Ya ever heard anyone say that they felt like they've been hit by a Mack truck?
Just one day after a massive 20 semi-tractor trailer rig pile up just East of Baker City, Oregon- yours truly got a piece of the action yesterday on Martin Luther King day. Here's some video from the pileup that happened the day before. The Oregon State trooper at the end of this clip is the same trooper who attended our collision. http://www.onenewspage.com/video/20150118/2462721/Multi-Car-Pile-Up-Near-Baker-City-Oregon.htm
I've had a rough 6 months between retina detachments and surgeries, broken water mains, and various other minor calamities including but not limited to blood clots, another minor accident, and furnaces going out during cold snaps. Oddly, it should come then as no surprise to anyone reading this, that I should get rear ended by a semi-truck.
While traveling down the Oregon interstate early Monday morning, we encountered that nasty form of road- the one where the road surface appears wet but it is actually frozen over with black ice. Having spun out a time or two on that stuff as we headed west near the Snake River, the young guy driving our truck slowed down to an appropriate speed. As we began to crest a small rise, we noted a wall of trucks on either side of the two westbound lanes. Other truckers had pulled over and stopped. We had probably slowed to about 30 MPH when a sonic "KA BOOM" hit us and sent our 20 foot delivery truck careening into the median.
The force of the impact was such that I was sent reeling forward into the dash and then backwards into the metal cab directly behind my seat. I acquired a nice lump on top of my head from the dash, and an even bigger lump in the back of my head from the metal support behind my seat- I bit down so hard on my tongue that it was lacerated and bleeding on both sides. When we came to, both of us just stared at each other. I do not remember how we landed in the median. I do remember some guy asking us if we were ok through the driver's side window. I could taste the blood in my mouth and my head, neck, shoulders, and back were hurting. Eventually we unbuckled and got out of the truck to find out what the hell hit us. The road was so slippery we could barely stand.
This is where I will give you some helpful advice.
If you ever rear end someone with your semi-truck at 60-70 MPH, it might be nice of you to ask the occupants that you have just struck if they are alright or heaven forbid- apologize to them for hitting or injuring them. Under no circumstances should you exit your truck and in a hostile and angry manner ask the people you have just struck, "How come you didn't have your flashers on!" Trust that I am telling you the truth as I mention this.
Had I known Ms Ramirez would be driving with her head up her ass, and had I thought it might have helped her avoid striking us, I would have begun lighting flares and throwing them out of the passenger window as she careened down on us.
As it stands, the 2 feet of wrought iron lift gate on the back of our truck probably saved us from serious injuries. It did however, put a woeful gash through the front of Ms. Ramirez' Peterbilt truck before caving in her radiator and supply hoses- sending radiator fluid onto the back door of our truck.
Ms. Ramirez, employing the same successful strategy she had used earlier, followed us down the shoulder as we surveyed the damage and another semi turned over in the ditch. That driver had the good sense to try and avoid striking the unfolding collision in front of her and chose instead to careen down an embankment and overturn instead. That decision may have averted another 20 truck pile up like the one the day before. As I stood trying to figure out whether that driver was hurt, Ms. Ramirez doubled down on her first winning statement by telling us she needed our names and insurance info. I told her, "Let's just wait for the cops instead."
Ms. Ramirez and her female passenger spent the rest of their morning filming us with their cellphones after we victimized them- by slowing down with nothing other than our brake lights sans some fireworks and a flashing neon sign or two.
We waved off the ambulance, mostly because I didn't want to spend the day in Baker City or the night in observation. We exchanged info with the Oregon State police who oddly, made no inquiry as to whether or not we had employed our flashers. We limped the truck back home.
At the hospital in Boise, I went to the ER which only had one person in the ER waiting room. After signing in, a river of people began arriving. One by one, all six or seven people were checked in behind me and seen by doctors. I was left all alone in the waiting area. After an hour or so, I stood up and informed the desk that I was leaving. In the same helpful tone employed by Ms Ramirez earlier in the day, the gal at the front desk told me, "Ok, whatever."
On Tuesday night I found another river of people at the same ER. Having experience in the matter, I left, got in my truck, and traveled to the hospital in Nampa which checked me in and treated me ala a CT scan in a fairly expeditious manner as hospitals go. Two hours later, I received a clean bill of health.
This morning my lower back still hurts. My swollen tongue has returned to normal size. I can move my head side to side although I keep hearing popping noises in my neck. All in all, I feel pretty good and grateful given the circumstances.
I'd be a liar if I told you I hadn't thought "Ok, so what's next?" I can hardly wait.
Wednesday, January 20, 2016
Thursday, January 7, 2016
The Best Move in Oregon Is To Simply Walk Away- The Sunday Collage
Please allow me to meander just a bit....
One of the great gifts of small town policing, the kind we saw in the Andy Griffith Show, was Andy's ability to resolve every situation amicably. This happens or used to happen in small town America. In my old policing days, I am not ashamed to say that often enough- drunken bar patrons would call the police station directly for a ride home and if we had time as we often did- we drove them home.
Back in those days, we didn't fear some public backlash. There was severability- which meant we were free to do our jobs as policemen without getting sued for the actions of others. That all changed in my lifetime as groups like M.A.D.D. and large award seeking lawyers found ways to sue the police and our employers, (government and thus taxpayers) for our actions. The lawyers were always looking for the most money or "deepest pockets." In the end, I won't speculate whether that was all good or bad. but it changed the way we did business and it also spelled death for policing ala Mayberry style and the places that policed in a similar fashion.
I remember being in Jackson Hole, Wy. in the early 90's once and reading about a big debate in the local paper in which the cops were defending the practice of taking would be drunk drivers home- long after the rest of us had thrown in the towel.
The next big police controversy to take center stage were vehicle pursuits. People were getting killed needlessly over small infractions and misdemeanors all over America. It was a big deal. Ultimately pursuit policies were revised and thinking changed. Law enforcement quit engaging in frivolous pursuits. We were consistently weighing them for their ill effects and refusing to engage in pursuits if they were too dangerous. I believe there are thousands of people alive today because police officers began to see the error in that "one size fits all" approach to pursuing drivers for every minor offense.
The point of those two illustrations is that circumstances beyond our control caused us to rethink the way we did business. We became better risk managers. We began to see the larger picture and the ill effects of our actions. Every way of resolving a situation was examined. We made better decisions.
Which brings me to the current state of affairs in Oregon. Last week, armed militia members took over an abandoned (for the winter) wildlife visitor center in a very remote and un-populated part of Oregon. The militia are protesting the treatment of a local ranching family who live near the Malheur Wildlife refuge- the Hammonds. The Hammonds have apparently been getting the worst of it for several decades as the Federal government employs it's brand of big city policing in the middle of nowhere. Here is the best, most comprehensive history of the situation- shaded a bit for the underdogs. http://theconservativetreehouse.com/2016/01/03/full-story-on-whats-going-on-in-oregon-militia-take-over-malheur-national-wildlife-refuge-in-protest-to-hammond-family-persecution/
In the story you will see a picture of a small visitor center. This I guess, is what the militia has taken over and occupied. Big deal.
What would Andy do?
Well, let's think. Nobody has been hurt or taken hostage. There have probably been a couple of minor crimes committed, trespassing and burglary of an unoccupied dwelling, but all in all- not much of anything has really transpired. The Bundys and their supporters are responsible- they have publicly claimed responsibility thus investigating this at some future point and charging them appropriately seems pretty easy- albeit a little time consuming. What's the worst thing that can happen if law enforcement packs it up and goes home? Maybe a government building gets destroyed. Big deal. I doubt they will do that anyway.
So you know what I'm thinking?
The smart move here is to simply fold up shop and go home. Nobody gets hurt, the Bundys' will no longer have a stage with which to draw attention to this situation or their plight, and the media will conduct a few interviews and go home. If the Bundys' and their friends break any serious laws- it will greatly damage their future credibility and subject them to the consequences.
So if this was my Mayberry, I'd tell the troops to go home. Maybe check in on things once in awhile to make sure Cliven Bundy doesn't accidentally shoot himself in the foot or poach a deer in the off season. Sooner or later they'll run out of food, energy, and passion and go home.
We'll see if the Feds can sort this out. Perhaps they will worry and speculate that leaving this mess behind will embolden other groups to take over the parking attendant jobs at Mt. Rushmore or the guard shack at the Grand Canyon where the Feds shake us down for 20 bucks. In a way, the whole thing seems pretty comical. Never under estimate the ability of government to screw things up. They can snatch defeat from the jaws of victory nearly every time.
One of the great gifts of small town policing, the kind we saw in the Andy Griffith Show, was Andy's ability to resolve every situation amicably. This happens or used to happen in small town America. In my old policing days, I am not ashamed to say that often enough- drunken bar patrons would call the police station directly for a ride home and if we had time as we often did- we drove them home.
Back in those days, we didn't fear some public backlash. There was severability- which meant we were free to do our jobs as policemen without getting sued for the actions of others. That all changed in my lifetime as groups like M.A.D.D. and large award seeking lawyers found ways to sue the police and our employers, (government and thus taxpayers) for our actions. The lawyers were always looking for the most money or "deepest pockets." In the end, I won't speculate whether that was all good or bad. but it changed the way we did business and it also spelled death for policing ala Mayberry style and the places that policed in a similar fashion.
I remember being in Jackson Hole, Wy. in the early 90's once and reading about a big debate in the local paper in which the cops were defending the practice of taking would be drunk drivers home- long after the rest of us had thrown in the towel.
The next big police controversy to take center stage were vehicle pursuits. People were getting killed needlessly over small infractions and misdemeanors all over America. It was a big deal. Ultimately pursuit policies were revised and thinking changed. Law enforcement quit engaging in frivolous pursuits. We were consistently weighing them for their ill effects and refusing to engage in pursuits if they were too dangerous. I believe there are thousands of people alive today because police officers began to see the error in that "one size fits all" approach to pursuing drivers for every minor offense.
The point of those two illustrations is that circumstances beyond our control caused us to rethink the way we did business. We became better risk managers. We began to see the larger picture and the ill effects of our actions. Every way of resolving a situation was examined. We made better decisions.
Which brings me to the current state of affairs in Oregon. Last week, armed militia members took over an abandoned (for the winter) wildlife visitor center in a very remote and un-populated part of Oregon. The militia are protesting the treatment of a local ranching family who live near the Malheur Wildlife refuge- the Hammonds. The Hammonds have apparently been getting the worst of it for several decades as the Federal government employs it's brand of big city policing in the middle of nowhere. Here is the best, most comprehensive history of the situation- shaded a bit for the underdogs. http://theconservativetreehouse.com/2016/01/03/full-story-on-whats-going-on-in-oregon-militia-take-over-malheur-national-wildlife-refuge-in-protest-to-hammond-family-persecution/
In the story you will see a picture of a small visitor center. This I guess, is what the militia has taken over and occupied. Big deal.
What would Andy do?
Well, let's think. Nobody has been hurt or taken hostage. There have probably been a couple of minor crimes committed, trespassing and burglary of an unoccupied dwelling, but all in all- not much of anything has really transpired. The Bundys and their supporters are responsible- they have publicly claimed responsibility thus investigating this at some future point and charging them appropriately seems pretty easy- albeit a little time consuming. What's the worst thing that can happen if law enforcement packs it up and goes home? Maybe a government building gets destroyed. Big deal. I doubt they will do that anyway.
So you know what I'm thinking?
The smart move here is to simply fold up shop and go home. Nobody gets hurt, the Bundys' will no longer have a stage with which to draw attention to this situation or their plight, and the media will conduct a few interviews and go home. If the Bundys' and their friends break any serious laws- it will greatly damage their future credibility and subject them to the consequences.
So if this was my Mayberry, I'd tell the troops to go home. Maybe check in on things once in awhile to make sure Cliven Bundy doesn't accidentally shoot himself in the foot or poach a deer in the off season. Sooner or later they'll run out of food, energy, and passion and go home.
We'll see if the Feds can sort this out. Perhaps they will worry and speculate that leaving this mess behind will embolden other groups to take over the parking attendant jobs at Mt. Rushmore or the guard shack at the Grand Canyon where the Feds shake us down for 20 bucks. In a way, the whole thing seems pretty comical. Never under estimate the ability of government to screw things up. They can snatch defeat from the jaws of victory nearly every time.
Friday, January 1, 2016
Build Lots of Prisons, For We Shall All Be Criminals Soon Enough- The Sunday Collage
Courage is contagious. When a brave man takes a stand, the spines of others are often stiffened.
I've tried to be a good citizen most of my life. I've never had much use for rural speed limits but other than that- I've been pretty good. Once in awhile a murderous rage overcomes me, but as of yet, the government hasn't figured out how to ferret those thoughts out of me, pass a law stopping them, or just ask me to disclose them and send in a fine. So while I've had the good discipline to avoid any sort of rap sheet thus far- that is certainly subject to change.
You see, you simply cannot look at this leviathan government with it's Supreme Court rubber stampers and envision any sort of future or ending other than a violent one.
Nobody wants to talk about that. We think we can negotiate, reason with our masters. Come to agreement. We think we are too intelligent or civilized to have to settle our issues using "violence." Unfortunately throughout time- it is violence that settles most issues.
Try to envision a day, which shouldn't be too hard to do, when the government at all three levels- local, state and federal are garnishing your wages collectively at 75%- leaving you with 25%. The only people escaping this tremendous tariff will be the poor who simply can't pay it and the somewhat rare and uber rich who have already bribed our government to get the best tax treatment money can buy. The rich and elite also have the means to hide money and evacuate to some other locale. Being the chicken shits that I have known most rich people to be- I doubt they'd be much use to anyone, anyway.
That this is coming is evidenced by our government which has now passed a law preventing people who owe taxes from leaving our shores and suspending their passports. You will be stuck here like some poor, wage slave except this that plantation is much larger than the ones in South Carolina.
Thus at some future point, everyone stuck between the uber poor and the uber rich- will be getting their financial asses kicked paying taxes on everything. This will scale up rapidly I think, as more and more people drop out and the rich start to flee our shores. The most level headed among the remaining souls will want to negotiate with our government masters. Our government masters, having all the power will engage in some superficial negotiations and may even make a minor concession here or there- presenting themselves as cooperative. The middle class negotiators may use this as evidence that our government is still representative and responsible to "we the people"- which of course it is not.
The people with standing power never negotiate. Not only are negotiations not in their collective interest- they don't see any gain in making concessions. Power has a collective ego which says, "we are right and they are wrong." And so it is that our government masters will selfishly trench themselves in- ultimately making peaceful negotiations impossible. Our middle class negotiators will find superficial victories less common and anything substantive will be hollowed out and lost.
That is how this will end.
Now perhaps you are of the mindset that believes that all of this can be avoided. That somehow, some way, people will come to their senses in time to avoid all of this. To that I will point to the history of mob rule democracy- a democratic regime which is clearly in charge right now. They will appropriate for themselves anything they desire and they will invoke their majority as reason enough. Obamacare is a fine example of this.
Our masters are going to seize what they want from us. They are going to pass laws, tax and criminalize any sort of behavior which aids them- while diminishing you and your freedoms. People will appeal these arbitrary laws and seizures to the rubber stampers. The rubber stampers, members of government, will make their decisions in favor of government expansion which they have already been doing for 90 years or so.
And one day, when we are all sick and tired of losing- people are going to wake up. The force that divides us now will be the same force that unifies us then.
They'll pass a lot more laws, try to outlaw guns, outlaw gold and silver, outlaw currency and trade done in cash sans government monitoring. Credit cards with chips embedded in them will track you and shut off your money flow when they see fit. They'll pass laws preventing you from leaving our shores which they already have and they'll continue to tax you after you leave.They will pass a lot of shitty, freedom sucking laws and I suspect that most people- like the sheep that they are- will obey them.
There will be the dissenters, the old men like me, who will tell Obama, or Clinton, or Trump, or Congress, or Justice Roberts to go fuck themselves. I don't need any help reading the Bill of Rights nor do I need their bullshit interpretation of the commerce clause or their abandonment of "we the people" in favor of "we who write big re-election checks." It will be lonely at first. It always is.. These are the bravest of souls. The first ones will be labeled traitorous or treasonous. They will be punished and jailed, perhaps executed. Normal, decent folks like Edward Snowden and those that will surely follow him.
One by one, the pieces will fall into place. The government with it's vast array of eavesdropping capabilities, stored fuel, ammunition, drones and hastily built prison camp system- will think they are ready and own the high ground.
Americans, armed with well over a billion guns, a boatload of ingenuity, and a healthy distaste for a bully government will finally find some courage and have their say. The talking time will have passed.
Oh how I envy those who will see those days. Those deserters of death who will help restore the Republic. Government as we know it will finally be eradicated and re-manufactured with the additional lessons we have learned regarding campaign reform, term limits, the elimination of a central bank and the banking cabal once and for all, lobbyists and corporate bribery all gone. A fair tax and social programs where workers participate- rather than be ordered and gutted. Representation that spends money where it should be spent- at home. Never ending wars finished.Terrible precedent and woeful decisions by the rubber stampers thrown out. A re-installation of our Republic and a rule of law which applies to all once again. What a wonderful place this will be then. What a wonderful place this once was.
And oh how I laugh at those that think things will be settled any other way.
I've tried to be a good citizen most of my life. I've never had much use for rural speed limits but other than that- I've been pretty good. Once in awhile a murderous rage overcomes me, but as of yet, the government hasn't figured out how to ferret those thoughts out of me, pass a law stopping them, or just ask me to disclose them and send in a fine. So while I've had the good discipline to avoid any sort of rap sheet thus far- that is certainly subject to change.
You see, you simply cannot look at this leviathan government with it's Supreme Court rubber stampers and envision any sort of future or ending other than a violent one.
Nobody wants to talk about that. We think we can negotiate, reason with our masters. Come to agreement. We think we are too intelligent or civilized to have to settle our issues using "violence." Unfortunately throughout time- it is violence that settles most issues.
Try to envision a day, which shouldn't be too hard to do, when the government at all three levels- local, state and federal are garnishing your wages collectively at 75%- leaving you with 25%. The only people escaping this tremendous tariff will be the poor who simply can't pay it and the somewhat rare and uber rich who have already bribed our government to get the best tax treatment money can buy. The rich and elite also have the means to hide money and evacuate to some other locale. Being the chicken shits that I have known most rich people to be- I doubt they'd be much use to anyone, anyway.
That this is coming is evidenced by our government which has now passed a law preventing people who owe taxes from leaving our shores and suspending their passports. You will be stuck here like some poor, wage slave except this that plantation is much larger than the ones in South Carolina.
Thus at some future point, everyone stuck between the uber poor and the uber rich- will be getting their financial asses kicked paying taxes on everything. This will scale up rapidly I think, as more and more people drop out and the rich start to flee our shores. The most level headed among the remaining souls will want to negotiate with our government masters. Our government masters, having all the power will engage in some superficial negotiations and may even make a minor concession here or there- presenting themselves as cooperative. The middle class negotiators may use this as evidence that our government is still representative and responsible to "we the people"- which of course it is not.
The people with standing power never negotiate. Not only are negotiations not in their collective interest- they don't see any gain in making concessions. Power has a collective ego which says, "we are right and they are wrong." And so it is that our government masters will selfishly trench themselves in- ultimately making peaceful negotiations impossible. Our middle class negotiators will find superficial victories less common and anything substantive will be hollowed out and lost.
That is how this will end.
Now perhaps you are of the mindset that believes that all of this can be avoided. That somehow, some way, people will come to their senses in time to avoid all of this. To that I will point to the history of mob rule democracy- a democratic regime which is clearly in charge right now. They will appropriate for themselves anything they desire and they will invoke their majority as reason enough. Obamacare is a fine example of this.
Our masters are going to seize what they want from us. They are going to pass laws, tax and criminalize any sort of behavior which aids them- while diminishing you and your freedoms. People will appeal these arbitrary laws and seizures to the rubber stampers. The rubber stampers, members of government, will make their decisions in favor of government expansion which they have already been doing for 90 years or so.
And one day, when we are all sick and tired of losing- people are going to wake up. The force that divides us now will be the same force that unifies us then.
They'll pass a lot more laws, try to outlaw guns, outlaw gold and silver, outlaw currency and trade done in cash sans government monitoring. Credit cards with chips embedded in them will track you and shut off your money flow when they see fit. They'll pass laws preventing you from leaving our shores which they already have and they'll continue to tax you after you leave.They will pass a lot of shitty, freedom sucking laws and I suspect that most people- like the sheep that they are- will obey them.
There will be the dissenters, the old men like me, who will tell Obama, or Clinton, or Trump, or Congress, or Justice Roberts to go fuck themselves. I don't need any help reading the Bill of Rights nor do I need their bullshit interpretation of the commerce clause or their abandonment of "we the people" in favor of "we who write big re-election checks." It will be lonely at first. It always is.. These are the bravest of souls. The first ones will be labeled traitorous or treasonous. They will be punished and jailed, perhaps executed. Normal, decent folks like Edward Snowden and those that will surely follow him.
One by one, the pieces will fall into place. The government with it's vast array of eavesdropping capabilities, stored fuel, ammunition, drones and hastily built prison camp system- will think they are ready and own the high ground.
Americans, armed with well over a billion guns, a boatload of ingenuity, and a healthy distaste for a bully government will finally find some courage and have their say. The talking time will have passed.
Oh how I envy those who will see those days. Those deserters of death who will help restore the Republic. Government as we know it will finally be eradicated and re-manufactured with the additional lessons we have learned regarding campaign reform, term limits, the elimination of a central bank and the banking cabal once and for all, lobbyists and corporate bribery all gone. A fair tax and social programs where workers participate- rather than be ordered and gutted. Representation that spends money where it should be spent- at home. Never ending wars finished.Terrible precedent and woeful decisions by the rubber stampers thrown out. A re-installation of our Republic and a rule of law which applies to all once again. What a wonderful place this will be then. What a wonderful place this once was.
And oh how I laugh at those that think things will be settled any other way.
Monday, December 28, 2015
All Men Are Not Created Equal- The Sunday Collage
I think men were created with rights. Be they God given or by galactic mistake. We weren't put here to serve others unless of course, we choose to do so.
I guess that choosing part, who chooses, makes all the difference.
Thomas Jefferson, the great polymath, penned the phrase "all men are created equal." As he penned that phrase, Tom must have forgotten about those slaves he owned. I suppose being a polymath does not always include uncovering your own hypocritical tendencies.The great truth is, all men are not created equal. They never have been. In fact it's not even close and as it turns out- that is a large part of our current problem.
You see the big credentialed geniuses then and now- really aren't the geniuses we think they are. The truth does not become truth simply because some well respected man utters a phrase which we wished were true but in all reality- is completely false. Wishing something were true does not make it so.
This week on "American Thinker" I read a piece about how the government can now seize your passport for being a tax "scofflaw." The author, part of the brain washed herd of Americans, thinks that it is perfectly fine to seize one's passport for an arbitrary amount of uncollected taxes- now currently 50k and certainly to be revised downward in the coming years, Apparently this author believes it is the state that endows us with our freedom. That our freedom to travel is some privilege that can only be conferred upon us by our government masters and now taken away as they see fit.
This is why I detest government yet love my country- filled as it is with brainwashed sheep. This is in large part why I started this blog. I come from the brainwashed herd.
In America, we once fought a war with a King over 3% in taxes. Today we think of nothing of paying 40-50% in taxes or better- nearly all of us- except for those wealthy, elite corporate souls who have created a tax law which allows them to dodge what those of us in the middle class cannot.
Please think about this. Every time the government snatches some of your money- you have lost the freedom that comes with that money. It might have been a vacation, tuition, or elective surgery. Your freedom, your ability to succeed, hinges on what the government takes from you. We see this each time the government passes a new law- somebody somewhere is losing a freedom they used to possess.
Mostly we don't care as government sets about the task of identifying minorities- like lottery winners- and sucking up every last cent that they can get away with. Government couldn't accomplish such brazen acts of thievery without the aid of a hollowed out media that pretends to have some watchdog function- yet we all know that our media owners ride on horses carrying the government's brand.
We once had a media whereby authority was questioned. Where truth spoke to power and our Kings like Nixon- were banished in disgrace. Today we have a corporate media- completely captured and owned by elite tax dodgers. Afraid to call criminals like Hillary- a criminal. They sit idly by while these pieces of shit seek shameless power for themselves knowing they will benefit when they remind Hillary of the stories they quashed, of the checks they sent.
We once had leadership which refused to allow any central bank to skim off our wealth and inflate away the buying power of our work product by manipulating the quantity of our currency. Andrew Jackson where are you now?
We wouldn't dream of allowing tax money- money needed for running our government- to be siphoned off for loans to private banks, insurance companies, automakers, and anyone else promising votes or campaign contributions. We wouldn't have simply gotten rid of these government types that exercised control over our tax dollars- we would have had them prosecuted for malfeasance, fraud, or dereliction of fiduciary duty. Not only do they hijack our tax dollars, and create the very system that destroys us- but they have the shameless audacity to write books about themselves such as Paulson's On the Brink: Inside the Race to Stop the Collapse of the Global Financial System.
Our founders could not have conceived of a Supreme Court that rules nearly 100% of the time against "We the people" in favor of expanding government control over us and diminishing our freedoms every chance they get. A court that apparently has suspended the rule of law, turns a willful blind eye to 4th and 5th amendment protections against illegal seizures and due process- that allows government to do anything just so long as it can hop over the lowest bars of justification real or imagined. They do this because they owe. They owe their jobs to government and the party which selected them. You, they owe nothing to. You are simply some subservient herd animal, powerless to intervene or change the course of events. You exist as a conduit to be governed and fleeced. Any talk of freedom will be done with their permission.
That's how the system has evolved. Or devolved. The individual is powerless and he sure as hell is not equal.
I believed that Thomas Jefferson bullshit for 50 years. Until I realized it was bullshit, written by a slave owner, a member of the elite class of his day. No different then than the bullshit spewed by Trump to an angry America now. Trump is a man certainly created greater than equal, just like Mr Jefferson was. People are going to fall for Trump's bullshit just like Jefferson's. We desperately want what they say to be true. We believe it.
Unfortunately, it ain't true just because we want it to be true.
The reality is simple. We are not created equal. We are not free in as much as the great orators and geniuses of our time spout that bullshit. For me to believe that means I must disregard everything my lying eyes and ears tell me.
Government and freedom are not mutually exclusive concepts but they certainly are today. There is no stopping this. It will continue until such point that it can't continue- that will happen when virtually every American realizes they have been fucked and a collective anger the likes of which has not been seen in a long time sweeps across this land once again.
I shall end here today with the great inescapable truth about freedom which Isabel calls "harm"- as spoken by someone not a polymath and certainly not a member of the elite class.
“Most of the harm in the world is done by good people, and not by accident, lapse, or omission. It is the result of their deliberate actions, long persevered in, which they hold to be motivated by high ideals toward virtuous ends.”
― Isabel Paterson, The God of the Machine
Born Isabel Mary Bowler in rural Manitoulin Island, Ontario, she moved with her family to the west when she was very young. She grew up on a cattle ranch in Alberta. Paterson's family was quite poor and she had eight siblings. A voracious reader who was largely self-educated, she had brief and informal public schooling during these years: about three years in a country school, from the ages of 11 to 14. In her late teen years, Bowler left the ranch for the city of Calgary, where she took a clerical job with the Canadian Pacific Railway. As a teenager, she worked as a waitress, stenographer, and bookkeeper, working at one point as an assistant to futureCanadian Prime Minister R. B. Bennett.
I guess that choosing part, who chooses, makes all the difference.
Thomas Jefferson, the great polymath, penned the phrase "all men are created equal." As he penned that phrase, Tom must have forgotten about those slaves he owned. I suppose being a polymath does not always include uncovering your own hypocritical tendencies.The great truth is, all men are not created equal. They never have been. In fact it's not even close and as it turns out- that is a large part of our current problem.
You see the big credentialed geniuses then and now- really aren't the geniuses we think they are. The truth does not become truth simply because some well respected man utters a phrase which we wished were true but in all reality- is completely false. Wishing something were true does not make it so.
This week on "American Thinker" I read a piece about how the government can now seize your passport for being a tax "scofflaw." The author, part of the brain washed herd of Americans, thinks that it is perfectly fine to seize one's passport for an arbitrary amount of uncollected taxes- now currently 50k and certainly to be revised downward in the coming years, Apparently this author believes it is the state that endows us with our freedom. That our freedom to travel is some privilege that can only be conferred upon us by our government masters and now taken away as they see fit.
This is why I detest government yet love my country- filled as it is with brainwashed sheep. This is in large part why I started this blog. I come from the brainwashed herd.
In America, we once fought a war with a King over 3% in taxes. Today we think of nothing of paying 40-50% in taxes or better- nearly all of us- except for those wealthy, elite corporate souls who have created a tax law which allows them to dodge what those of us in the middle class cannot.
Please think about this. Every time the government snatches some of your money- you have lost the freedom that comes with that money. It might have been a vacation, tuition, or elective surgery. Your freedom, your ability to succeed, hinges on what the government takes from you. We see this each time the government passes a new law- somebody somewhere is losing a freedom they used to possess.
Mostly we don't care as government sets about the task of identifying minorities- like lottery winners- and sucking up every last cent that they can get away with. Government couldn't accomplish such brazen acts of thievery without the aid of a hollowed out media that pretends to have some watchdog function- yet we all know that our media owners ride on horses carrying the government's brand.
We once had a media whereby authority was questioned. Where truth spoke to power and our Kings like Nixon- were banished in disgrace. Today we have a corporate media- completely captured and owned by elite tax dodgers. Afraid to call criminals like Hillary- a criminal. They sit idly by while these pieces of shit seek shameless power for themselves knowing they will benefit when they remind Hillary of the stories they quashed, of the checks they sent.
We once had leadership which refused to allow any central bank to skim off our wealth and inflate away the buying power of our work product by manipulating the quantity of our currency. Andrew Jackson where are you now?
We wouldn't dream of allowing tax money- money needed for running our government- to be siphoned off for loans to private banks, insurance companies, automakers, and anyone else promising votes or campaign contributions. We wouldn't have simply gotten rid of these government types that exercised control over our tax dollars- we would have had them prosecuted for malfeasance, fraud, or dereliction of fiduciary duty. Not only do they hijack our tax dollars, and create the very system that destroys us- but they have the shameless audacity to write books about themselves such as Paulson's On the Brink: Inside the Race to Stop the Collapse of the Global Financial System.
Our founders could not have conceived of a Supreme Court that rules nearly 100% of the time against "We the people" in favor of expanding government control over us and diminishing our freedoms every chance they get. A court that apparently has suspended the rule of law, turns a willful blind eye to 4th and 5th amendment protections against illegal seizures and due process- that allows government to do anything just so long as it can hop over the lowest bars of justification real or imagined. They do this because they owe. They owe their jobs to government and the party which selected them. You, they owe nothing to. You are simply some subservient herd animal, powerless to intervene or change the course of events. You exist as a conduit to be governed and fleeced. Any talk of freedom will be done with their permission.
That's how the system has evolved. Or devolved. The individual is powerless and he sure as hell is not equal.
I believed that Thomas Jefferson bullshit for 50 years. Until I realized it was bullshit, written by a slave owner, a member of the elite class of his day. No different then than the bullshit spewed by Trump to an angry America now. Trump is a man certainly created greater than equal, just like Mr Jefferson was. People are going to fall for Trump's bullshit just like Jefferson's. We desperately want what they say to be true. We believe it.
Unfortunately, it ain't true just because we want it to be true.
The reality is simple. We are not created equal. We are not free in as much as the great orators and geniuses of our time spout that bullshit. For me to believe that means I must disregard everything my lying eyes and ears tell me.
Government and freedom are not mutually exclusive concepts but they certainly are today. There is no stopping this. It will continue until such point that it can't continue- that will happen when virtually every American realizes they have been fucked and a collective anger the likes of which has not been seen in a long time sweeps across this land once again.
I shall end here today with the great inescapable truth about freedom which Isabel calls "harm"- as spoken by someone not a polymath and certainly not a member of the elite class.
“Most of the harm in the world is done by good people, and not by accident, lapse, or omission. It is the result of their deliberate actions, long persevered in, which they hold to be motivated by high ideals toward virtuous ends.”
― Isabel Paterson, The God of the Machine
Born Isabel Mary Bowler in rural Manitoulin Island, Ontario, she moved with her family to the west when she was very young. She grew up on a cattle ranch in Alberta. Paterson's family was quite poor and she had eight siblings. A voracious reader who was largely self-educated, she had brief and informal public schooling during these years: about three years in a country school, from the ages of 11 to 14. In her late teen years, Bowler left the ranch for the city of Calgary, where she took a clerical job with the Canadian Pacific Railway. As a teenager, she worked as a waitress, stenographer, and bookkeeper, working at one point as an assistant to futureCanadian Prime Minister R. B. Bennett.
Sunday, December 6, 2015
Now Is the Time To Make Health Insurance Illegal- The Sunday Collage
All
truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it
is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
Have you ever looked at a problem and thought...."A complete moron could do a better job of managing this?" That's how I feel about healthcare in the United States. Getting rid of health insurers would be a huge leap in the right direction.
The idea is not mine. I culled it from the comments on a daily financial blog. The commenter failed to elaborate on the point yet I began to mull over the possibility that he was on to something. Let's call it a radical reform idea and preface it with a brief history of what happened within the entire health care arena prior to the controversial installation of the Affordable Care Act.Have you ever looked at a problem and thought...."A complete moron could do a better job of managing this?" That's how I feel about healthcare in the United States. Getting rid of health insurers would be a huge leap in the right direction.
For the purposes of this piece I am going to try and write this as politically non-partisan as possible because politics and who did what are little more than distractions to be studied in some future history class. Interesting, but no longer useful.
A good starting point for our healthcare dilemma begins with the installation of Medicare in 1966. It is important to start here for two reasons. This is the beach head, that moment when government edged itself into the arena and set the precedent. It is also important to note there was no trust fund or savings set up prior to the installation of Medicare- thus it started out in the hole from the very beginning. People were receiving benefits without even having paid anything into the system.
Throughout the remainder of the 60's, 70's, and 80's, health care in the United States was satisfactory and mostly affordable although the slow drip of rising costs had already begun. Costs in medicare were quickly over run. Parts C and D were added. The program expanded allowing new treatments and new providers. The medical device industry and big pharma were demanding and receiving 20 year patent protection which truly amounts to a license to steal. Lawyers refused to cap awards in litigation, malpractice suits were costly and rampant. Malpractice insurance was also outrageous, sometimes forcing doctors to fold up shop. Insurers were busy maintaining margins, paying stockholders, and making all sorts of demands upon insureds and providers seeking to contain costs rather than take care of their customers. Customers became some third party conduit- largely left out of cost containment. Rarely is the actual consumer a part of the cost containment process where insurance is involved. Insurance and risk management in turn forced extended and specialized education with it's associated rising costs and credentialing. Within the provider world, a full third of hospital expenses were administrative. Non tax paying hospitals or non profits- have built empires rather than pay taxes. The demographics are just as bad. It seems that everyone in the health care arena was positioning themselves to take full advantage of the aging and largest generation ever. By the early 90's, the meteoric rise of healthcare costs was just beginning and it would take the financial meltdown of 2008 to bring it to critical mass. It was and still is- the perfect storm. The ACA was hastily written by a desperate healthcare industry and bullied through Congress because millions upon millions of healthy, young workers had left the work force and they weren't coming back to pay premiums. This left an over supply of unhealthy plan participants sucking the assets out of healthcare insurers.
The Affordable Care Act was simply a health insurer bailout. That is all it ever was.
Max Baucus, the former Montana Senator likes to take credit for the two years he spent writing the ACA. The truth is, that's simplistic and inaccurate. The ACA was largely modeled after the Massachusetts health care system. The ACA bill was actually written by a number of people, some in the House and Senate, but others who were advisers to President Obama (like Ezekiel J. Emmanuel), and some who advised members of congress (like Elizabeth Fowler). Other influences included lobbyists from the health care industry; the former governor of Massachusetts (and Republican presidential candidate) Mitt Romney; MIT Economics professor Jonathan Gruber (a former aid to Mr. Romney and later an adviser to the Obama Administration); and Harvard Professor of Public Health John McDonough (also a former adviser to Mr. Romney, and later an adviser to several US senators).
Can you imagine passing any kind of legislation, let alone this behemoth, with zero advocacy from the people responsible for paying it? I can't even begin to imagine a process where the overwhelming majority were simply ignored. It actually smacks of collusion.rather than public service.
Remember the "taxation without representation" cry that rang out among colonists when a foreign King tried to tax us? Where are you now? What about that fourth amendment that allegedly protects me from unlawful search and seizure? Is the ACA not a seizure of my work product and therefore my property? Can the government simply seize, under color of law, anything it chooses and then hide behind the Commerce Clause? Maybe. I'm wondering who's going to stop them and when.
The Solution(s)
The mother of invention is necessity. We have arrived at that moment in time when we have to re-think everything we do in terms of health and health care. We will never be able to eliminate unforeseen events or congenital disease; however we can estimate numbers and curtail risk. This is not rocket science, actuaries and risk managers have been doing this for eons.
If I had an employee charged with reducing accidents, risk, and curtailing employee losses at my company and his solution every year for decades was to simply raise my costs, failing to provide any innovative solutions- at some point I would ask, "Why am I employing this guy?" I'd fire him. That is the situation with health insurance companies. They have become a parasitic one trick pony with only one solution. Raise rates. No price breaks for people who abstain from alcohol and drugs, no financial incentives for people who submit to regularly scheduled health check ups. No bonus for maintaining a physical fitness regimen. They simply don't care to reward people for reducing risk. Indeed, those healthy types swell their margins. They are busy sweeping every last crumb off the table.
Why is that? Insurers are focused on the short term. They have an entirely different focus. They want to make the most money right now- in this quarter. They don't care about individual lives, outcomes, or quality of life. They care about margins. Cutting their costs. Forcing you to see doctors that have agreed to their terms. They do not have a 20 year cultural plan or vision of a changing society in charge of their own health care needs. Indeed, they would see that as their enemy.
We need comprehensive reform at the cultural, grass roots level. We need education in our school system and we need to substantially incentivize people to eliminate risks and improve their health. I'm talking about rewarding people thousands of dollars in premium cuts for maintaining their health supported by annual exams and blood tests. Individuals, people, are not sheep to be fleeced in some corporate boardroom. We have never been a society that can't innovate or solve our own problems- unfortunately we have been led by the wrong people for far too long. We really do need to innovate and re-invent the wheel.
Originally, I listed about 25 reforms that need to happen- a list which doubled the size of this piece- but in the interests of brevity I have deleted them. Instead, I would like to leave you with an intermediate solution for those of us without insurance.
Last month, while searching for alternatives to 500 dollar a month Obamacare plans, I came across a Christian based health sharing innovation. It is Obamacare exempt- meaning that the uninsured will not have to pay fines for being uninsured. For 199 bucks a month, you can obtain a million dollars worth of coverage. There are some hoops to jump through- no tobacco or booze- and they may not cover pre-existing conditions. They have a completely different model- no stockholders and no ridiculous administrative costs. If you know of somebody that is uninsured, reasonably healthy, with an income stream that can support 200 bucks a month- this link might be worth sharing. http://www.libertyhealthshare.org/
Health insurance no longer does what it was intended to do. Rather than hedge against a catastrophic loss...it has become a catastrophic loss. The only answer health insurance companies have had- for the past 50 years- is to raise prices. They have essentially done nothing for their customers except take our checks and redistribute them.
Cutting out the insurance middleman would save billions. Consumers would no longer be forced to pay for marketing, advertising, stock holders, and all of the other expenses of insurance companies. We would save billions in administrative expenses, billions in government subsidies and backstops.
Health care providers would come face to face with their patients again. It would force providers to become competitive and it would also make for better outcomes.
Alternatives to insurers such as the liberty health share plan would be developed. In fact, I think so much money could be saved that plans could be developed according to income- where all but the terminally unemployable would participate and start putting a little skin in the game.
Making health insurance illegal is not as crazy as it sounds. It's time to find alternatives. A nation full of innovative people can surely do better than this.
Saturday, November 21, 2015
Now the Government Wants Your Passport- The Sunday Collage
More "land of the free" blogging. This time it's the "Drive Act." The government is calling it a highway and infrastructure bill and it's free!!
I am going to just post this and edit it tonight- so forgive me if you find any glaring mistakes, I have lots to do today.
The "Drive Act" like the "Patriot Act" and the "Heart Act", is yet another mislabeled and deceptive piece of legislation designed to raise more taxes and steal money from already existing, dedicated funds. Contained within the Heart Act is a provision that allows the government to seize your passport- your paid for property- if they decide you owe them more than 50,000 in taxes.
Like freezing your banks accounts, the government does this without any sort of due process. Due process as you will recall- is part of that thing called the Bill of Rights.
In 2014, over 3400 Americans renounced their citizenship. That figure is set to double in 2015. The truth is, it's far worse than that. More people are fleeing the U.S. than at any other time in the last 50 years. From wiki:
There were 235 renunciants in 2008,[25] between 731 and 743 in 2009, and about 1485 in 2010;[26][27] In 2011, there were 1781 renunciants.[28] A total of 2,999 Americans renounced their citizenship in 2013;[29] in 2014, 3415 have renounced their USA citizenship or long term residency. [30] The State Department estimates 5986 renunciants and 559 relinquishers during FY2015. [31]
If you think those numbers are remarkable, consider this. The U.S. charges a renunciation assessment. In 2008, Congress enacted the Heroes Earnings Assistance and Relief Act that imposes a penalty—an "exit tax" or expatriation tax—on certain people who give up their U.S. citizenship or long-term permanent residence.[47] Effective June 2008, U.S. citizens who renounce their citizenship are subject under certain circumstances to an expatriation tax, which is meant to extract from the expatriate taxes that would have been paid had they remained a citizen: all property of a covered expatriate is deemed sold for its fair market value on the day before the expatriation date, which usually results in a capital gain, which is taxable income.
They named that bill the "Heart" Act" and passed it in 2008.
In addition to the renunciation tax, the government is also charging a 2350.00 fee per person to expatriate. http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/2014/08/28/u-s-hikes-fee-to-renounce-citizenship-by-422/
It would be a complete mass exodus except for Social Security, Medicare, and taxes on foreign earnings. People who have been forced into paying these income liquidating taxes for 40 years- expect something back. If you renounce your citizenship- the government doesn't issue a refund. If you simply move out of country- they will continue to tax your income streams even though you no longer live here which lays waste to the theory that you are actually receiving something in return for all of that money the government takes from you.
One of the great tricks of the government is that when they pass legislation like the "Heart Act" and the "Drive Act"- they target higher income individuals. The poor, middle class- the big voting bloc- will read the law and think- well it doesn't apply to me. They become apathetic. That's how Congress manages to keep passing garbage laws like this- by targeting small groups of individuals rather than everyone. Once our body politic manage to pass these laws without serious backlash, then they will simply amend the law later on and apply it to everyone else. Once you give them an inch- they will take a mile.
What about a hyper inflationary event where the currency spirals out of control? Wouldn't that subject everyone to the minimum provisions of the "Drive Act?" Of course it would, but government doesn't care nor do they consider things like that. It just gives them the additional means to strip you of your property and money.
I will link the actual government propaganda for this bill- note the passport omission. It is written and offered as propaganda. If you didn't know better- it actually sounds good. http://www.epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases-republican?ID=DFAF66C0-D453-42C3-AB84-A90BBD326E44
Make sure you read the last line of this website propaganda. It's all free!!! Woohoo!!!
So here's the latest on the "Drive Act." I think you'll like this. Another "land of the free" writer. http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-11-20/congress-wants-seize-your-passport-unpaid-taxes
I am going to just post this and edit it tonight- so forgive me if you find any glaring mistakes, I have lots to do today.
The "Drive Act" like the "Patriot Act" and the "Heart Act", is yet another mislabeled and deceptive piece of legislation designed to raise more taxes and steal money from already existing, dedicated funds. Contained within the Heart Act is a provision that allows the government to seize your passport- your paid for property- if they decide you owe them more than 50,000 in taxes.
Like freezing your banks accounts, the government does this without any sort of due process. Due process as you will recall- is part of that thing called the Bill of Rights.
In 2014, over 3400 Americans renounced their citizenship. That figure is set to double in 2015. The truth is, it's far worse than that. More people are fleeing the U.S. than at any other time in the last 50 years. From wiki:
There were 235 renunciants in 2008,[25] between 731 and 743 in 2009, and about 1485 in 2010;[26][27] In 2011, there were 1781 renunciants.[28] A total of 2,999 Americans renounced their citizenship in 2013;[29] in 2014, 3415 have renounced their USA citizenship or long term residency. [30] The State Department estimates 5986 renunciants and 559 relinquishers during FY2015. [31]
If you think those numbers are remarkable, consider this. The U.S. charges a renunciation assessment. In 2008, Congress enacted the Heroes Earnings Assistance and Relief Act that imposes a penalty—an "exit tax" or expatriation tax—on certain people who give up their U.S. citizenship or long-term permanent residence.[47] Effective June 2008, U.S. citizens who renounce their citizenship are subject under certain circumstances to an expatriation tax, which is meant to extract from the expatriate taxes that would have been paid had they remained a citizen: all property of a covered expatriate is deemed sold for its fair market value on the day before the expatriation date, which usually results in a capital gain, which is taxable income.
They named that bill the "Heart" Act" and passed it in 2008.
In addition to the renunciation tax, the government is also charging a 2350.00 fee per person to expatriate. http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/2014/08/28/u-s-hikes-fee-to-renounce-citizenship-by-422/
It would be a complete mass exodus except for Social Security, Medicare, and taxes on foreign earnings. People who have been forced into paying these income liquidating taxes for 40 years- expect something back. If you renounce your citizenship- the government doesn't issue a refund. If you simply move out of country- they will continue to tax your income streams even though you no longer live here which lays waste to the theory that you are actually receiving something in return for all of that money the government takes from you.
One of the great tricks of the government is that when they pass legislation like the "Heart Act" and the "Drive Act"- they target higher income individuals. The poor, middle class- the big voting bloc- will read the law and think- well it doesn't apply to me. They become apathetic. That's how Congress manages to keep passing garbage laws like this- by targeting small groups of individuals rather than everyone. Once our body politic manage to pass these laws without serious backlash, then they will simply amend the law later on and apply it to everyone else. Once you give them an inch- they will take a mile.
What about a hyper inflationary event where the currency spirals out of control? Wouldn't that subject everyone to the minimum provisions of the "Drive Act?" Of course it would, but government doesn't care nor do they consider things like that. It just gives them the additional means to strip you of your property and money.
I will link the actual government propaganda for this bill- note the passport omission. It is written and offered as propaganda. If you didn't know better- it actually sounds good. http://www.epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases-republican?ID=DFAF66C0-D453-42C3-AB84-A90BBD326E44
Make sure you read the last line of this website propaganda. It's all free!!! Woohoo!!!
So here's the latest on the "Drive Act." I think you'll like this. Another "land of the free" writer. http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-11-20/congress-wants-seize-your-passport-unpaid-taxes
Sunday, November 15, 2015
Life, or Sometimes Death, In Moderation- The Sunday Collage
Today I want to talk little bit about the rise of extremism and intolerance. The idea was brought to me courtesy of a statement by a political candidate who believes abortion under all circumstances- including rape or incest- should be illegal. (Carson) Very often this position is taken by religious zealots who believe that somehow instances of rape and incest are examples of "God's will" and that a subsequent birth despite the criminal circumstances that led to the conception- were somehow ordained by our creator.
Indeed, I have friends who read this blog and who agree with that position. I am ok with that and I'll explain why in a bit.
If I've learned one thing over the years, I think it would have to be that life should almost always be done in moderation. The needle should hang around the middle of the gauge. When an issue becomes extreme- the people promoting extreme views become unstable and downright dangerous. People adhering to extremes cannot accept the idea that moderation and tolerance for the views of others is the proper approach. Instead they think that they have been singularly pre-ordained and programmed by God himself with all of the correct answers. God in his infinite wisdom apparently forgot to tell the millions of people practicing abortion that it should be illegal. So today I thought I'd discuss a few issues where people tend to come off the rails with extremism. So let's take a random walk through a myriad of examples first of moderation and then extremism.
I have a friend who can smoke one cigarette in the morning and one cigarette at night. She has been doing this for 30 years. Smoking in moderation. I can't do it but she does.
People who can drink once in awhile, take it or leave it style, or perhaps a drink a day are said to be "moderate" drinkers- meaning I suppose, that their drinking does not cause the rest of us harm. In other words- it's not extreme.
There are folks who go to church once or twice a week. They practice their own beliefs in private and they do not use casual conversations to promote their beliefs or diminish the beliefs of others. In other words, they live their lives with respect for others.
My favorite group of people and you will meet damn few of them- are those that practice tolerance for others and engage in moderation at all times. Very often you will hear others refer to them as "nice people" because they do not offend anyone. Of the thousands of people I have known, I can honestly say I have only met two or three people like this. I had the very pleasant opportunity to work for one- unfortunately his working life and ultimate termination came about as a result of an extremist held completely hostage by ego.
We both worked for the same woman, a gal who once told me that she enjoyed "firing" people. Firing people is an example of extremism. You don't fire people because your ego enjoys it and therefore you must satiate that need- you fire people when you have exhausted all of your intermediate remedies- and thus terminating a person becomes your last recourse. So it was, this woman fired my boss who was effective while practicing life in moderation, primarily because he would not practice her brand of extremism.
We were once a very nurturing society, particularly in small towns and rural areas. In those settings people are forced to be courteous to each other because they interact very frequently. I understood this well. The ticket you write today might be to the mechanic or doctor you will need tomorrow. Often people in small towns attend the same churches and functions. People help each other in rural settings. I feel grateful for those who helped me.
The idea of a caring, nurturing, tolerant society is completely lost in the big city. I believe that. Occasionally there are random acts of kindness in the city but in small town America- helping others or taking time to help others simply because you care- happens every day.
This week in Paris, ISIS attacked and killed a hundred innocent people.
Islam is extremism. I want to believe that people should be free to worship and support the religion of their choice. The problem with Islam, Sharia law, and the Quran is that they support extremism and intolerance of others. That is why I have often thought that Islam is not a religion but rather a spiritually sick philosophy founded by a self declared prophet 600 years after the time of Christ. The other problem with Islam is that while I have studied it a bit and I have read the Quran- most non Muslims have not. If you want a hateful, exclusionary God- then Islam is the way to go.
I am about to introduce to you the concept of killing human beings in moderation.
Killing a person is probably the worst thing human beings do. Yet there are times when it becomes acceptable or at the very least, unavoidable. Killing people in the defense of your life or intervening when someone else is about to be killed are the only times when killing someone is acceptable. That was what I was taught and unless you've been trained specifically to kill someone or are in that business- I think most people generally don't think about it. It's just not something they need to think about but they should. The extremists are growing in number.
My brand of killing in moderation does not require state executions or dropping bombs on brown people.
Ben Carson does not adhere to the idea of abortion in moderation or in certain circumstances. He quite clearly is a Christian adherent to the idea that all births are "God's will" and that all potential babies should be born. I understand that and Carson may actually be practicing his brand of life in moderation. What's he going to do? Reverse the Supreme Court? Not likely. If that is Carson's brand of extremism, the one where the innocents get a chance, I can live with that too. Either way, I'm not too worried about his position.
I miss small town America and civics classes. I miss helping people and having them help me. Here in the big city, it's just another dog eat dog environment. I don't even know my neighbors. Practicing life in moderation has been hard for a guy like me. But I'm getting better.
Indeed, I have friends who read this blog and who agree with that position. I am ok with that and I'll explain why in a bit.
If I've learned one thing over the years, I think it would have to be that life should almost always be done in moderation. The needle should hang around the middle of the gauge. When an issue becomes extreme- the people promoting extreme views become unstable and downright dangerous. People adhering to extremes cannot accept the idea that moderation and tolerance for the views of others is the proper approach. Instead they think that they have been singularly pre-ordained and programmed by God himself with all of the correct answers. God in his infinite wisdom apparently forgot to tell the millions of people practicing abortion that it should be illegal. So today I thought I'd discuss a few issues where people tend to come off the rails with extremism. So let's take a random walk through a myriad of examples first of moderation and then extremism.
I have a friend who can smoke one cigarette in the morning and one cigarette at night. She has been doing this for 30 years. Smoking in moderation. I can't do it but she does.
People who can drink once in awhile, take it or leave it style, or perhaps a drink a day are said to be "moderate" drinkers- meaning I suppose, that their drinking does not cause the rest of us harm. In other words- it's not extreme.
There are folks who go to church once or twice a week. They practice their own beliefs in private and they do not use casual conversations to promote their beliefs or diminish the beliefs of others. In other words, they live their lives with respect for others.
My favorite group of people and you will meet damn few of them- are those that practice tolerance for others and engage in moderation at all times. Very often you will hear others refer to them as "nice people" because they do not offend anyone. Of the thousands of people I have known, I can honestly say I have only met two or three people like this. I had the very pleasant opportunity to work for one- unfortunately his working life and ultimate termination came about as a result of an extremist held completely hostage by ego.
We both worked for the same woman, a gal who once told me that she enjoyed "firing" people. Firing people is an example of extremism. You don't fire people because your ego enjoys it and therefore you must satiate that need- you fire people when you have exhausted all of your intermediate remedies- and thus terminating a person becomes your last recourse. So it was, this woman fired my boss who was effective while practicing life in moderation, primarily because he would not practice her brand of extremism.
We were once a very nurturing society, particularly in small towns and rural areas. In those settings people are forced to be courteous to each other because they interact very frequently. I understood this well. The ticket you write today might be to the mechanic or doctor you will need tomorrow. Often people in small towns attend the same churches and functions. People help each other in rural settings. I feel grateful for those who helped me.
The idea of a caring, nurturing, tolerant society is completely lost in the big city. I believe that. Occasionally there are random acts of kindness in the city but in small town America- helping others or taking time to help others simply because you care- happens every day.
This week in Paris, ISIS attacked and killed a hundred innocent people.
Islam is extremism. I want to believe that people should be free to worship and support the religion of their choice. The problem with Islam, Sharia law, and the Quran is that they support extremism and intolerance of others. That is why I have often thought that Islam is not a religion but rather a spiritually sick philosophy founded by a self declared prophet 600 years after the time of Christ. The other problem with Islam is that while I have studied it a bit and I have read the Quran- most non Muslims have not. If you want a hateful, exclusionary God- then Islam is the way to go.
I am about to introduce to you the concept of killing human beings in moderation.
Killing a person is probably the worst thing human beings do. Yet there are times when it becomes acceptable or at the very least, unavoidable. Killing people in the defense of your life or intervening when someone else is about to be killed are the only times when killing someone is acceptable. That was what I was taught and unless you've been trained specifically to kill someone or are in that business- I think most people generally don't think about it. It's just not something they need to think about but they should. The extremists are growing in number.
My brand of killing in moderation does not require state executions or dropping bombs on brown people.
Ben Carson does not adhere to the idea of abortion in moderation or in certain circumstances. He quite clearly is a Christian adherent to the idea that all births are "God's will" and that all potential babies should be born. I understand that and Carson may actually be practicing his brand of life in moderation. What's he going to do? Reverse the Supreme Court? Not likely. If that is Carson's brand of extremism, the one where the innocents get a chance, I can live with that too. Either way, I'm not too worried about his position.
I miss small town America and civics classes. I miss helping people and having them help me. Here in the big city, it's just another dog eat dog environment. I don't even know my neighbors. Practicing life in moderation has been hard for a guy like me. But I'm getting better.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)