Despite price hike..YouTube TV remains the best service.

To take a break from the political, and because we're a few hours away from opening day, I thought I'd take the opportunity to bring up the recent price hike by YouTube TV. 

While it is somewhat disappointing, I've tried other free (and not so free) trials of other services and none of them match the quality I get from YouTube TV. Other live TV services I've tried constantly skip and freeze, no doubt due to limited internet speed on my "unlimited" data plan.

Of the other services,  Hulu with live TV does not have BBC America which is a must when new episodes of Doctor Who are aired. AT&Ts service, which i believe used to be DirecTV Now, double charged me after i canceled their service.  In order to get both USA and BBC America as well as ESPN on Sling, i would have to subscribe to both the Orange and Blue plans which is $40 and to get SEC Network and ACC Network, I would have to add the sports package at $15. I may be able to get by without the DVR upgrade, that's $5 and still wouldn't compare to YouTube TV's unlimited DVR. I would be up to $60 with no guarantee of the quality. 

The only time YouTube TV freezes or skips is if i don't stay off my tablet while it is connected to my Google Chromecast. The picture sometimes suffers during heavy internet traffic times, but for the most part is very good.

There is something to be said about the channels added being ones I've learned to live without, but i have already enjoyed episodes of "The Andy Griffith Show" on weekday afternoons as well as "The Golden Girls" on Sunday morning and afternoon. The continuing lack of access to Hallmark Channel has been a blessing in disguise as I no longer stay up late watching the "Girls". I have yet to enjoy "The Daily Show" on Comedy Central as my work and TV schedule haven't really allowed a viewing. I could record it of course but I'm not sure when I would find the time to watch. 

I've also recently been using my Google Chromecast much more than my Amazon Fire Stick. It's been a very long time since Amazon and Google fortunately settled their differences and we can now cast Amazon Prime to Chromecast. I've found that Amazon Prime works as well if not better on Google Chromecast. The episodes, for example, play all the way to the end and through the end credits before loading the next episode; something we classic Doctor Who fans appreciate. With fire stick i had to either hit the "return(?)" button before the next episode or give up on watching the end credits. I also don't often "binge" watch, instead watching one episode at a time. Amazon fire stick can also be temperamental at times of heavy internet traffic. 

I'm holding out hope that YouTube TV will come out with some tiered pricing plans before my bill officially goes up in late August, but regardless they remain my best option for streaming live TV. For the record, I am committed to streaming. I don't want to return to rain outs of satellite or have people in my house hooking up cable and internet. That would also involve changing mobile providers and I'm happy with the status quo. I may just have to bite the bullet on the price hike although Google may lose a lot of customers over this.

Jo No! What a dilemma!

I learned a very interesting thing the other day when i was curious who was the 

Libertarian presidential candidate in 2020.

I know her. It's Jo Jorgensen whose congressional campaign I was heavily involved with in 1992. It presented a bit of a dilemma but this complicates things further. I took the isidewith.com quiz as I do fairly often...

46%. The thing is I don't think my views really changed but in 1992 I was swept along by my friend David. I was also like most of Generation X raised during the "Reagan Revolution". We were raised to hate those "tax and spend" Democrats. So when I came out of the closet as a gay man and learned from my new gay friends that the Republicans did not support my right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness like they claim, I didn't switch over to the Democrats. I met my friend David and much of what happened next would make a great trashy tell-all one day.

So here's the problem. Can I NOT vote for someone who had such a big influence on my life? Can I not vote for Uncle Joe in this crucial election? 

The reason I'm able to consider my vote is because of the electoral college WHICH NEEDS TO GO!

The electoral college allows candidates to concentrate on a few "swing" states and ignore so called "safe states". Of course Republicans want to keep the electoral college, it has benefited them each time. If we went to a popular vote, Republicans would have to broaden their appeal and not just be the gun loving, gay bashing, immigrant hating, tax hating,  women's reproductive rights opposing country club. They might even return to being the big tent party we grew up loving and admiring. 

On the other hand, we anti-republucans in "safe states" like South Carolina have an option of casting a 'meaningless' protest vote.

I love Uncle Joe. There's a reason he's nicknamed that, everybody (well almost everybody) loves him. I really want him to win just like I wanted Hillary to win but fell for what I now believe was a phony vote trading website and voted for Gary Johnson....and I want the orange pussbag to lose. But if I do cast a 'protest vote'....why would I vote for someone I only agree with 46%..when I agree with Howie Hawkins 92%?

I prefer the French system. You have rounds of voting where you can vote for anyone in the first round but you must choose between the top 2 in the second round. 

The gap between the Green Party and the Democrats is a little smaller at least according to my latest survey.  

So I have some thinking to do. I think i may have to overlook my fondness for Jo in favor of Joe. Howie is also in the mix. Oh my 2020 is getting more and more interesting. 

Liberals are Patriots!

I had a harrowing experience driving home the other day. Some trump supporters, obviously upset by my "Democrat" and HRC magnets on my car, began yelling at me and waving a MAGA hat out the window. As the pulled away in a turn lane they yelled "Donald trump....trump 2020.."followed by the N-word, which puzzles me as I am white, I guess they were working on assumption. As if that were bad enough I have to put up with outrageous comments from conservative coworkers. One that was said today is an attitude that I am so sick of.

My coworker told a customer that we may not have "4th of July" anymore "The way things are going ".

I knew what my coworker was trying to say and i almost started throwing groceries at him very hard.

My coworker was advancing the narrative that Democrats are so unpatriotic that we would try to stop people from celebrating the 4th of July. 

BULL...

forgive my language....

SHIT!

Recognizing that our country has not always lived up to it's ideals is not unpatriotic. 

Far from it.

Recognizing that our country can do better is not unpatriotic. 

Far from it.

Republicans also claim to be the party of "fiscal responsibility".

I've seen the memes.

Deficits go up under Republican administrations. 

They go down under Democratic administrations. 

Bill Clinton....lord knows the Republicans have made the Clintons public enemy #1....some of it is deserved. He did wag his finger at us and say "I did not have sexual relations with that woman".

Put that aside. The man had a budget surplus. 

Republicans now claim we can't afford universal health care while there's plenty of money for wars and corporate bailouts. They stop at nothing to try to strip individuals of health care , particularly the most vulnerable. 

Republicans also claim moral superiority. 

How many Republicans have been disgraced by extra marital activities. Or homosexuality while opposing every pro LGBTQ piece of legislation. 'Lady G' for example. 

I came across some information online that suggests that the bible doesn't in fact condemn what we think of as modern day homosexuality. The line conservatives love to throw out "Man shall not lie down with man" actually reads "man shall not lie down with young boy" and where it says "homosexuals shall not inherit the earth", the word used was the word for "boy abusers" or "boy molesters". There was a practice in ancient Greece of the sexual pairing young boys with older men known as pederasty. That is what the bible condemns.  The word "homosexual" was not invented until 1862 in Germany and doesn't appear in print in the bible until the 1940s. This use of the bible to justify discrimination against homosexuals is

BULL...

again forgive my language....

SHIT!

I came across an old notebook from high school the other day. It of course had a "Campbell" bumper sticker from Carol Campbell's campaign for governor here in South Carolina in 1986. I've mentioned in past blogs that i went to elementary school with his son Mike Campbell. Also on my old notebook however is also a bumper sticker for his opponent in 1986, Mike Daniel. Part of the reason is of course Daniel is the name I've always gone by but it also shows how bipartisan we were. We didn't hate people who had a difference of opinion. That's the difference in politics of that time and now. Republicans and Democrats had a difference of opinion then.

Now it's a difference in morality.