Pleasure principle

     There are some things built into the human brain.  A conscience, an innate sense of right and wrong is not one of them.  The first thing that forms I  think Freud called the Id; I call it the pleasure principle. The Freudian model of a human mind consists of the Id, unrestrained search for some desire; the Ego which grows in strength until it controls the Id and makes it possible to live with other beings, and the Super Ego; called a conscience, a sense of right and wrong.
     The Id is part and parcel of our personal fantasy world.  The things and feelings we really want to do or experience but are constrained by laws, religion or society.  Our Id set free to roam at will in imagination.  Our inner happiness depends on how much of our fantasy world we can bring into reality without hurting our self or anyone else.  Sexual impulses are the strongest force in the human mind and body.  Nature made it so to insure reproduction.  I'm reminded of the angry old lady who called the police to report a man exposing himself and masturbating.  When the police couldn't see him, she explained "you have to climb this fence, go halfway up the ladder on this water tower and use these 20 power binoculars and there he is, plain as day and I'm offended."  Actually both the unknown man and the old lady fulfilled their fantasy world, both were happy and no one got hurt.  This is the way life should be - nobody hurt.

Windows 10

     If you are planning to download Windows 10 to upgrade, wait a while.  Of course, the download and installation are free.  Even Microsoft couldn't get away with charging money for it.  Actually they should send us a check for helping to make it a sellable product. As I write there is a note at the top telling me that the browser they detected is unsupported.  It instructs me to choose from a list of supported browsers.  I am using Edge that they must have detected.  On the prescribed list is Edge.  Explain that to me.  The browser has a habit of simply shutting down and refusing to respond to anything. One has to then sign out and log back in with the password.  Only then will Edge re-open by clicking on it's icon.   This only happens 6 or 8 times a session. Re-start sometimes from where it quit, but sometimes forgetting everything that happened.  It becomes exasperating.  Maybe it's my machine but I lean toward software.  I'm waiting for money from Microsoft but I'm afraid it's going to be a long wait'

Denial of Service (DOS)

      Today is the day after Christmas also now known as denial of service day.  During last year, I wrote about it being the cell phone generation.  This coming generation, I think will be known as the tablet generation.  Every teen or young person now have a tablet in addition to their cell phone.  Nearly all retailers sold beaucoup of these new electronic marvels.  All the new users immediately turned them on today to enjoy their new treasures and found them unlike what the advertisement told them.  You were supposed to flit from Facebook to Twitter to U-Tube effortlessly.  Instead, they moved sluggishly until they got to U-Tube and found it closed.  Their biggest servers simply couldn't handle the massive overload.  Denial of Service. Dancers were shoulder to shoulder, the doorman couldn't fit anymore and hung a closed sign outside the ballroom.  This won't last long.  Net providers  are working 26 hours a day at the behest of disgruntled advertisers eager to reach these new multitudes.
      I think the new Windows 10 will be Microsofts Edsel of the electronic world.   Ford overcame its mistake and Microsoft will too.   Just have a little patience.  Every expected this boom but no one anticipated it's sheer size.  Right now you are actually living what will become history.

          

Capitalists and reality

      “There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."
       Quote by John Rogers in comment by Akadjian.

     I read both of these books in my late teens.  I have to admit I thought capitalism and conservatism were the way to go.  I grew up in smalltown, Texas.  In the fifties of 20th century America; the economy and our town was booming.  We had a town drunk, a crazy man who walked the streets, going nowhere but neither one was homeless.   We had the requisite 10% black people and two Mexicans that I remember.  That was the extent of our diversity.   Being a voracious reader, I couldn't envision myself remaining there the rest of my life.  In time, I left for College.  Encountering the real world, real ideas and real people was like an electric shock to me.  Like after EST, my whole viewpoint was altered and like a minor epiphany I realized that Ayn Rand was as full of crap as a Christmas goose.  It's why I became a lifelong progressive socialist democrat.  I never got rich but mainly because I invested in children instead of stocks and real estate.  I have never regretted that choice.  If  I was 18 and knowing where I am now, I would do exactly the same thing.  Nothing could replace the pride I feel at their accomplishments, their children and their love.
        

Guns and love

     It's incongruent that in this country,  a man with his son walk proudly into a gun store to purchase the boy's first killing machine.  A gun designed to cause injury, pain, suffering and probably death to some animal or human.  They leave to go shoot at paper targets in preparation for killing something.
     In olden days, they had the excuse of obtaining food for themselves and their families.  But with the coming of Kroger and Ralphs and Safeway and Great Eastern, they no longer need a quest for sustenance and can give free rein to an innate bloodlust.  They call it sport; I call it sickness.
     On the other hand, this same pair will slink into a drugstore. sidle up to the counter and in almost a whisper, ask for a pack of condoms.  They are ashamed they are probably going to perpetrate an act of love between two people.  Shame, shame, shame.  In this topsy-turvy world we live in, love and tenderness are bad, killing is good.  How did we ever come to this pass?  If we can discover how and why, maybe we can set things right.    

Changes

     Lots of people don't like change.  They both hate and fear it.  They comprise the  pessimists of this world.   They are called  conservatives.  Ostensibly because they want to conserve what is or was instead of what could be.  In political circles, they are usually Republicans.  People on the other side are Progressives.  They are usually Democrats.  I don't think independents have settled on a name for themselves as yet.  Sooner or later the mass media will call them something.  I expect Trump will come up with something derogatory when he notices most of them are not his supporters.
     I always tried to teach children to just expunge the word 'never' from their vocabulary.  Change is a constant of life.  If you think you  never change, you are probably dead, then you change slowly into dust.  The world, yourself and society is constantly evolving and becoming different from what existed yesterday.  Looking back to what I wrote about faith and religion,  there is a flow to existence that is always positive.  Once you find that current and join with it you will no longer fear changing and probably register to vote as a Democrat.  Feel the Bern.



  

Epiphany

     Most people think of the word 'epiphany' in a religious context like the feast of the Epiphany commemorating  the realization of the divinity of Christ by the Magi, but in a secular sense, it is a sudden revelation or insight into some work or study.  Actually, it's quite a experience when it happens.  It happened to me only three times in my lifetime that stand out in memory, two times in my teens and once recently.  There might have been others bur minor in nature and soon forgotten.     

     It was a fishing trip with my father and uncle. I was chafing at my dad's constant admonitions;  don't stand up in the boat, put on your life jacket, don't tangle your line, etc.   Seething with anger, I thought of  a way to get back at him.  I would smile pleasantly, do every thing he wanted cheerfully and that would really piss him off.  As you can guess, a change in attitude changed me rather than him.  I began to enjoy the trip and had this sudden sharp realization that he loved me, wanted me to be happy and my whole family was complete with me in it.

     I had struggled for months trying to learn plane geometry.  I had worked through sample problems over and over and just couldn't get it.  I was frustrated and my instructor was annoyed.  One spring afternoon sitting at my school desk and staring out the window thinking about it when a miracle happened.  Suddenly It all came clear.  Something clicked into place and I could see and understand the whole concept, I knew then I would be able to solve any problem in the subject.
      My third epiphany is happening as I write.  In my last post, I reported being taken hostage.  Windows 8.1 has been on my laptop since forever.  I tried to work with it and quickly gave up.  These last four days or so, I had to live with it being unable to escape easily.  In my efforts, I learned a lot and ended up with a combination of Windows 8, Chrome, Explorer and Google Plus.  I'm understanding how windows 8 works and am able to manipulate it to my satisfaction.  I'm reminded of a Johnny Cash song about stealing a Cadillac from the plant one piece at a time.     

Microsoft/Google War

    Having to write tonight in an unfamiliar realm.  I made the mistake of using a couple of facets of Windows 8.1 in an incursion  with the result that Microsoft caught my browser, Chrome, and replaced it with Explorer.   Try as I might, I found Explorer had lodged itself as my default and locked out any change to anything else.  Inadvertently, I became a hostage in an internecine war  between Microsoft and Google.  All my bookmarks were confiscated and being translated into a foreign language  and I was unable to write my blog yesterday.  
    After an evening, most of a night and all morning searching, I was finally able to find and retrieve my bookmarks, now called favorites.  Such a strange new language.  But as most hostages do, I will make myself comfortable and wait for a rescue, a truce or prisoner exchange and make occasional attempts to escape.   With concentrated effort, I should be fluent in Explorer as I have access to communication with Google people here who can help.  For now, I'm stuck with Yahoo for searching.  Need to replace that.  People here use Bing.  I think Bing is the bottom tier of search engines.  I really miss Google.

Freedom

      I have a very dear friend I know possesses what's generally known as a free spirit.  She's like a beautiful bird that would wither and die if she were ever confined to a cage, unable to soar across a sky that's her true element.  One can love her but never possess her.  If one is fortunate, she will love you with a fierce intensity and loyalty,  Her love is gentle and kind but if someone tries to hurt her friends, her family or her, she will defend in a most fearsome manner.  I could write on and on about her spirit and never do her justice.  I am only thankful to God every day that she paused in her flight to her destiny to become my wife and helpmate.  Nothing more need be said today.

Right Wingers

     Right Wingers, the more rabid ones used to call themselves "tea baggers" until one of the more worldly of their group learned what the expression referred to.  Right Wingers are not the shiniest ornaments on the tree, cognition wise.   Now they are Conservatives although what they are conserving is any body's guess.  But certainly not intelligence, logic or common sense because that seems in short supply in the comment section of  their favorite websites.  I love to respond to their writings with remarks of my own often eliciting insults, anger and other negative emotions on their end.  There are other trolls like me on their turf taking delight in what we call "rattling their cages."
For example go to columns on sites like The Daily Caller, Newsmax or Media Matters.  Go to comments at the end and read the garbage.  If you run across some wise ass reply to a dumb comment by 'Forthi' that would be me..  A Trump supporter told me I shouldn't denigrate Donald because I hadn't made millions of dollars.or married a supermodel wife.  I replied I didn't start with a million dollars from Daddy, never filed numerous bankruptcies leaving other people to pay millions of dollars in Trump debts.  And in my eyes my wife is more beautiful than any supermodel trophy wife. That was the end of that thread.
      Let's support Bernie Sanders for President.  If Diogenes and his lantern were still around, he would find Bernie sooner or later.
 

Republican Debate?

    Not so much a debate as  "bash the president" & "bash each other" & "who is most kooky" events except all together in prime time instead of presented piecemeal on daily news and other comedy shows.  A cornucopia of bigotry, ignorance and hatred.  A Christmas present for conservative voters and other idiots.
    If I seem to be down on Republican presidential candidates, I certainly am.   I have enough sense to know they are working to make America into a Christian theocracy.  Like Muslims following Sharia law, they want to do away with secular law and impose Biblical law.  They want to turn women into chattel owned by them totally, according to what they interpret as Biblical commands. They disown Jesus as some weakling pussy with His love thy neighbor craziness.  He should have been banned in the first place and finally got what he deserved for meddling in politics.
    I think that while reading the holy book, just substituting Republican for Pharisee you can get a perfect idea of their mindset and agenda.  I am not a Republican or a Christian.  I am a free man with free will living in a free country.  I plan to remain exactly that.  Next year I will vote for Bernie Sanders, a  free,honest and truthful man.      

Brain Files

I practice mindfulness meditation during my morning breathing treatment using a nebulizer.  I felt really extra drowsy this afternoon, having missed my noontime short siesta.  I read somewhere that it's beneficial for old people to take naps during the day.   Now although I don't consider myself old by any means, it might also be good for a youngster like me.  So I kind of fell into a good habit of napping about 2 hours in the morning about  9 to 11 and again from 1 to 2. Today while meditating, my mind hit on a theme of poetry.  I was remembering a huge file of lines from poems I read only once and couldn't remember where or when. Sometimes only one or two lines although I feel like the whole poem is in there somewhere.   Of the billions of neurons in the human brain. I'm sure there is a personal compendium of  a  "Bartlett's Familiar Quotations"  floating around in there somewhere.  The trIck is to find the index drawer.  There has to be a way.  So I've decided on the basis of wild, random thoughts to start searching for some trace of that key that will open up this treasure.  No matter that a multitude of Indian and Buddhist thinkers haven't found or taught that key.  Or maybe they have and they won't tell you unless you ask. So it may be just a matter of formulating the right question.  Google has a lot of answers.  I found the poem I remembered several lines from.  It was in a science fiction magazine in September of 1960.  Today I remembered lines I read 55 years ago. Google is pretty good but they will never match this wondrous brain in which God really lives.

Houston Mayor

Sylvester Turner is the newly elected mayor of  Houston, Texas replacing Anise Parker.  Mr. Turner happens to be a black man while Ms. Parker is an avowed Lesbian.  Her election a few years ago was applauded by another minority group in Houston; the homeless community.  We thought that she would be understanding of a daily search for food and shelter. She helped by making sure all the dumpsters in the city were locked and anyone caught eating any food from them would be arrested and jailed.   The next thing was selling Christmas gift bags for people to give to homeless people begging on the street.  This cheap plastic bag contained an assortment of little items like little tooth brushes and a tiny tube of toothpaste, a bar of soap the size you find in motel bathrooms and various items you could buy from a Dollar Store for less than a five dollar bill.  She charged good-hearted people $20.00 each.   I personally never saw an accounting of the cash profit from this sale.  Word on the street is it went into mayor Parker's pocket.  I don't have any teeth but I had about twenty tubes of toothpaste and toothbrushes.  I and many others would have preferred that bag had contained a gift coupon for a hamburger and/or a coke from MacDonald's on the corner.  Many of us could use that more than any bag of crap.  What good are clean teeth without anything to bite, chew or swallow.
This year she decided the gift bag scam wouldn't work again.  Her hatred of the homeless reached full flower this year when she decided all of them were to be given misdemeanor tickets they couldn't pay and warrants issued for the police to take them to jail for Merry Christmas this December 25th.
   The hope we felt when a minority like us was elected those years ago.we are feeling again with Mr. Turner.  A poet said "hopes springs eternal in the human breast."

Homeless Yes -- Hopeless No

  Homeless often means a prior life and any return to it is out of the question.  Especially when one is advanced in years.  There are as many reasons for this situation as there are individuals experiencing it.  Young or old, no one comes with a pocket full of money, a big retirement account or a government check that is usually not enough for one person to live on for a month. Few people come to this estate without being sick, needing medication or getting that way with exposure to the elements and the many dangers that live outdoors.  Many would like nothing better than to get straightened out with the available help.  But lacking transportation or communication is a big roadblock.  There are people with alcohol and/or drug dependency whose illness keeps them from help.  Church groups come around with food and clothing in one hand and bibles in the other.  They get angry if the next time they visit, their victim is not a devoted follower of their view of how to live life.
   As to daily living, it's easy to imagine if you have ever gone camping outdoors.  But also imagine that without a camp stove, a freezer chest with food and water, a portable toilet or even a tattered tent to stay dry sometimes.  That's what it's like having to beg people for food who sneer at you and insult you.  The police are another matter and will be discussed in another installment.  This year it's worse than it's been in the past.  I'm trying to research the reasons why and will writh about it.

Post Polio

When I was a little boy about four years old, there was an epidemic of Infantile Paralysis or Polio  sweeping areas of the nation.  Since I tended to catch everything from chicken pox to head lice simultaneously, naturally I caught it.  All the local hospitals were full.  Luckily I came to the attention of what we then called a jack-leg preacher, meaning one not associated with any recognized sect or religious persuasion other than Christianity.  Like a medical general practitioner; a general practice sky pilot.  In any case, he was a Mason at the local temple and a higher up like a 300th degree or something.  Regardless of what he appeared, he was a good, compassionate person and embodied the acts and personage of Jesus Himself.  I heard another such man say "don't tell me what you believe, tell me what you do and I will tell you what you believe."  To make a long story longer, with the assistance of this master string puller, I was with my father  armed with a handful of rationed gas coupons on my way to Dallas with the ultimate destination being Scottish Rite Hospital, the best polio specialists in the world there.  They worked with me sporadically for eight years through paralysis, braces, crutches, a drop foot problem and finally intricate muscle graft surgery to enable me to walk almost normally and play high school football.
  Years later, they found the true viciousness of polio.  Irreparable damage to the spinal cells that control muscle tone and strength.  In my golden years, the process I went through at four years old I experience again, except in reverse.  I have gone from a cane to a walker until finally to my wheelchair.  I can't really complain, though.  From an itinerant preacher to the groups of Masons and Shriners that opened their hearts and wallets to pay for my care, to a great innovative surgeon, Dr Carroll, to a young nurse named Ms. Tallant who sang at night to make us forget the pain from surgery; they gave me a wonderful life of 78 years now.  I am eternally grateful.  

Plagirism

Not feeling well tonight so I will steal some comments by Bernie Sanders regarding Donald Trump's plans regarding Muslims.

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) reacted to Donald Trump’s call to ban all Muslims from entering the United States by stressing that Trump’s plan is based on weakness and fear.

In a statement, Donald Trump called for Muslims to be banned from entering the US.

Trump said, “Without looking at the various polling data, it is obvious to anybody the hatred is beyond comprehension. Where this hatred comes from and why we will have to determine. Until we are able to determine and understand this problem and the dangerous threat it poses, our country cannot be the victims of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in Jihad, and have no sense of reason or respect for human life. If I win the election for President, we are going to Make America Great Again.”

Sen. Sanders fired back by pointing out the Trump is nothing more than a demagogue who is looking to divide the country, “Demagogues throughout our history have attempted to divide us based on race, gender, sexual orientation or country of origin. Now, Trump and others want us to hate all Muslims. The United States is a great nation when we stand together. We are a weak nation when we allow racism and xenophobia to divide us.”

                              ==   Vamonos y votar por Bernie Sanders   ===

Courage

I once lived in a mostly Hispanic neighborhood.  The men there placed much store on their nerve and courage.  Young men, far from home working week after week at arduous and often dangerous jobs; when a holiday cane around like the 4th of July or Cinco de Mayo, it's fiesta time.  These same young men, full of piss and vinegar, cerveza, tequila and music set out to impress the young. available girls in the area.  To this end, they play a game called "quien es mas macho" which involved holding a lit firecracker in their teeth the longest without spitting it out.  Luckily I lost a front tooth playing high school football.  When they tried to get me involved, I opened my mouth,showed the gap and said "I played last year."  They clapped me on my back and named me "macho man."  I got to go along with the boisterous group when we took this year's mas macho men to the local emergency ward.
   I couldn't help but remember that day as I watched the Republican presidential candidates vying to be mas macho in dealing with Syrian refugees, terrorist plots, their fearful and terrified voter base of support. And with Donald Trump.
   Reading the comments on right wing websites, I learned that Fox News is advising children to rush the shooter if ever confronted with an armed psychopath.  Half the commentators agreed while the rest bragged about what they would do in such a situation. Thank heaven their chance of an encounter with an armed terrorist is so infinitesimal that  they stand a far better chance of being hit by frozen waste from an airline toilet.
  I thought about what might change their misconceptions and realize that facts would only solidify their erroneous mindset.  It's part of an emotional belief system and any attempt at reason would be the same as my favorite aphorism; "never arm wrestle with a chiropractor."  All I can really do is Vamonos y votar por Bernie Sanders.  Let's go vote.

My Rules

When I first started posting on a semi-regular basis, I thought for along time about what I wanted to commit to view by other people.  At first I only posted for my family to read.   I wrote about daily life and soon realized that no one was really interested in knowing I visited a drugstore searching for something to relieve the itch caused by my case of athletes foot.  They were more interested in what I thought about a new TV show that just aired.  They could relate to watching TV while their feet weren't itching.     In short, they wanted to know my opinions to see if it matched up with theirs.
   To gain insight, I began to go to controversial websites, read the message and the comments by other readers.  I finally got up the nerve to post a comment of my own in reply to another readers comment.  In that initial foray, I was chastised as being a complete idiot by this person.  From that point on, I was hooked.  I replied that only an ignorant moron could make his comment in the first place.  A few others agreed with me on that and a blog was born.  I decided to set up some rules for myself.  I never worry about pissing someone off.  That's their problem, not mine.  Too many of my family agreed with me in thinking I would be flattered enough to give up this foolishness.  So I went public.  Now I'm thinking about going to Google+ public and see what response I get.  Since I think without any limits on subject, personal or otherwise, I will go to my Rules again and say anything without limits.  If I live it and think it I will write it.   The final rule.  Don't  keep writing after you run out of what you wanted to say.  Invoked now.

Disappointment

One trait I seem to have been born with  is too much empathy.  This is a virtue when the people nearest to me are experiencing joy and happiness.  I feels wonderful to me to experience the good times along with them.  It becomes a curse when they are fraught with disappointment, emotional pain and depression.  This is especially true when the person I am closest to and love the most is having these feelings.  I feel them so severely that I become almost paralyzed; unable to perform any action whatever.  Frustrated with knowing there is nothing I can do to alleviate their pain.  From past experiences I know that I have to concentrate as much as possible on something else with that part of my mind still functional.  Writing helps, so I write a letter to them drawing on my own past actions and how they were overcome with something other than time.  When I get knocked down I concentrate on getting back up.  I remember once when I was a little boy getting knocked down by a schoolyard bully.  I would get up and get knocked down again.  Finally after four or five times he pleaded with me, with tears in his eyes "just stay down so I can quit;" then I got up again and he ran away crying.  He never bothered me again either.  I always try to think life is like that bully.  Just don't stop getting back up and you will always win sooner or later.  The only way life can keep me down is get death to help.  I will still put up a hell of a fight before I go down for good.  Count on that.

Serendipity

The concept that I wrote about before in a post called "Faith and Religion" is that there is a force in nature and the universe that is always flowing forward and positively good for everyone.  Once you find that flow and join with it, another component comes into play and creates some unseen force that senses your desires for something and tries to satisfy those desires in the best way possible.  Often this takes the form of something greater and better for us.  When that happens, it's known as serendipity.  In my own life, one of my most ardent desires was that someone I love very much would be able to move from a tent in the woods to some place safer and warmer.  That unseen force kicked in and sent someone to offer both the things I wanted and much more besides.  Serendipity.   Unity describes this unseen force as the spirit of God living in the spiritual life of our humanity.  God doesn't live in the clouds somewhere, He lives within ourselves.  We were never created to be miserable but to have life and enjoy our time in this dimension until our spiritual being moves on.  As Jesus said "jn my father's house there are many rooms."  I take that to mean there are many planes of spiritual existence.  On our journey through this earthly life we need always to remember that we were created out of love by a force unseen by us but have faith that it is always there and  unchanged by any of our actions.  We are loved unconditionally.  

Thankfulness

First, I need to apologize to everyone who reads me faithfully for my lack of writing anything for the last several days.  Although I don 't like to blame anything other than myself, I have to admit there are two things I just cannot eat; chicken and whole kernal corn.  I think chicken eating is psychological.  After a meal of fried chicken, a gallstone lodged in a bile duct and my pancreas starting eating itself.  After nearly dying and much morphine and other drugs, I came to and refused to let them operate which turned out would have killed me.  After weeks, my gall bladder was removed and a shunt was installed to continually drain a cyst that had formed on my pancreas.  This happened almost twenty years ago and I'm still here.  So I no longer eat chicken.  Since our dog found my false teeth and mostly ate them, I can no longer chew corn.  There is one consolation though, without teeth, I can touch the tip of my nose with my tongue.  Not many people can do that. It teaches me to be thankful for little things.    Sometimes I get down with my inability to do much for my family.  I feel like my writing on faith and religion is nothing like reality,
                                               I start thinking 

  Then along comes some people that share my beliefs about sharing and giving back some of their faith in life and restore my brain to generate good thoughts again.  I will again share them with all of you by resuming my writing.  As Unity pastor Howard Caesar always closes his talks "May God bless all of you."

Crimes and Punishments

This week in a major city, where I unfortunately reside, there were three instances of jealousy prompting shooting 3 women with 1 surviving; 2 men were shot to death with 1 killing himself  and the last man standing is in jail.  I'd always heard that in this state, it was OK to kill a man messing with your wife or live-in girlfriend but you can't shoot her in the process.  Strange as it seems, the man in jail won't be charged with murder of the cuckolding, man but he will stand trial for assault on his wife, only wounding her with 2 gunshots.  Lucky for him he wasn't a very good shooter.  Since he is white, he will probably get a light sentence or probation.  If he had been black though, he surely would be facing 20 years to life in prison.  Nowadays, the severity of the crime has nothing whatever to do with the severity of the punishment.
   Maybe it was better in the old west days.  G,W, Bush and a lot of other Republicans would be hanging in trees around the country  Or following the bible they love so dearly, they would have to have some surgery on their penis's to remove the foreskin God seems to hate so much before open heart surgery with someone's sword.  At least we can still dream about justice.

Republican Blood

Another group of people killed over the beliefs of a right wing nut-job.  When is enough become really enough to do something about it.  Thankfully it's not up to me except as a member of the majority of sane, rational people in this country.  In my opinion, free speech stops when you yell fire in a crowed venue and people are trampled to death.  It becomes the same as yelling "God wants sinners killed and wiped out" to a group of ignorant, unstable morons.  Someone needs to be held accountable for such blatant evil.  ISIS will cut off your head for going against their religious beliefs.   Saudi-Arabia will do the same thing, again for their religion.  Unstable Christians will use bullets to enforce their beliefs.  We hold ISIS leaders and the Saudi government leaders responsible for the actions of their followers.  Why are not Mr. Huckabee, Mr. Trump, Mr. Cruz and the editor of fake videos being held responsible for the three dead people in Colorado?  We can name quite a few more that believe their version of a holy book is the right version and have been led to believe somehow they should follow someone's interpretation of it instead of the US Constitution and American laws. It's really sickening to view sites such as The Daily Caller or Red-State and see the misinformation they foist on Fox News addicts under the guise of "real truth" when it is anything but.
   I believe we should research laws against sedition, treason, slander and libel and see which ones might apply to the Republican Party and their adherents.      

People and Guns

There is widespread belief that in a wartime operation like the invasion on D-Day or Inchon landing in Korea, over half of soldiers never fired their weapons.  They simply froze.  This was attributed to the lack of aggression when they were growing up.  They were taught, contrary to reality, that America was a peaceful nation.  Books by Howard Zinn or James Loewen were never mentioned until a young person left high school and encountered some reality in college history courses.
   Lately though, aggression has become the new normal and directed at minorities, homosexuals or any other group the right-wing religious police have designated undesirables that need to be converted or eliminated. Witness two days ago a shooting at Planned Parenthood perpetrated by a crazy Christian zealot attempting to rectify what he thought were sinners being bad.  He just took the Republican party agenda to it's logical culmination.
    Soldiers now are conditioned to kill other people.  If they were taught otherwise, they wouldn't be much use in combat.  Most people, as a rule, are not soldiers or ex-soldiers.  their knowledge of fighting and death are gleaned from TV shows or video games.  So they go out, listening to the NRA propaganda, buy themselves a gun to feel safe, take time to shoot at paper targets and get themselves a license to carry it around, feeling like a combination Marshall Dillon and Sheriff Joe Arpaio.  I feel
that before getting a license to pack their gun, they be required to spend a weekend observing or helping in the emergency rooms of a large metropolitan hospital actually experiencing what their little safety toy can really do.  See how many people actually shoot themselves or someone they love accidentally.
   I believe that if a terrorist were to attack normal people in a crowded, darkened venue, most of them would shoot themselves or their fellows and terrorists would escape unscathed.  Luckily the odds of such an occurrence actually happening are about the same as being hit by a meteor from space.    

Technology Speed

As one gets older, the world speeds up.  And at a pace that seems to increase exponentially.   Today I helped a friend pick out an electronic tablet mainly to send and receive e-mail.  This little tablet she chose probably has a dozen times the speed and power of the first PC I purchased only about twenty years or so ago.  Additionally, at only $50.00, it cost about 1/6 of the price I paid back then.  We never dreamed of built in cameras and webcams.  It was slow as cold syrup because a 56Kb modem was top of the line  I wasn't happy with Windows Explorer so I downloaded  Netscape Navigator.
I remember that took a number of hours to download and install.  Since then I have used Firefox and finally Google Chrome.  I was using Navigator when I heard about the new search engine named Google.  I was intrigued by the name knowing that mathematically a googol is a number big enough to count every elementary particle in the entire universe.  The only number bigger is a googolplex for which there is absolutely no conceivable use.  Anyway, Google was by invitation only though you could buy an invitation online.  I snapped one up posthaste and always wished there were some stock shares available then.  I still have my soul although I would have been sorely tempted to sell it for a thousand shares of Google stock.  I once knew a man who had a roommate in college that had an idea for a company he needed another $500.00 to start and offered Walter half of the company for a loan of that amount. Walter turned him down so Elmer managed to get the amount without giving half of Frito's Corn Chips to anyone.   Deep down I honestly got a computer like one of the characters on "King of the Hill."  He said "all you gotta do is put in 'nekid wimmin' and there they is."  I have always liked naked women rather than naked men.  They are so much more beautiful.
   But I digress.  I think both computers and cell phones have become so automated that in the case of a computer one can't actually do anything for themselves.  Gone are DOS commands.  You can't even get to DOS anymore.  Gone are floppy drives and a mouse is becoming useless.  Maybe it's about time to slow things down just a tad and let human people catch up,

Dreams

Due to the national celebration of Thanksgiving, everyone's schedule got all screwed up.  Mine in particular.  Ordinarily, I go to bed after the ten o'clock news and talking to the night shift caregiver. whose time starts at 10;00 PM and runs to 6:00 AM.  Unfortunately, no one showed up last night and
since I was the last one still awake, I felt responsible for staying up in case of fire, break ins or any other emergency.  At last, at about 1:30, the evening shift caregiver came by, left to get some food and returned at 1:45.  Although satiated earlier at dinner, we all ate again including a lot more pie and cake.
   Finally went to bed sometime after 3:00 AM.  Got up and took medicine at noon and back to bed, sleeping soundly until late this afternoon.  I suppose that because of hearing so much daytime activity, I was besieged with a multitude of dreams, none of them bad.  I have always believed that dreams are the brain's interpretations of sounds to preserve our sleep and keep us from waking up too soon.  This is on a semi- conscious level.  On a deeper level, our brains are seeking a better explanation of the day's and earlier events stored in memory.  Our brain constructs scenarios that are mostly good of past events.  In scenes where you remember shame or  embarrassment, they are scrubbed to show the good parts only. This occurs if you are in tune with the flow of cosmic life.  If you don't know about that, it would be good for you to find out and join it.
   Needless to say, I had good dreams all day and awoke refreshed with a positive outlook on life and the future.  So much so, I look forward to my next night's sleep, even though it uses up so many hours of my lifeline.

Santa's Hot Items this Year

Santa goes modern this year.  Gone are the Furbys, the Tickle-me-Elmos, the Cabbage Patch Kids and the Transformers.  All replaced by semi-legal personal drones and hover boards, the modern version of a motorized skate board.  Add a raincoat to the hover board assembly and you have essentially a 1964 Volkswagen Beetle.  Since I never learned to skate or ride a skateboard, I will always be suspicious of any contraption that uses hands free operation for controlling speed and/or direction or stopping and starting.  I learned to ride horses but I consider them more dangerous than a motorcycle mainly because they don't have brakes or an on & off switch.
     The personal drone is every nerdy teen age boy voyeur's dream.  He can fly it around the neighborhood and peek in his female schoolmates bedroom window and possibly catch her sexting her jock boyfriend.  A sex-text he can only imagine never having seen one himself.  Not having a personal drone, he is restricted to his dad's porn collection.  He will then grow up and become either a pastor in his church, a closet homosexual or release his frustrations by shooting up his school lunchroom with an AK-47.  I hope his parents relent and spend the $500,00 or so and get him the drone.  The possible alternative is so much worse.  Next time, only have girl babies.
    On the subject of Santa; with global warming, don't you think it's time to get rid of the image of a jolly, old fat man riding a sleigh and wrapped in a red suit and furs.  Coca - Cola took him off their cans decades ago.  Maybe we need to stop polluting little kid's minds with images of snow and roasting chestnuts.  Probably 80% of them have never seen snow or a chestnut.  Can't anybody think up some new myths to occupy little minds to prepare them for a new reality?  Please try.

Green Thanksgiving & Black Friday

Tomorrow is the day for Americans to outwardly commit six of the seven deadly sins and inwardly take care of the seventh.  At home, they start with Gluttony followed by an afternoon of Sloth. Then they go to their Internet connection and consumed with Envy for people already camped out at Walmart who will be getting all the best deals; they quickly dress and head there.  Once in there, they react with Wrath toward other people trying to satisfy the communal Greed with the sale item they want.  They emerge with Pride they were able to trample other people and escape that fate themselves.  At last, they look with Lust on the swinging, shapely buttocks of the opposite sex person walking ahead of them in the seductive light of a shopping center lighted parking lot.
    And now we come to Black Friday door buster sale items.  For a small, easy to understand example take a look at the case of a high definition Japanese camera.  The Chinese build them by the boatload and sell lots of them.  A retail chain like Target or Walmart buys 20,000 of them.  As is customary for factories which don't want defective ones back, they will increase the order by usually 2% or 400 free cameras so the retailer can make good on a come back at no cost to him or shipping it back to China for a credit.  In our fictitious example, the factory price is $60.00 each.  They are placed in stores with a price of $149.99.  Dissatisfied with sales, marketing starts gradually lowering the price down to $109.89.  They see the year ending and they are stuck with 2000 cameras.  So since they aren't selling anyway they raise the price to $146.50.  Closer to the end of the year they send 50 each to 40 of their stores in the area.  They are the Black Friday door-buster special with $60.00 off the normal retail  price and only cost  $86.50.  The chain then makes 44% profit at the special price and a good time is had by all at the Winter Solstice annual Orgy.      

Faith and Religion

I think that faith and religion are two completely different concepts.  Faith is an important component of the flow of the Universe, kind of a cosmic jet-stream of time, events, problems and solutions, questions and answers like an endless river of the universe.  The important item to remember is that the flow direction is always positive and forward and good.  Like the unity church says "life is meant to be good."  Always remember though. a church is not a religion, it's merely a meeting of like minded people.
   Religion is a set of pre-packaged  beliefs, do's and don'ts, crimes and punishments, rewards and penalties, all handed down to people by their initial authority figures, most likely being parents. No one is actually born with any of this rigmarole as instinctive.  It isn't born into us and has to be inserted manually, again the role of that first authority figure.  I never tried to instill any particular religion into my children.   I did expose them to many belief systems but never said one was best or better than any other.  I did let them know that whatever walk in life they chose, I would always respect, support and love them.  Looking back, I believe that worked out well for all of us.
    To be happy, calm and stress free, it's important to find and join that metaphysical flow by first believing it exists and get in tune with it.  I've heard black people say to "go with the flow," which is an apt saying for anybody'  You first have to get rid of all your learned prejudices and limits to thinking clearly by realizing that all of us are different outwardly yet all of us are alike inside where we truly live. We are all lost children wandering in a world we don't really understand.  Stop trying to understand or trying to choose between frozen peas versus fresh corn and just accept what comes without question.  Once you can do this, you have found the flow and life will be in tune and good in many ways because you will have peace and faith in life being ultimately good.

Observations from a Van

Today I took a 26 mile journey to get a medical checkup and a blood test required by my insurance company.  For now, I am in disgustingly good health.  I say disgusting because then I don't get to go out at all since I have no free transportation to take me around to see anything other than the road to various doctor's offices.  I checked and Medicare just will not pay Uber or any other service to go sight-seeing. So this day was a real treat for me.  I got to see both sides of the road as well as a new part of the clinic I visit.  My doctor has moved to a new part of the building that also houses the Pediatrics section.  Strangely enough my primary care physician specializes in Pediatrics and Geriatrics.  She gets us coming and going. I tell her she should add Dermatology so she would have patients that never get well but don't have emergencies so they could be scheduled at her convenience and would never call in the middle of the night.  I have a lot of redneck friends that can't understand why my doctor for the last 13 years is a black female.  She was the best qualified doctor in a pool I had to choose from.  I have never been disappointed in her care.  Sometimes I wish she was a Muslim too so I could really piss off my idiot acquaintances.
  What I saw was not a city or country in decline; exactly the opposite.  New building  everywhere from stand alone shops or food outlets to new strip centers, each complete with a new nail salon.  I think the presence of a nail salon is indicative of the wealth of an area.  When people have enough extra money to pay someone to perform a simple task like taking care of their fingernails, the economy is just fine.  In California, there is a service to comb lice out of one's hair if they get them. Maybe off public toilet seats, lice not crabs.  They draw the line at pubic hair. All this just short of a butt wiping service with people cruising around in cars waiting for a cell phone call to converge on a calling address.  First one there like a wrecker service at an accident gets the job.
   Speaking again of cell phones; when I sat for some minutes, I saw babies using their mother's I-Phone as a pacifier or teething tool.  Toddlers with hand held video games, being introduced early
to a fantasy world.  If their parents happen to be conservative republicans, they are getting a running start on a lifetime of living in a fantasy world.  I hope not.  For the most part, the mothers seemed young and likely not having been exposed to Saint Ronald Reagan.  In fact, they looked like Bernie Sanders material.  The very first money I get extra will go to a jacket or t-shirt or some article that visually will identify me as a Bernie Sanders supporter.  Then I won't seem like some fanatical Witness or Mormon or wing-nut Evangelist when I give them some information about the importance of voting.  If they vote, they have a choice.  If they stay home, they are automatically voting for some nut like Donald Trump.  Vamonos y votar por Bernie Sanders.    


 

Our President

I have lived under 13 presidents in my lifetime with this present one, Obama, by far the best.  A lot of people judge a leader by asking "Am I better off today than when I voted for him."  My answer to that would be a resounding No!!  A much better criteria is to ask "Is America better off than when I helped elect him" leaving the 'I' out of the equation.  Personally I believe no one is better off than they were 7 years ago.  They have used up 7 years of their lifespan, hopefully learning more about why they were put here in the first place but probably not.  I once  heard it said that every person accumulates a dust pile during their life.  When they die, God comes along and kicks their pile into the air whereupon it settles on several other dust pines.  I think the meaning is we need to start giving others part of our pile rather than making it bigger  I believe God smiles on finding little to kick and can blow it away with one little puff.  In a little preparation for this effort I searched Google for some accomplishments during Obama''s tenure.  One site lists 309, which comes out to nearly 4 per month or 1 a week.  Not bad for a president who plays golf too much as he is accused of doing or going on too many vacations as counted by republicans.  People need to realize that when this country improves, everybody improves.  A rising tide lifts all boats equally, it's said.  When Obama was elected, George Bush had run us aground.  Obama first had to refill the water and get the boat unstuck before he could set a sail.  When he kept hitting either no wind or a contrary current, he just got out and rowed himself.
   Looking at the current crop of Republican candidates for president, I can't believe  any of them could tell bow from stern on ship "America."                                                                                                        

TERRORISM FEAR??

Mass killing by psychopaths, although instilling fear and trepidation, is not actual terrorism because it has no reason or ultimate end in sight. The earliest terrorism I can personally remember happened just short of 70 years ago in 1946 when I was 8 years old.  The Jews known as Zionists set a bomb to destroy the King David hotel,  The end was to force the British, who after WW2 was in control of Palestine, to carve out some land for the Zionists to establish their own state which they called Israel. Unfortunately, the land already belonged to Palestinians who were thrown off it to give it to the Jews. That argument is still on going but the terrorists got what the wanted through their actions in killing 91 people and maiming 46 more.  The major terrorists today like ISIL have a much grander scheme and that's to consolidate a major portion of the Middle East into a Muslim caliphate devoid of what they consider corruption of their religion.  They are threatening the US trying to get us out of our affairs, off their backs and let them do and live as they want to and have been doing for over a thousand years.  If they want to fight among themselves and kill each other, it's their business and not ours.  Americans are so terrified that a few hundred may die in an attack yet they ignore that we are killing each other at the rate of 83 people a day with our cars due to alcohol drinking and paying more attention to our cell phones than steering our vehicles. Add this to killing 85 a day with our guns and we lose 165 Americans every  day 24/7 and we tremble in fear in the face of a few terrorists maybe killing a hundred of us over the course of a year or so.  Except for Obama most of our leaders are craven cowards.  We should thank Providence that he is in charge rather than Donald or Ben or Ted or worse, Jeb.

Christmas in July

The Fox News manufactured war on Christmas is partly to blame for the gift buying frenzy that so many Americans go thru at this time of year.  I'm reminded of the Jewish family that before leaving on their winter vacation in the Caribbean on Christmas morning at their store they surveyed empty shelves, held hands and sang "What a friend we have in Jesus."
   I used to think it would be a smart marketing ploy to manufacture something in mid-summer that would set off another buying frenzy like Christmas.  Then I woke up to the fact that it already exists for 1.6 billion people that make up the majority in over 50 countries and 23% of the world's total population.  Toward the end of Ramadan, Muslims make a donation to the poor of actual food so everyone can have an Eid feast. The feast of Eid al-Fitr falls for several years in mid-summer. It's celebrated by a gathering in the morning of the first day for a sermon and a community prayer.  After the prayer, people go home to give gifts, especially to children & reconnect with old friends and distant relatives. School is out for three days and it's a National three day holiday.  If a retailer can't make a summer profit from 1.6 billion people with kids, he needs to find a new line.  The British call it the Ramadan rush and make many millions of pounds sterling.  There are estimated any where from 2 to 7 million Muslims in America.  Our Islamaphobia and stupidity prevents marketing to them although nearly all are loyal Americans.  If only America had a brain smarter than Donald Trump.






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Dress Codes

I think American men are so uptight about sex and so many other things is due to what is customarily known as business attire.  The biggest problem is the upper torso where they have little choice other than color.  Most politicians wear a light shade of blue because it shows up better on color TV pictures but they are required to wear a colorful rag around their neck on a shirt buttoned as tight as possible again around their neck.  In the rodeo game they tie a rope tightly around a bull's testicles to make him angry and he bucks wildly trying to free his balls.  Then they put a man aboard and he tries to stay atop for eight seconds or so. The bull probably doesn't even feel the man any more than he would feel a tick on his back.  I believe that psychologically human males feel the stricture around their neck and equate it with the bull's anger about the rope around his testicles and the tension created by society's unwritten rules.  If men would just wear a causal shirt with an open collar they could stop worrying about their balls and get along with each other a whole lot better.
   Women politicians are another breed of cat entirely.  I notice that so many of them are blessed wth humongous posteriors necessitating the wearing of pants suits.  From Hillary Clinton on down to Houston mayor Anise Parker women in pants suits are never photographed below their waists. Camera people have this unwritten rule probably out of fear for their own testicles.  Every so often a snapshot will slip through and you quickly agree with this photography rule.
   One day I'll discuss the Middle East and their night shirts and towels wrapped around their heads. The question exists that like the Scottish kilts, what's under those flowing gowns?  That's for another time though.  Check back.

Cell Phone Generation

Does anyone not have a cell phone  Too poor; the Federal Government will send you one for free with some free minutes attached.One of the funniest things I have ever seen involved two inebriated, homeless men.  One had obtained a cell phone and was trying to activate it while his pal watched.  He tried several times to enter the required numbers without success.  His friend said "wait, I'll get my phone and we'll try again.  When he returned, he said "now call out the right numbers and I'll enter them for you."  The numbers were called out and he carefully entered them, except he entered them on his phone instead of the new one.  It obviously didn't work and both threw down their phones in disgust.  "The hell with it" they agreed and "lets go and get some more vodka and maybe it'll start working."  And off they went in search of more alcohol.  As I observed; everyone has a cell phone whether they need one or not.
   Also, they always need a new one. The Chinese roll them out by the boatload and the distributors and sales people want more and more added to them to increase their sales until they seem like a Swiss Army Knife with about fifty fold outs with some scissors, a nail file and two kinds of screwdrivers till one is hard pressed to find an actual blade to cut something with.  Cell phones will find food for you. lock or unlock your home, guide you when you want to go somewhere, do your banking, etc. until it becomes a task to find the button to push with which to make an actual telephone call to somebody.
   I fully expect one day they will make a cell phone that can be implanted in someone's head.  I will then witness long lines in front of  "The Apple Store & Surgical Center" for the debut of the new I-26 skull phone.  Maybe a Republican Congress will pass a rule that will take us back to the good old days of two tin cans and a long string.  I guess I'm too old to be surprised by anything anymore.

Day of Rest?

I was going to relax and take off with the excuse of Sunday rest.  But laying back. I thought of all the people that don't get the luxury of a respite from hard work.  All the fast food outlets and workers in the food service industry that pays so little in wages that people are forced to work as many hours as possible to just survive with out the pleasure of losing even one day's pay.  Or enjoy the fruits of living in the richest country in the world.  It's really unbelievable at least to me how people with money and power that claim to be Christians or charitable people are consumed by such greed, they can't even think of others that only want a living wage that enables them to just move beyond mere survival for themselves and the people they love.  Watching the republican campaign debate shows that not one is in favor of any raise in the minimum wage.  Several of them even advocate doing away with the minimum.  How anyone with an ounce of brain, compassion or concision vote for any Republican is beyond belief.  If one opens their bible and finds the word Pharisee and substiutes Republican, they will understand why Jesus condemned them so strongly.  

Frustration

I'm a cranky old man but I do like to keep my eye on the young whipper-snappers that live up north in Washington pretending to run the government or trying to get in on the money feeding frenzy that goes on there.  To this end, I get this thing called E-mail and every day I get about thirty or forty letters from people that want to change things to make them better for me.  For example they ask if I want more money from social security, well sure I do.  Or make it eaier to vote or help out veterans more.  All good things I think and they ask if I agree and will vote for them or not.  Well, I sure will support their efforts.  Then they ask if I would chip in to help them get elected and they have a page with little blocks representing amounts I'm supposed to check on what I want them to deduct from my bank account or credit card.  But unfortunately by the time they ask, I have paid for my room and board, the internet access, medicine, etc.,there is nothing left to send them except my promise to vote for them and their causes.  There is no box to check for this, hence my frustration.  I truly want to help them financially but it's not possible until I get the income they will try to get for me.  So we have a catch 22.  Just put a box in there for that and I won't feel bad about ignoring their message.  As Tom Hanks says - "that's all I got to say about that."

Vacation Over

Back to work. I dreamed I was running for congress from the Doofus Party. They are a lot like the Republican Party except as our name implies we are a cut above republicans as far as intelligence levels in general.  Even more like republicans, we embrace religion as we interpret it.  Our holiest books were written in the sixties by the prophet, Max Schulman along with his disciple, Dobie Gillis.  One of our beliefs is a commandment to wash the feet of strangers whether they want it or not.  Taking a cue from the Mormons and the Jehovah's Witnesses, we also work in pairs or groups as our potential converts often struggle as the devil is removed from their feet where Satan likes to hide. Our
platform is to designate the American cockroach as an endangered species.  This ties in with our economic plan to impose a fine of $5.00 for killing of each endangered cockroach. And a fine of $10.00 for only crippling a cockroach without killing it and requiring our administration to supply necessary medical care for it's emergency status.  I just woke up and realized it's the new world order.  I want to go back to sleep but I can't; too much to do to get this campaign on the road in time for the primaries.





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Dylan Lyrics

I have been posting lyrics from early and mid-sixties songs written by Bob Dylan in an era of coffee houses, and singers dis-satisfied in the directions our people and government were taking us toward War in Vietnam and the general blase' attitudes about civil rights for all people, black or white.  I lived in New York those years and I am hearing young people voicing those same concerns now.  I feel I'm am witnessing a new awakening in the air.  It feels good to hear it on the internet from coast to coast from youth even after the indoctrination suffered in our broken education system.

                            ---  A Personal View  ---

Given that six financial institutions have assets today about 60% of the GDP of the United States. I do not believe that Congress has to ability to regulate Wall Street. I believe that Wall Street regulates the Congress and you have to break these guys up. --- Bernie Sanders ---  

Not much more to say. Just that in spite of Republican efforts to stop any voter who might oppose them, I have to believe there are enough of us to overwhelm their best efforts to just vote Democrat and throw their do-nothing people out with the garbage. I myself am being dis-enfranchised by rules keeping me from exchanging a drivers license I've had for over sixty years and replacing it with an ID card needed

to vote absentee since I am confined to a wheelchair and have no transportation for my chair and oxygen tanks to go to a drivers license office for an ID card. Thank you, Greg Abbott, Republican Governor of Texas for rejecting any increase in Medicaid. He campaigned about his being in a wheelchair for the sympathy vote. He didn't mention that it was caused by a tree falling on him or that a lawsuit resulted in a handsome settlement. They say every time a bell rings, an angel gets his wings. They should also say every time a poor person dies, a Republican gets his horns.

Senior Citizens

And the words that are used for to get the ship confused
Will not be understood as they're spoken
For the chains of the sea will have busted in the night
And be buried at the bottom of the ocean.   ---  Bob Dylan
 

A nation is judged by how it cares for its most vulnerable.
American seniors deserve to live with dignity and with a sense of security.
               ---  Bernie Sanders  ---



      Yesterday, the US Senate passed by voice vote a Re-authorization of the Older Americans Act of 1965.  The vote was 75 for -- 25 against.  I think many times a senator of one party or another will vote contrary to his parties agenda to please a segment of voters in his state knowing how the vote the vote is trending and knowing his yea or nay will not affect the ultimate outcome in the slightest degree.   This vote might tip the scales of a state that might go from red to blue or vice-versa.  The House of Representative is a way different can of worms.
       In the house, it's the Speakers job to try to bring some order and coherence to the various ideas and groups.  A herculean task akin to herding a clowder of cats.
I haven't been able to find out when the House might debate funding and passage of this Senate bill.  Hopefully before they all go home for their August vacation.  I wouldn't count on this happening though and certainly not holding my breath.

Deal with Iran, ,,

Then the sands will roll out a carpet of gold
 for your weary toes to be a-touchin'
And the ship's wise men will remind you once again.
That the whole wide world is watchin'. --  Bob Dylan


We've got to start creating a situation where our kids can leave school
and start leading productive lives.  --  Bernie Sanders


      I'm reminded of the John McCain refrain from his campaign policy,  "Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Iran..  Sadly, It's the Republican alternative to President Obama, John Kerry, China, Russia,Britain, France and Germany.  I think it's the height of arrogance to consider themselves more competent than most of the rest of the world.  Kind of like a flea on a a Grizzly Bears scrotum, a momentary itch and quickly forgotten.

      t's unbelievable how any of the Republican entrants think that the message of "screw 99% of the American people"  and "I've raised Hundreds of Millions of dollars to convince you to just bend over next November and spread your cheeks for your new masters.  If any but Fox viewers or Daily Caller readers fall for such obvious crap.  But, A rich,old man told me what  I should do to be rich like him and why would he lie.

   

Iran Nuclear Deal

 Oh the time will come up when the winds will stop and the breeze will cease to be

breathin' like the stillness in the wind 'fore the hurricane begins; the hours when the ship comes in.  -- Bob Dylan                                                                                               

The nuclear agreement with Iran is a victory for diplomacy over sabre-rattling.  

-- Bernie Sanders

As expected, Republicans and Israel don't like it. Surprisingly for similar reasons. Money!  One of the many reasons they hate Obama and his administration.  The democrats refuse to shovel the amounts and sweet deals they used to get even with their stranglehold on the US congress.  Netanyahu going to our congress like he owns it.  With all the people in congress and our federal government holding US and Israel dual citizenship, one has to wonder where their loyalties lie and their orders come from, Obama or Netanyahu.  All of them should have to choose one or the other.  We don't need a citizen of a foreign country making decisions regarding our economic and foreign policies.

    As for Republicans, the Military/Industrial complex is their cash cow.  The sooner they can quash talk of peace and diplomacy, the better.  The sooner the army needs more rifles and bullets, the sooner the kickbacks and bags of money start rolling in. Now with control of congress, no wonder they want to bomb everyone.  As a side issue, they want to test their ideology before the elections when they hope to make abortion illegal and get their hands on Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and stop all this healthcare crap asap.  Don't judge them by words, judge them by their actions.  

Hillary Casmpaign Speech 7/13/15

The line it is drawn, the curse it is cast, The slow one now will later be fast,  As the present now will later be past.  The order is rapidly fadin'and the first one now will
later be last for the times they are a-changin'.  ---  Bob Dylan

America becomes a greater nation when we stand together as one people and in a loud voice say no to racism and bigotry. --- Bernie Sanders

Poor, pathetic Hillary reduced to stealing Bernie's positions on the economy, the wages,etc. Positions and ideas she never talked about before now or offered anything concrete as solutions. She looks at the multitudes that listen to and like what Sanders has to say and know it's what he said for years and not now to get elected. His reputation is unchanging truth and people recognize and respond to that. People trust him and unfortunatly find it hard to trust her. So any plagirizing done by Hillary will never be more than a pale imitation of the Sanders campaign.

To be fair, a lot of what Hillary says or does is distorted, twisted and mis-stated by people who hate her and only want to bring her down. Due to her lifetime of public service they can always find something to hang their vitriol onto. In the case of Bernie, they can always make up something that turns out to be nothing more than obviously invented lie. Actually this helps instead opn hurts him.

Children need carer

If your time to you is worth savin' , Then you better start swimmin' or you'll sink like a stone, for the times,  they are changin'.


This is not a denocracy, it's Oligarchy.  Yesterday afternoon, Jeb Bush announced that a relatively small number of wealthy donors have contributed over one hundred million dollars to his Super PAC.   Let me be clear: I am more than aware our opponents will outspend us, but we are going to win this election. They have the money, but we have the people.  -- Bernie Sanders

I'm aways angry when fans are shouting, "we're number one". No,we're not.  As long 

as the children in Houston that went to bed hungery last night, will have to tonight again as well as tomorrow.outnumber the fans and their heroes combined.  If,hitting a littlr ball with a stick or throwing a bigger ball through an irom ring with strings hanging from it or catching an oblong ball or preventing someone else from catching it constitures heroism, then I just never understood the word or it's meaning at all.

Only 10% of the salaries of the Astros, Rockets and Texan heroes were added together, I suspect there would be enough money to feed all the hungry children in Houston for many dars in the future. Especially if the food was bought or donated and prepared by volunteers.  Probably more than enough hands if our money grubbing mayor was kept out of the effort. The end of my rant about heroes.

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Children need care

Oh,the foes will rise with the sleep still in their eyes, and they'll jerk from their beds
And think they're dreamin, but they'll pinch themselves and squeal and know that it's
for real; the hour that the ship comes in.  --  Bob Dylan

Election day 2016

Millions of children in this country are not receiving the quality childcare or early education that they need. - Bernie Sanders

I always get angry when a local sports team rides in a big parade with every one shouting we're Number One, see the heroes waving at you. What is so heroic about getting paid millions of dollars to hit a ball with a stick of wood, or running up and down a room to throw another ball through an iron ri ng with some strings attached to the bottom of it, or running up and down a grassy field to either catch an oblong ball or prevent someone else from catching it. Excuse me I can't see the heroism her.  I'll have to continue this blog tomorrow. Google refuses to let me finish.

FORMER PRESIDENT BUSH

I just read that George Bush collected $100,000 Plus $20,000 for a private plane to take him back and forth between Dallas and Houston.  A distance of about 300 miles.  All for a speech to the Wounded Warriors organization. People he sent to his phony wars.  Whoever in this organization asked him and paid him this outrageous amount needs to immediately lose his job and be blacklisted by all veterans groups.  Bush time and time again has proven to be a cold-blooded Sociopath. Haven't he and Cheney made enough money from war profiteers like Halliburton and Blackwater stealing money meant to pay local warlords. Or the 10 billion in cash that Rumsfeld claimed to have lost somewhere.  Has anybody ever found it or even asked about it.  
I seem to remember Laura Bush getting $50,000 for an earlier speech.  Bush's paid false press releases.  Like the hundred mile race he supposedly made for wounded veterans.  A member of my own family made that ride and never saw Bush anywhere
around there.   Just another Bush family lie.

The Amish have a custom known as "shunning" for people who break their vows of baptism and refuse to obey laws and regulations of the community.  George Bush is a prime candidate for shunning by the American people.  When a woman named Karla Fay pleaded for her life when she was about to be executed, Bush thought it was funny and mimicked her words like a comedy. This was from the testimony of people who were there that night.  Bush should be shunned by all Americans.  He should give back money taken from these valiant men crippled due to his vanity.  It would be the decent American way although his greed would always trump decency.  Don't look for restitution any time soon.    






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