Asking the Right Questions

I don't feel like writing, but I feel unrequited.  Therefore I must write.  About what to write?  As I watch Vladimir Putin's attack on Ukraine, it does not make sense.  There are so many questions to be answered, and the American media is doing a poor job of asking.  News reporting is an anachronism.  Like so many professions, vocations, occupations, and jobs, America was led astray by something as simple as an iPhone.  Social media "apps," little graphic anodynes that erode your thinking and your awareness.  They are addictive, and America is on the hook.  Sobriety is a bitch, and we must ditch the smart phones.  Make a choice.  As I shopped for groceries today, there were people who were aware, and there were those being controlled by their phones.  What is the analogy?  An invisible puppet master pulling your strings but from your own palm and seemingly at your discretion.  Like the Covid pandemic the affects of the iPhone are deep, far-reaching, and destructive.  There is a sinister quality to their power, and it is called addiction.  Covid has had us on the hook for two years.  We cancelled school.  We shuttered businesses.  We become more reliant upon Amazon and its convenience.  It is a coincidence a handful of people expanded their wealth during Covid, or is it?  Once upon a time in America there were all kinds of professions, vocations, occupations, and jobs.  Then we recognized the human equation in life and nurtured it.  Now we nurture the iPhone, and it has left humanity in the lurch.  North Carolina is a big fat whore, and we are all about the money.  Bill Bowman, the publisher of "Up and Coming" went to bat for state senator Kurt Deviere.  He is working "across the aisle" from our Governor.  They, through mostly Republican inroads, found and additional four hundred million dollars for Cumberland County in the budget.  It's all about the money, but money does not solve problems.  It creates them.  Human thinking solves problems, when America was able to recognize humanity is the core of our existence.  It is not money.  We have four hundred million dollars sprinkled on the cake, but the deep-seated problems of Cumberland Country remain.  Homelessness.  Pollution.  Political corruption.  Crime.  These are real issues, because they are human.  They are not an entertaining iPhone app.  They are not a computer game.  America has lost the ability to discern the difference between the two.  This was the mission statement of Japanese programmers.  Deep fakes.  The ability to mislead, misinform, and hijack American freedom.  Big Brother.  What are the questions that need to be asked about the War in Ukraine?  First and foremost, "What is Putin doing?"  Bombing a nation out of the blue?  "Whence are the attacks coming?  Are they air-fired missiles?  Are the coming from the ground?  Who is determining at what they are aimed?  Is there a pattern?"  At first I thought he was trying to overthrow the Ukrainian government.  He wanted to oust their own leadership and take control.  Then the attacks became haphazard.  "Who is he bombing?"  Civilians?  Hospitals?  Carnage.  Fascism.  Hitler.  The Nazis.  "Is he doing this for fun?"  Why would anyone, especially if they wanted control of nation, destroy their infrastructure?  He doesn't want Ukraine.  He does not care about Ukraine.  He despises Ukraine.  What Vladimir Putin wants is their spoils.  He wants the geographic region of Ukraine and what is produces.  He is a barbarian.  He wants their products, their natural resources, and their money.  He wants their money.  Putin wants and needs their money, and he will kill  to get it.  He is similar to Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani.  The Russian Mob has substantial influence on these men.  When someone threatens to cut off your fingers or worse, you will do amazing things.  "Who is behind it?  Who put the nerve agent in the Covid virus?  How and why were Russia-owned American aircraft granted the freedom by the FAA to fly wherever they please?"  We don't know who yet, but the media needs to begin asking the right questions.