21 Years

“Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and in the degeneracy of manners and of morals engendered by both. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.”  ― James Madison

(Since the United States was founded in 1776, she has been at war during 214 out of her 235 calendar years of existence. )

Everyone is Selling Something

Everyone is selling.
Everyone is being sold to.

Pay attention, listen and watch.

How are you being treated and why?

A salesperson wants you to buy something.
They want you to give them something.

If they can't treat you right before they have what they want,
why would anything improve after they have it?

Only the thought that there might be more.
Nothing else.

It's up to you:
Is the product is worth the price?
Everything costs something.

No refunds.
No exchanges.
Satisfaction NOT guaranteed.

The Trouble with Normal

Rejoice Friends!

Every Home A Prison - Cold Cut

Rejoice friends!

Big government is over.
From now on, instead of Community,
You will be left in the market place,
To fend for yourselves, claw for yourselves,
Stab for yourselves, guard for yourselves
What little money, savings, dignity and shelter You have left.

After your jobs are downsized and exported to Mexico,
Tennis shoes made by slaves in camps in Indonesia,
Computer jobs sent across the ocean to Indonesia...
You will be next unless you bow down in the garboots
And throw your benefits away, your raises away...
And this is all you have to look forward to,
Forever and ever and ever
As more and more benefits are slashed.

No more "tax and spend" welfare state.
The windfall from tax cuts for the rich is more
And more people out in the cold on the street.
Begging for money.
And when that doesn't work:
Robbing people
Car jacking
Home invasion.
Everyone taught that life is so cheap,
And there's nothing to look forward to,
Except what you can score
And smoke in a pipe

Ending welfare as we know it
Means third would crime
As we know it

So why is it all these young people today
Misbehave
Misbehave
Misbehave?

Don't they appreciate the world we've built for them?
Crappy jobs, dod eat dog, no compassion in the marketplace.
If you like school, you'll love work.
Instead they ditch school
And hang out on the street.
Yob culture, Young hooligans.
Everywhere you look, on TV anyway,
And in the newspaper,
More and more people
Will pour in the streets
As their rents go up
And job opportunities go down.
So we have to keep them down
Before they rise up and burn our
House of cards to the ground.

It's just the cost of doing business
In third world countries where we keep the peasants down.
We have to live in armed compounds, with armed guards,
Play tennis at gunpoint

A different route to work behind bulletproof glass each day,
But hey, the more the hordes hate you the more status you've got.
Why not do this with the whole world?
With GATT treaties, downsizing...
But what about those goddamned hooligans in the street?
We stole their future?!
It's all their fault!
We must lock them up
But there is no room in the jails
So the best way to sweep them away:
Make every home a prison today!
Curfew, Curfew!
Who cares how much our leaders are corrupt,
As long as they are tough on crime...
Curfew...
Keep them away!
Curfew...
No longer unauthorised activity

You can't leave your home without an electronic ankle bracelet.
Young offenders must be tagged and watched at all times.
Tag their parents with bracelets too if they don't obey.
For that matter tag them at work and make them stay...

The main enemy,
Terrorist threat,
Is your own children...

Think about it:
The music they listen to
That tells them the world is bad.
It's the songs that are the problem
Not the violence outside
Keep them locked up!
Keep them in curfew...
Put them away!
Don't let them out!

We are tougher on crime,
before the election.
We want a national law
Establishing children's bedtimes.
Bedtime Patrol,
We'll check up on you...
Bedtime Patrol,
Make sure that your bracelet is on.
The nanny state:
To reach down your pants and check to see if you've been
Moistening yourself with any unauthorised substance without permission

Tag them!
Curfew them!
Keep them down!
Keep them at home!
At school!
To rent a video on the way home
And stay home.
Just like at work...
Do not gather after dark...
Curfew!
It's such a family oriented word.
A much more acceptable smiling soft word.
A much more pallatable concept,

THAN MARTIAL LAW!

Put your bracelets on
You are safer when you are watched
Don't go outside
You'll set the alarm off!
Curfew
Forever
And ever and ever!

An Answer is Not the Answer

More accuratley what life with women has taught me about the human condition and communications.

Listen:
Don't think about your response in advance, where things went wrong, who or what is to blame, or how to solve anything. Listen, like it will never be your turn to speak.

NEVER look for your opportunity to speak:
You cannot listen and do this at the same time. That lack of attention will not be unnoticed and it says, "I don't really care.".

Understanding is far more important than being understood:
Ask personal questions, not situational, then again, listen.
If you can sincerely relate, or empathize from personal experience say so, but only after they are done speaking or at a natural pause. Be sincere. Be transparent. Be vulnerable.

You are both people but you are not the same people:
Never assume that your situation is/ was the same as theirs. You are different people with different lives, that should be enough to let you know that your answer may not be theirs.

When emotions are raw, offense comes easily:
Any answer given before full and attentive listening is often the best way to alienate people in a time of need. You will have replaced caring with judgement, however inadvertant, it is not always the thought that counts.

An Answer is Not the Answer:
If you found a way out in your particular experience, or have insight about how things might better find a way to express them as possible options to consider. The decision to accept or reject your suggestions is their decision alone. There may be factors at play you will never be aware of and how they cope says more about where they are at with the situation more than where they are at with you.

Remember it's not about you, it's about them:
Because your conversation has ended doesn't mean your opportunity to help has.

Initiate unprompted follow up and ask how they are doing.

Think about what helped you (or what would have helped you) and do that for them. A simple act of kindness goes a very long way, but don't place any importance on receiving credit for those things, that undermines the value of them.

. 

It's Party Time

Money is power, and where either are to be had, corruption lurks in the shadows.

The Enemy is Within (part 2 of 2)

There are people that are often inclined to disagree with my perspective on social and (only incidentally) political views. They are intelligent, articulate and thorough in making their points, and I appreciate their input and viewpoints. However, while I appreciate all these things it seems by their approach that often times the concern is not as much about correction as it is about exemplifying that they are correct. Perhaps better stated, doing right is a lesser concern than being right.

I say this because often I feel that their responses come before they have considered the entirety of the issue or question that I am addressing, and often I am forced to address issues that were never my intention to address in the first place and are often totally irrelevant to my point.

It is frustrating to say the least.

I understand that each of has a natural tendency to view the world through our own lenses of experience and understanding. Then I thought perhaps I too am guilty of the same though I might not see it in myself.

As I considered all of this, as I took my view on them and turned it inward, this is what I thought...

It is delusional for any of us to believe that our particular brand of spiritual self destruction is practiced with any less enthusiasm, frequency, self justification or impending judgement than that of anyone else.

We would be foolish to believe that our sins are somehow "better", that our faults are so minor that they should be envied by those whose faults and shortcomings are clearly worse than our own.

They certainly are not. They are different only in that they are our own and so more understood by us, but that is where the differences end. At their root, and in the end the offenses are the same and all exact the very same price.

It seems however that our words and actions betray us as somehow believing it to be so. That we ourselves do not see it, does not indicate that it is not seen by others, though they may not feel inclined to rebuke us.

I have to wonder if our tolerance for their existence within us can become so great that we are slowly blinded by them to the point that we no longer recognize the divine bestowal of grace and mercy that is generously bestowed upon us which was once so obvious and convicting.

I wonder of failing to recognize ourselves as the unmerited recipients thereof, we them become reserved in our dispensing of it as well. Feeling as though we require little ourselves we then afford little to others as well.

Lord have mercy on us all.
Solo Cristo Salva!

db

Timing is Everything

Know Your Enemy (1 of 2)

There was a point for us when things were really rough financially. Prior to that we did okay, and God saw us through, but it was scary for a while.

I didn't have a "real" job for quite a while, but I was never really out of work for very long. That's because no wasn't an option to me. I often took crappy jobs that paid crappy wages. We caught s*** for that. Clearly if I wanted a job I would have had one.

We weren't proud of it, but we had food stamps. We've always been thrifty shoppers with coupons and ad watching. We don't buy garbage for food, we didn't before and we don't now. We caught s*** for that. People often and freely remarked that we ate better than they did. I imagine the judgment and eye rolling wouldn't have been any different if we bought junk for food either.

We drove a newer car, that was given to us by generous friends. We caught s*** for that, and "helpful" people suggested we sell the car, buy a less expensive car and then we could use the balance of any remaining money. That's both ignorance and stupidity.

We didn't go without cell phones or internet connection, because I can tell you as someone who employs people it's a bitch to find a job without those things. We caught s*** for having such luxuries.

When things finally started going better, we got a tax return. So we paid off the balance of our bills and because our only TV was broken we bought a flat screen. I got a hell of a deal on it. Yep, you guessed it, we caught s*** for that.

I didn't dress like I was poor, nor did my family. Of course we caught s*** for that. Over time that might have changed, but apparently people think those who are not steadily employed should sell their clothes to dress in potato sacks I guess.

People don't realize it but living with very little money is much more expensive than living with a comfortable amount of it. 

For some reason the poor become fair game for judgment and scrutiny by those who have not known the same, and everyone has some great unsolicited insulting advice or observations. I can't imagine they'd see the sense of either if they were receiving rather than giving it.

We can and do judge by appearance. Often appearance is all we have to judge by, what is the point of judging when it is not in discernment or discretion, but only your own pride that hangs in the balance?

We fill in a lot of the missing details with our own imagination in leu of facts. We become far more quick to judge than we are moved to help. But why?

I've also driven like s*** overcome by emotion because of the death of friends, or because I've had to get to the hospital. No one else could have know my situation. So I try not to judge people who drive like s***. I have no idea what they may be going through either.

And that is my point. 

Compassion is most often compelled by virtue of experience, and the conviction that comes with it ask something of us.

Judgment most often comes by those things lacking within ourselves and asks nothing of us.

Occupying ourselves with issues of others allows us to not only avoid addressing of our own spiritual self destructions, but it somehow makes  them a point of pride that "we" are better than "them".

We drive the wedge of selfrighteousness ever deeper in order to separate ourselves from the lowly feeble minded sinners.

Solo Cristo Salva
d(-_-)b

The Theif

The thief might be a man who steals for the provision of his family, but this not the worst thief. That might be understood in a sense.

A thief of a lesser base might be one who steals for his own indulgence, but this too is not the worst thief. Though it may not be justified, he may steal for lack of legitament opportunity to do the same for himself.

The worst thief however, is the man who withholds from the provision of his family for his own indulgence. He taints forever the lives of those who could not understand or justify his actions. This thief steals more than money, he steals from his own the ability to trust in others.

To Anyone That May Benefit

There is a level of confidence and certainty about the world that is only afforded to those who lack the necessity of experience to understand that their world is not the whole world. 
Not unlike a person that would look at one piece of a complex jigsaw puzzle and presume they can tell you exactly what the picture is.

There is also a level of confidence and uncertainty about the world that is only afforded to those with the experience and hindsight that only time can afford us. 
Not unlike looking at a black and white checker board, as your distance increases you begin to realize it's really much more grey than it is black and white.

Even as a parent, I generally try to refrain from giving advice to other parents, simply because in large part there are no formulated answers. 
From the get go children have their own feelings, sensitivities and inherent vantage points in how they perceive and respond to situations. 

They are as we are, each unique unto themselves so that what may work for some does not at all work for others.

Over time I have come to the acceptance, as with most of life, that everything is just a phase.

Like a chapter in a book that takes far more than a lifetime to read.

There will be difficult times and times of great joy, sometimes they will occur simultaneously.

Often in times of crisis or uncertainty we as parents need sounding boards.

Our emotion may cloud our judgement so that the recipients of our expressions may not be as selectively chosen as perhaps they should be and and helpful suggestions ensue by those with the best of intentions.

However well intentioned our audience may be however, what many fail to consider is that it's not always the thought that counts and the worst kind of advice is unsolicited advice. 
In those times rarely do I feel the level of confidence about accepting that advice as deeply as the one who is so generously doling it out. 

Whenever non-parents offer me parenting "advice", I try to politely smile, nod and thank them.
Just as I do with all people who do the same about other circumstances without the benefit or consideration of understanding the full scope of the situation. 

Then following their generous insight, I give them the future obligation to do the same (smile, nod and be polite) when one day they find themselves in the same situation...and inevitably they will.

Hang in there.

This too shall pass.

d(-_-)b

Two Wrongs Don't Make It Right

Wrong?

I'm no different than anyone else,
I mean when you get down to it.
So, why should I feel bad or say sorry?

Everyone does the same things I do.
Even if they don't admit it.

That's just people doing what people do to get by.
There' nothing wrong in that is there?

Wrong?

Well If you think I'm so bad you ought to look around this place.
If you did that you'd see that other people are much worse than I am!

Look at the kind of stuff they they do!
I don't do half that stuff.

Not on that level.
Not like they do.

I'm very different from anyone else
I mean when you get down to it.
So, why should I feel bad or say sorry?

Wrong?

I Did It

Two (Actually 3) Important Lessons

1. If you aren't willing to fight for what is  yours, rest assured that someone else will.

2. Sometimes you will have to take those things which should be given.

3. Don't be the catalyst for lesson 2. If you don't have integrity, you don't have anything.

Fartbook

Saving the OneBorn

If I didn't know better I'd say that Facebook is full of well informed, knowledgeable people.

Mostly though it's pop journalism with a definitive slant to appeal to certain audience, leaning certain ways on certain matters.

It might even be called propaganda or maybe more accurately advertising.

What most people know is what they've been told.
Which is really to say Facebook is really just full of people who are primarily ignorant about many things and are just passing along what they've been told.

Sometimes they're trying to help or advise, and sometimes they are just serving to underscore their own correctness. An ego stroke or a filling of the holes left by insecurity.

Some people think they're sharing truth, but if there is truth out there I'm hard pressed to think that anyone can do it anything but a disservice by fooling themselves into thinking they are capable of speaking it beyond a couple of sentences. (If that much)

There's always an agenda and the agenda is power.
It's always looks like that, but it's also about money, because money is power.

The bottom line is, someone wants your power or power over you, and they want your money. For anyone that spends time earning that money what all this means is they want as much of your life as they can get from you.

So when you read all this shit disguised as news or helpful information, ask yourself, "Why?"

Why was it important to someone to take the time to tell you whatever it is they're telling you?
Who is profiting and who is paying?
How can you be sure that any of what's being said is as close to truth as one can get in this life?

Well, I hope this gave you some food for thought.

For $25 bucks I'll send you more information on how to stop being a sucker.