George Carlin, RIP 1937-2008

I have written a lengthy remembrance of George Carlin, a huge influence on my life, over at my other blog. If you would like to read it, please click here -- but be aware that it contains strong language and challenging opinions many people could find offensive (unless they knew anything about what George was really trying to say).

If you are saddened by this news as I am, one of the best ways to honour George's memory is to spend the next few months recalibrating your BS detector, sharpening your critical thinking skills, and generally disbelieving almost everything anyone in authority has to say. If more of us did this more often, if we gained a little more perspective and proved we are able to focus on the real issues instead of getting distracted by trivial nonsense, if we stood up and called out the liars as disruptively as possible, in as many places as possible and as often as possible, we might just start to make our leaders nervous. And that's just where we want them.

Forget the "seven dirty words" and hold our leaders accountable for the real obscenities they perpetrate. Let that be George Carlin's legacy.