I was once sitting on the flight deck in the middle of a heavy downpour while the ship weather radio was saying it was clear and beautiful outside. I radioed the weather guessers and simply asked them if they had looked outside.

Several hours later the guy in charge of the weather guessers tracked me down and griped at me because I "embarrassed" them. When I replied that if they just looked outside and updated their tape they could avoid such embarrassment he called me a nasty name and left. I guess they get touchy about being wrong all the time.

We all like to think of ourselves as rugged individualists. But when push comes to shove most of us are sheep who do what we are told. Worst of all, a lot of us become unpaid agents of whoever is controlling the agenda by enforcing the current dogma on the few rugged individualists who actually exist.