note: Our Memorial Day weekends are now also as “loud” and “raucous” as N.Y.E. – hell, the stray police bullets alone will give all of you a time – plus hospital bills for your ICU stay – you won’t forget.
Now, I was planning to write about this over a year ago, when Travel + Leisure ranked us #4 Rudest City. But, as happens, other topics, some more timely, crowded it out; it got pigeonholed away in a desk drawer.
Until now. When I learned we went from #4 to #2, I very well couldn’t ignore that. AND, add to that the ignominy of our next-to-last distinction in the “Intelligent” category – well!
Not only do visitors think we’re a lowest-common-denominator, scummy breed of dumbshits (34th intelligent of 35 cities ranked), we rate ourselves #32.
Wow! – we’re smart enough to recognize just how dumb we are.
We’re also smart enough to know how awful our drivers are. Visitors know, too, likely from first-hand experience in having shared our streets with us. They – and we – rate Miami drivers the worst (#35) of the pack.
We also suck at friendliness. Visitors rank us #34, but we rate ourselves #35 – the unfriendliest of Americans.
Same with tech savviness. Visitors grade us #34, but we go further and grade ourselves as the least tech-savvy.
We flunk at culture, too. In the categories of classical music, historical sites/monuments, museums/galleries, and theater/performance art, both they and we rank Miami in the 30′s.
“Proud of our city?” Nope. “Cleanliness?” Sucks. “Affordability?” Nada. “Peace and quiet?” Not! “Public transportation and pedestrian-friendliness?” Crap. “Safety?” No way. “Family vacation” spot? Ugh!
Our burgers, pizza, and micro-brew beer? Fucky, sucky, yucky.
“Okay, Charles, what ARE we any good at?” you ask.
Well, our folk may be rude and stupid, but they look attractive (#3) and stylish (#3) while being rude and stupid.
Our weather comes in at #8. Visiting during winter (#7) is a no-brainer. Coming to town for a “wild weekend” (#4) is a deal-maker. Our bar scene (#4) and cocktail hour (#9) are enticing. So, too, our luxury stores (#7).
I’ll let HuffPo sum up:
“So, in other words, we’re vapid, devoid of culture, running people off the road, unable to work electronics, anti-brewski, bad at basic food staples, sucking at green space, and fair weather fans, and there’s next to nothing nice about us. But we look good in this dress, right? OF COURSE WE DO: it’s all that matters.”
Having just dictated those stats to my laptop, I only wonder now if my laptop will come to life in a way not described in the dictation software instructions and start ridiculing me as a “stupid Miamian.”
If it does, in exchange for it kindly not lumping me with other Miamians, I’ll promise not to cuss at it anymore.
Well, maybe for a day.
TALK ABOUT DUMB: THE LATEST FROM OUR JR. SENATOR
That would be Marco Rubio, who opened his piehole and responded thus to Obama’s SotU the other night:
“The president is on the verge of committing economic malpractice. How does raising taxes create jobs? How does raising my boss’s taxes help me keep my job? Why is he advocating policies that will punish people that are investing in American businesses that are creating middle class jobs?”
Where to begin? Okay, Marco. Listen up, unversed tyke: Taxes do create jobs, in fact they create many jobs. Raising taxes (which most all of the economic experts say we should be doing now) not only (they say) will pump in much-needed revenue to spur job growth but would also help shrink the nation’s deficit and put the nation on more sound financial footing.
“Advocating policies that will punish people”? What gall has he. Seems Rubio has conveniently forgotten that it was his party that balked at a bipartisan extension of the payroll tax cut last month – and which he, too, voted against. The cut was proposed by the president as part of his jobs creation plan. It was a popular tax cut, worth $1,000 annually to that middle class family that Rubio purports to care about, one earning $50,000 a year.
Balking to the very end, the House Republicans came off looking like they were opposed to tax reduction for the middle class while appearing positively gaga over tax breaks for the wealthy.
Please, little boy Marco, go seeketh thee an education in economics before mouthing off platitudes about matters on which you are obviously inadequately informed.
NIXON LEARNED FROM THIS AFTER HIS DEBATE WITH JFK
Republicans of late don’t just sound bad, policy-wise; on TV, they even look bad.
Watching House Speaker John Boehner sitting stoically-as-a-sourpuss behind Obama throughout the president’s State of the Union Tuesday night – his extremely fake-tanned mug barely betraying a smile – was like seeing a cadaver excessively touched up with too much rouge from the mortician’s makeup kit.
By contrast, Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels, delivering the Republican response with too much lighting on him, looked as pale as a ghost, or as if he was auditioning for a role as a vampire in a way-off-in-the-future Twilight series sequel (Breaking Wind: Edward & Bella, the Middle-Aged Years).
Hey, Mitch: Regretting that you didn’t get into the presidential race? You’d likely be on top now, surpassing even Mitt.
