Steubenville Exposes Ugly Truth About Rape

We currently are hearing so many feigned voices of shock and surprise about the rape in Steubenville,Ohio, after having had an election while one Republican candidate for the Senate spoke of legitimate rape after having co-sponsored the same bill with the Republican Vice Presidential candidate, Paul Ryan in Congress, to define legitimate rape as opposed to regular rape. Another Virginia Republican candidate called rape and the children born out of the same,” The intent of God.”

If women raped men we could all bet that women would be accused of being Jezebels and inspired by Satan if the reverse happened.  We could also guarantee ourselves it would be discussed as the most evil of acts and no woman would be left severely unpunished, regardless of how the rape occurred.

Men have gotten off with the excuse of going into a blind rage in an act of murder and instead charged with manslaughter when they kill another where women are often charged with murder 1 since the judicial system does not equate fear in women with the level of rage in men.  It totally discounts the idea that women can to act out of rage after years of abuse. Where women need a well documented history of rape or abuse, men need to establish little to no history either supportive or contrary to their own word in order to get a lesser sentence of manslaughter or for lawyers to refuse prosecution for rape charges.

When women are prosecuted for twice the amount of time that men are when death occurs in a domestic dispute, but treated more justly in other charges, we do not need to even guess how much harsher Society would be on a woman rapist than they are on men. Why so much shock and surprise over a statement that has been promoted for generations by the “Good Old Boys”,caused such a stir in the elections this year is beyond me.

Let me take this time to clarify the fact that rape amongst athletes has been taking place for generations just as the mentality has existed for Centuries, “That good girls cannot get pregnant from rape”, has existed as well. for the Republican Party or Press to deny the same is what is at the root of the ignorance in America.  To feign ignorance over rape amongst athletes or the idea that a child born from rape is a “Blessing from God,” are new ideas should leave us all sickened with those who continually dismiss the truth.  These ideas have existed since the beginning of time.

In the minds of the “Good Old Boy System”, and unfortunately some women as well, a legitimate rape is one that involves Street mugging or when a rapist breaks into the home of a woman and rapes her.  Any rapes that happen when a woman is in the company of men or marriage or in the man’s Apartment, barracks, frat house or territory, provocatively dressed or drinking, and the woman is raped it is no big deal to this mentality.  To many of both genders feel when this happens a woman is just asking for sex and rape does not happen under these circumstances.This attitude has always existed over the years, and continues being the attitude of to many.

Etiquette stated years ago, and perhaps still does,”One should never speak of politics,sex, or religion while in mixed company.”  Although I believe we have developed too casual of an attitude towards good manners, I do believe that not talking about politics,sex, or religion has left too many of us brain-dead on the issues that should matter and be discussed by all of us.  When we say the subject bores us then we are the ones who lose.  This post discusses all three subjects.

Allow me to tell you,the not so uncommon stories of its’ day in regards to women and rape.   I change the names and do not name the locations but I will not tell anything but the facts in the telling of these three stories. The names or locations are not important as these stories took place across our Nation in Jane and John Does and in anywhere U.S.A. during the era in which I write, along with years in advance of the same.

One generation does not often tell these kinds of stories from previous generations because it has to often been bred into the older generations to keep secrets in the past, or perhaps with time memory does get lost, behind both denial and disease.I begin from the truth of my own memory, that is still well-preserved. I Thank You for that Dear Lord, as I also inherited the mouth to tell the truth! Way back when there were the Landers Sisters writing and publishing the Nations problems, I was nicknamed Ann Landers since both men and women felt comfortable in telling me things that they would not even tell their husbands or wives.

1. It was the Spring of 1959 and an eighth grade girl ,who was rumored to  have been molested by a family member, was dating a young man,and together they had sex,previously,to the young girl attending a keg party with highschool athletes.  She was severely gang raped that night, as a result of drinking at the party.  No local lawyer, would take her case. The young victim had a wealthy aunt who lived 75 miles distance from the town, who could afford to pay for a lawyer, so they were able to hire an out-of-town lawyer.

When the case came before the judge, the victim’s boyfriend had been rounded up and forced to acknowledge that he had sexual relations with the girl who was the victim in this story.  The Judge threw the gang rape case out of Court and his finding stated,”No young man much less young boys could be held responsible for rape when the young girl in question, had previously de-flowered herself and was drinking alcohol under age.”Nothing was said about the young boys drinking illegally,of course.

2. In the Winter of 1964 a Catholic Priest, who the Church knew had a History of molesting young women, was given dispensation from duty as a Parish Priest and instead sent on the rounds of filling in as a speaker while conducting retreats in Convents and All Girls Catholic boarding Schools.  The same happened during this time with Priests celebrating retreats in all Boys Schools, when they had a history of molesting young boys.  The Catholic Church has come clean about their history but so many other Private Schools and Colleges are still denying that this still continues in their schools.  The Penn State Coach is NOT an uncommon story but just one of many.

3.  Going back to my farthest memory, any Sports player or Coach who brought fame to their sports program whether it was highschool, college, or the pros, were entitled to take anything they wanted to take, regardless of the size of the Town, City, or Religious affiliation. If the athlete is part of the team but not a star player then they will be used as the fall guy for the stars to remain clean. Unless it was burglary, where a Store refused to drop charges but in most cases even they could be bought off, if the athlete was a star and changed his ways.  Most Teams, while traveling elsewhere to play outside of their own town or City will have a team of scouts scouting out the local scene for a Party for them to return to.  These Parties since the 1960′s have both girls of questionable morality as well as virgins rounded up to attend.

Highschool girls have always been amongst the attendees of both sports and fraternity parties. It may be cool to a 16-year-old virgin, or not, to think they look older than they do and to go ahead and drink but when these girls do, it excuses the boys from showing the girls, respect. To many believe that when a girl says “NO” they are only teasing and instead they really want sex.  Boys have been told for generations that some girls need more convincing and when they say “No”, they really mean yes. Dress and drinking in women has always been grounds for rape, if they get drunk or even if drugs have been placed in their drinks, at these parties. I certainly do not accept that this mentality has ever been right but pretending we have not only tolerated it but promoted it for generations, makes it even more deplorable now when we deny the same.

A woman or young girl who is unconscious from drugs or alcohol has never been hands off in the minds of some boys and men and to pretend that this behavior does not happen or has not happened in the past is just another lie of the “Good Old Boy System.” I do not deny that there are some girls whose morality can make some mens’ behavior, pristine, but until we accept that prostitutes are raped, then we deny reality.

We fail women and our sisters alike, when we hold all women responsible for the behavior of a few.  All women have always been held responsible for those few women; where as all men and their behavior has been excused because of the behavior of the few women, who would set up men and yell “rape.” Rape is as unpleasant for most women to have to divulge the details and to relive the rape in a Court of law, regardless of their background, as it is for a man to get his penis removed, and yet we have always blamed victims of rape, for causing rape. Women, not men, are raped again by our judicial system.

Regardless, if it is a house party or a frat house across America the boys and men of the crowd are egged on to feel that rape is justified because “Good Girls” would not be there drinking if they didn’t want sex, has always been the mentality of the “Good Old Boy System”This mentality has existed in the “bad boys” as well as the Sports teams going back at least to the 1950′s when I first heard the stories told to me by the girls who had been raped.  Going to a man’s house or apt. under the guise of having a cup of coffee or to listen to his music, has existed for just as long, as a reason for rape.  It doesn’t have to be alcohol and to pretend that it does is only promoting the same lies. I’m sure those older than myself will tell my readers the same statement of fact, if they care to be honest with their grandchildren.

For a bunch of right-wing Republican men and the media that backs them,to feign ignorance or to act flabbergasted at the same while they continue to deny women,that this has been and remains the mentality amongst the “Good Old Boy System,” for centuries, sickened me in the Republican elections this year.  The fact that the media is now pointing a finger at Steubenville,Ohio, as being small town and unique in their cover up of the most recent rape being broadcasted, leaves me equally sick.

No one who has ever served as a cheerleader or been part of the popular or un-popular group could not possibly have attended highschool and had a successful Sports team, without knowing that this behavior took and takes place whether they were or are girls or boys.  The mentality that allows whole communities to protect rape and the behavior and mentality that broadcasts,” That these women deserve to be raped”,comes from a background in which we began early, hearing these stories as always being the fault of women. Too many women who serve on Juries are even worse than male juries when it comes to pointing a finger at the rape victims. To many times the lives of all boys, girls, and women who are raped, are destroyed by the men and women who protect these lies.

To deny that as a fact, has to make all of us ask,”Just how far has America slipped into denial?’  Will we deny that 67 Republican Tea Party members attempted to hold up funding for the Hurricane Sandy victims while FEMA was saying they were going broke and could not pay back the families who had paid into their flood Insurance?

Will we remain in denial of the fact that 183 Republican Congressmen and Senators could have cared less if it cost the middle class 100s of thousands of jobs, if we had gone over the fiscal cliff?  Did we elect them because their ideology is more important to us, than are our children and elderly, who will go hungry or without effective medical care? Will we all do better living on the Republican and the N.R.A. ideology that makes us feel unsafe without a gun in our homes even though a third of all deaths of children result as our having a gun in our homes. Will their ideology make us a better Democracy if we cannot provide for our families?

Does the N.R.A. lobbying the Republican Congress, who followed through on their bidding, to disallow funding to the Disease Control Center, make us feel even safer against Disease? If this sounds like a stupid analogy to those of you who protect the Republican Congress, rape, and guns, then just think of what you, yourselves, must sound like to the rest of the World!

Will we keep denying the fact that 50 some economists outside of Washington are saying that the only thing that is stagnating the American Economy is the 67 Tea Party members voting against the needs of the people along with the far right in Congress, who clearly want to see government go broke before they serve the needs of our elderly? Even Wall Street has joined the side of the Democrats on the damage being done to Business growth and jobs by the uncertainty of the Republican Congress. How much more can we deny until denial renders us all brainless when it comes to human decency and common sense?

I ask you,”Are we now going to pass the blame on to a bunch of kids in Steubenville,Ohio, for doing what men have always done or are we going to finally acknowledge the injustice of it, ALL! The guilty in Steubenville needs to be prosecuted along with others in our Nation.  I certainly do not mean to make allowances for the people responsible for such an ugly crime in Steubenville, Ohio, but it is our Nation’s problem. We all must take responsibility for denying these problems have always existed and still do exist.

We begin by eliminating the mindset that allows us to remain in denial, to the point that those amongst us simply accept it as “Just being the way it has always been,” before another election brings in more of the same mentality that cripples us as a Democracy. To accept it as being the way it is, has always been a second crime of humanity, against both our children and women. Those who tell us they want to go back to the 1950′s morality are lying to all of us about the truth that existed then just as it does today.

I warn all parents to think twice when they think popular,”is all that,” because a cheerleader and a popular girl are twice as likely to be raped than is a less popular girl. These girls also peak early just as the ball players do, and their best memories are as children or in highschool.  They learn ,too often, to settle for less and have a far greater chance of becoming pregnant as teenagers.  The “nerds”, on the other hand, have far greater statistics when it comes to those who go on to challenging careers following a College education and happy and contented lives.  If we parents cannot consider long-term results as a priority in our lives, then how can we expect those younger than ourselves to have common sense?

When we set up our own children to continue under the system that many of us tried to stop, we punish our children for the sins of the parents.” When we lack common decency,our children lack the same.  When we make everything about ourselves then our children do as well. When we as adults deny truth of fact and our children are raised on the same, we create the monster that often leads to more half-truths and false accusations against the victims of our Society.

Ultimately the same mentality leads to an increase failure in families and a bigger concern of increased crime in children at a much younger age. We cannot deny that the viciousness of our youth crimes are not increasing with the mentality that blames the victims over the perpetrators. As a Society brain washed in gun ownership our children have emerged as the losers. We need to hold both parents responsible for the failure of the child while we increase our endeavors to spot and treat both mental illness and drug addiction as the diseases that they are.  We need to give trained professionals who recognize the need for early intervention and parents the ability to get the help these children need through our Court Systems.

Those who claim family values would not need to talk about family values, if they had any.  Conversation along the lines of family values or the worsening of morality ultimately gives our Churches a bad name for failing at their jobs. The Conservative right is doing a bang up job of destroying Religion along with the Republican Tea Party, when they are not doing it to themselves. When questionable and charismatic Religion preaches the “Prosperity Gospels” while bleeding money from the poor and middle class and then blame the poor and middle class for their own poverty due to a lack of Faith, it is time we all voice our outrage. It takes the voice of the people to stand up to the injustices taking place and have taken place under our noses for generations. It begins with placing the emphasis on the right priorities without attacking the victims.

It never solves anything to talk when we need to be acting to stop the mentality in all of the new generations while charging those,” who do not get it”,in a Court of Law.  The mentality of,”Boys will be Boys,” has always laid at the root of the corruption in morality, since the beginning of mankind. If we want to make a difference, then we must begin today in telling the younger generations, who are our future, the ugly truth of yesterday.

To tell our grandchildren that children and women experienced a kinder gentler time in History, is and always has been a lie. Any adult who refuses to accept reality, needs to also accept that they are jeopardizing the future of their children and grandchildren, when they choose denial of the facts, over the truth. When we know better then we need to do better as a Society and as a Nation of laws.

To blame Steubenville alone is ludicrous, because if we leave them carrying the bag for what has been wrong for generations,around the World, we leave all of our children unprotected against rape,guns, and our own stupidity.  For the sake of our children, we must begin with changing the mentality, that we have allowed to go on.  We can no longer deny our own behavior and motives when technology shows us the truth and refuses to tolerate lies.

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The Irrational NRA Leadership

When Wayne LaPierre, Vice President of the NRA held his press conference today, and got up to speak I got so sick to my stomach of his propaganda that I hate to write this post drawing attention to his speech.  If I don’t talk about it and point out just how severely insensitive the man was then, I like to many others will let that type of mentality pass off to those who do not know the heart of the American citizen, think his brand of callousness lies in the hearts of the majority of Americans.  As expected he blamed everyone but the NRA. Politicians politicizing it, demonic behavior, gun free school zones as an advertisement for the disturbed,video games, the lack of guards in our schools, the entertainment industry and the media.

If anyone read my post yesterday entitled,”Why Do We Lead The World In Suicide’ then you know I pointed out the cultural differences that we all must share in and the responsibility we all must take to keep our children safe.  We do not need guns in schools because they offer a false sense of security to those who carry a gun.  They also offer a challenge to those like Timothy McVeigh who went to a bomb where armed guards were, instead.

The facts are that the majority of us who own a gun will not and cannot shoot to kill another human being and we will either freeze up when called on to do so or we will shoot wildly into a crowd and kill more innocent people. Even policemen, who are trained to use a gun, know to shoot their guns is the last possible choice they have to make,since we have an established record of collateral damage and more lives lost as a result of having to use a gun in a crowd, throughout our History. Armed guards in banks and air ports know not to shoot where people are gathering.  The guards only end up being another victim when a person enters the space or establishment and far more guards are killed in businesses,Court Houses, or banks than are armed robbers, because they do not want to harm the innocent around them.

I don’t know what kind of sick home Wayne LaPierre grew up in or raised his children in but his statement that,” today’s children will see 16,000 murder scenes by the time they reach the ripe old age of 18,” is so totally inaccurate that if it wasn’t such a serious subject it would be laughable.  Movies of sexual or violent content are rated in America and children who do not have an ID of proof of age cannot get into a PG13 or R rated movie.  I know that to be a fact, even when they are accompanied by an adult.

I don’t doubt there are irresponsible parents who could care less about the movies their children watch at home but to declare them as the norm is totally adding salt to the wound of parents who do not allow their children to watch these movies or play these games.  Many homes have controls on their computers and televisions that will not allow the viewing of these shows and television warns adults when something is not appropriate or wrong for children to watch as well.  Even our news programs will place a warning prior to showing it.

Facts number two are that the very same movies named and the very same video games that Wayne LaPierre named play in Countries like Britain and Japan and are the very same video games played in both Countries. A ten-year study shows that they do not influence children to kill but violence in a home acted out by parents can and does. The Industrial or Civilized Nations have as much porn and as many people who prostitute.  They work to buy and over spend as well.  All the same things we have in our culture they have as well.

Britain and Japan are as civilized and advanced as we are and have the same kind of Democracies as we do. Britain’s Military is as strong as our own. The prices and costs in Japan are extravagant along side of what we pay for the same. The raining London skies and the Cramped Tokyo Apts. lead to as much depression and thoughts of suicide in these Countries as much as they do in our own but they do not stigmatize mental illness the way we do. They have free treatment facilities where anyone who is suffering from mental illness or delusional thinking can get help free, at any hour.

What separates all other advanced or civilized Countries from the United States is they do not have a powerful lobbyist that has brain washed gun enthusiasts into believing that the right to own a gun is a higher right than the right for people to be able to live.  When murder happens they do not have a Wayne Lapierre blaming everyone and everything else but themselves for the murders in their Country because they have gun laws that lessen those deaths.  Britain averages 600 murders per year in total and Japan has practically none while the United States has 18,000 suicides or 32,000 murders per year.

The facts are that no other civilized Nation tolerates the mentality that the NRA has and the irrational thinking that they hold nor do they use the lies or the scare tactics and the despicable words the NRA uses to blame everyone but themselves. The National Rifle Association leadership, needs to convince gun enthusiasts that everyone else is wrong and they are right otherwise they may lose their own power through lost of membership dues.

They are amongst the most powerful lobbyists in the Nation and no conservative politician from either the Democrat or the Republican Party can get elected without the support of the NRA.  Other Countries refuse to fight murder and suicide by using guns to protect against guns because they are rational enough to understand that people cannot kill unless they have months of training or are disturbed enough to commit suicide/murder. These certified programs that Texas and Utah like to talk about are three-days of watching videos and training at a gun range while shooting at a target in order to get a certificate to carry a gun in school.

To give teachers and school workers,  in places like Utah and Texas a certificate of completion of  a gun training course does not qualify them for training that allows another human being to fire under threat of gun fire or to kill another human being while looking into the eyes of someone who is just a kid themselves. How much more desensitizing of our behavior towards the power of the gun over the value of life are we going to tolerate in teaching our children, as a Nation, before we yell enough! Do we really want our youngest and most innocent strapped with the knowledge or fear that their teacher or the nice man with a gun or themselves can be killed at any given moment?

Teachers are trained to keep our children safe and we want their thoughts to go first towards protecting our children, over running in fear or stopping to kill. Teachers who care are not trained to kill the next young man who walks into the building armed to shoot. Many times they are students or past students of theirs and they are not going to be able to shoot to kill.  It is irrational thinking on our part to think they can and equally as unfair as to think they should. We may think if it is our lives or the lives of a child we all can shoot to kill but it is pure and literal nonsense. Firing a gun is not like going out to the paint ball course and shooting paint balls at each other. The fear or the need to survive under pressure of assault in the untrained, takes over control of all rational thoughts that we have when our lives are not under threat of danger. We freeze,run, or if we shoot we shoot wildly injuring far more others than lives we save.  Firing at a target is not the same as looking a human being in the eyes and firing.

It takes a well trained or a disturbed mind to do so and even then that trauma follows those who are trained perfectly, the rest of their lives.  Ask any military personnel or policemen how devastating the effects are of taking another life in defense of the Country, is on their lives, even when it is done for a higher honor.  I have lived with the results of those who fought in wars and too many times they are haunted by it forever. Many come home and turn to alcohol just to live past the nightmares that enter their sleeping hours or become workaholics in an effort to forget.  Their marriages and their lives quite often fall apart.

The mistake the media made was to allow that kind of propaganda that is spread across America by the NRA and some of its followers to even be broadcasted. As soon as they knew they had been had by the National Rifle Association they should have shut them off just as they do when a politician says something that is not of their political persuasion.  When this propaganda is spread it only leads to desensitize the minds of those who are already desensitized to the point that it starts making perfectly good sense to them.

No person who hunts wild game, even after hours of target practice, will escape what is known as buck fever. It takes practice to be able to shoot game animals before becoming an accurate enough shot to make the bullet connect with the game animal being shot. Even seasoned bird hunters will experience buck fever when switching to larger game animals.  Buck fever is the name commonly given to the hunter who will both sub-consciously and automatically pull up on their gun when shooting rather than to kill the animal.

It is not an automatic reaction in clear thinking humans to kill with a gun on instinct and it requires months to train people to kill out of a necessity or a higher pursuit of justice. Both the Police Academies and Military training requires men and women shooting blanks or live rounds above the heads of those in the fields to acclimate them to the reality of being able to fire at a human being every bit as much as it takes hours to train humans to remain calm, in order to kill out of necessity in war or when under attack. These are not normal traits that we adapt to on a first reaction under attack.

The guns Mr. NRA said the media is lying about and the politicians are trying to find fame in and that are being politicized hold magazines that leads to massive deaths.  Does it really matter if they are military or assault weapons when they fire in rapid succession?  Don’t they kill just as quickly and destroy the lives of our innocent just as well. They certainly cannot be used for hunting anymore than the ammunition they protect can be used to hunt when its only purpose is to pierce the vests of policemen and police women who are killed in the act of duty by the same.

I have acknowledged that it is our culture and the love of the gun  that needs to share responsiblity with the NRA for gun deaths in America but it does not hold a candle to the deaths that are caused by people arming themselves with a false bravado of thinking they will be able to shoot to kill.   Nothing inspires the fantasy  or gives forth the power to kill more than those who are too meek to murder or encourages those who are disturbed enough to murder faster, than the thrust of a gun. The gun feeds those fantasies in the minds of the disturbed faster than anything else that they can do.

Those who will cause murder have no conscious and we cannot try to rationalize  our minds with theirs. I repeat, people who are armed are killed  far more often by the perpetrators than what the perpetrators are killed. They always have the element of surprise over us and a great many of them do not have the same fear of death because many of them are seeking out suicide by cop.

Guns in the hands of those who are not thinking realistically only offers us a false sense of security that is quickly over taken by the perpetrators. Those who are disturbed do not hear the noises and sounds we hear as many are disturbed or can only hear the voices in their own heads.  They do not even hear the screams around them that make us run out of fear but as soon as we think we can pull a gun and shoot we will be dead with or without our three-day certificate that gives us a license to carry a gun. It is a fact!

I am sick of the hate and the fear tactics of the NRA and if you viewed the same that I did and could not see that expressed yourselves, I can only respond that Americans are much more sicker than I thought.  The NRA fear and propaganda tactics are not only false but they are irrational and have no place in the power that runs America. It sickens me that such trash talk was allowed to be spoken on our media services at a time we are already sicken by the deaths of our innocent, by guns.

Instead of talking about banning ammunition and magazines that only serves to kill humans along with high powerful and assault weapons, Wayne Lapiere and the NRA paid for monkeys successfully changed the subject to arming personnel in our schools where our children would be subjected to even more violence.  Anyone who thinks the bullies or gangs who hang out in some of our schools across America would not find a gun a worthy challenge to be taken, are not being realistic about what really does go on when the disturbed are made to feel powerful behind a gun.

What can I say other than may the Season offer some design of light into the hearts and minds of all of us and may we be infused by the Holy Spirit and Guardian that guides us towards common sense and intelligence to know the difference.  May God help us all in letting the goodness in all of us shine through the insanity of it all. God Bless us and God Bless America.

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Why Do We Lead The World In Suicide?

Today I will offer my own opinion along with established fact that leads me personally to believe what the problem is behind the increase in murder/suicide in America.

We are second in the World in front of other advanced Nations after Montenegro in  percentage of suicides, where such records are kept.  When we think of ourselves as the Nation that people from other Countries want to immigrate to, we have to ask ourselves as to why our suicides are so high?

We  again begin with the N.R.A. interference into gun registration and add to that Americans’ love of the gun and its accessibility to people in America.  When the NRA not only fights against gun laws but also fights against people having to show proof of the lack of mental illness or treatment for depression when buying a gun, then guns end up in the hands of too many people who should never own guns.  They spend millions in litigation to fight privacy laws in favor of gun ownership. With the sponsorship of gun shows by the NRA across the Nation that require no waiting period what-so-ever and the illegal guns of street sales, America is flooded with guns.

Living in the land of guns and honey brings along with it the stress that often goes along with keeping up with the Jones. People do not miss that which they cannot hold,own, or goes unseen in their lives. American workers work longer hours in more extended days straight than any other Nation in the World.  We have fewer and less holiday and vacation days of any other Civilized Nation. We out work all other Nations in the World. Todays’s workers work longer hours than any generation has before them.

A person who struggles to feed their family or to provide basics are not nearly as likely to feel that they are missing out as those who are accustomed to getting what they want over what they need.  If we have paid attention to school shootings at all, we must have noticed that the majority of these children are white males who come from upper middle class or wealthy homes when murder/suicide does occur. It is much easier never to have had it than it is to have had it and to lose.   Americans many times marry their jobs since they spend many more hours on the job than they do at home, and when they find their jobs pulled out from underneath them it can and does trigger murder/suicide in the work place.

We are a Capitalist Society that invests in trade over the needs of the people. We are the only civilized Nation in the World that does not pay the entire healthcare costs of 100% of its people but yet we remain the richest Nation in the World. We  subsidize commerce to a far greater degree than do all other Nations just as our costs of the greatest military in the World cost 10 times more that what the rest of the World combined pays to maintain a defense system.

We live under stress every day of the week and often with wants that we either can’t provide for or feel we need. Many of us have not learned to make sacrifices now in order to enjoy life later. The exposure to goods in America,technology,clothing stores, and all other retail stores leave us wanting or feeling we are being denied.

With the breaking of the backs of our Unions across America by men like Sam Adelson who has vowed millions to eliminate them and the Tea Party Governors along with Republican legislatures  supporting the right to work laws without the same coming up for vote in our States, the middle class are dropping $5500.00 per year. Despite the facts, 47% of the American people who are primarily middle class voted to guard the gate of the 1% by voting Republican in our past elections. Stress in America is the number one killer because of the message driven home by too many for the need to own more, at the expense of the middle class.

When we started closing down mental Institutions because of the absolute abuse that was triggered by the lack of laws protecting our citizens, we went the other way and left our loved ones defenseless when it came to getting help for mental illness.

Previously to closing down the mental Institutions across America and the passage of the Equal rights amendment husbands could declare their wives unfit to raise the children and have her committed without even a record of instability. The husbands word alone was enough and many times he could get a Dr. to agree to the same without even seeing the woman. People who suffered from vision or hearing loss or were slow learners were committed into Institutions.  When the laws were lax towards those who could commit others, so much abuse reigned across America that it led to shutting them all down.

We are now in a cycle where those who are desperate for need of treatment for mental illness cannot get the help they need.  It is too easy to prescribe drugs without any follow-up or counseling.  Some general practitioners along with chiropractors, will prescribe both narcotics and antidepressants that lead to both aggression as well as further anxiety and depression.  In America if a person knows the right people or wants to find someone who will prescribe or supply drugs or guns all things are possible.  It only takes money to get whatever an American citizen wants both legally and illegally.

Even with good counseling and a drug plan that works parents cannot force adult children to remain on their treatment program.  The very symptom of some of the most grievous of diseases that lead to bouts of severe depression is that the patient will be made to feel better and believe that they can quit treatment which only aggravates the disease and makes it worse.

Drugs are readily available in America to both Street people and those who start out life as high achievers.  We are a Country that has a high tolerance for both guns and drugs while our Conservative politicians appear to be against the same with public messages over the years. They in reality will never face off against the lobbyists or the NRA who put millions into their pockets for re-election. Illicit drugs in America makes up 33% of our Gross National Product. Many killings in America are as a result of the flow of illegal drugs and the need to protect the distribution of the same.

We have 17 Republican controlled States that have passed the “Stand Your Ground Laws” with 6 more States discussing arming teachers. Too many amongst us have no concept of the danger of guns because it has been romanticized as part of our culture and of the old Wild West. When these same States are talking about arming teachers they are ignoring that any gun on school property is susceptible to causing collateral damage even in the hands of trained policemen.  They also are denying that even guns that are safe guarded in schools can be easily over taken by the gangs of bullies who often hang out in our school systems and intimidate teachers. When sliding steel pocket doors that close instantaneously and are impenetrable to those who threaten entry  from the outside are being used in facilities across the World the mentality of the American mind instead goes to more guns to protect against guns.

When people who suffer from mental illness are not confined for their own good or their own needs because Insurance Companies refuse to pay and  Obama care is ridiculed and fought against in sectors in fits of rage, then we leave ourselves and our loved ones vulnerable to the stresses and ills along with fits of depression that can and do lead to suicide. Instead of treating our mentally ill and  drug addicts we imprison them.

Any Nation of wealth encompasses people who make comparisons because too many times the politicians themselves will belittle or blame the have-nots while promoting those who have. The Republican Party appeared to accelerate that belief this past election with attacks against the poor in their own leadership and the need to adopt the Ryan Plan in order to deny the needs or in most cases the rights of the people. When those who are feeling rejected from loss of jobs and incomes, or are being bullied by others, are made to find their own uniqueness a fault rather than a plus, we leave open the potential to not only suicide but we harbor those who would take down our children with them.

We are a Society who puts too much importance and stress on the things we own, on beauty,skin color,appearance,money, and popularity. We encourage sameness or like beliefs, over encouraging individual expression.  We too often fail to encourage value in the uniqueness of each individual to express that uniqueness but instead demand that we all share the same belief system. Those who fail to fit into a cli’que of like mentality are often shunned,ridiculed, and bullied.  We support violence in the games we play and the movies we watch.  The movie industry knows and understands that movies without sex or violence will too often fail at attendance and revenues.

Our educational system is not supported by the Conservative causes and ranks low in comparison to other civilized Nations as a result of it. Bright children are too often criticized for their superior intelligence and not supported by a system that inspires them up to their abilities to succeed, due to limited funds granted to the School districts in our States.To many amongst us push our children in all categories that will gain them popularity over education and in doing so, to often it leads to mediocrity while insisting they excel in sports.  When highschool coaches feel that winning is the only thing that will save their jobs they offer steroids and muscle enhancers to their young players and it starts a panacea of corruption in our sports’ programs. The stress to always have more and to do better leads us in advancement in many fields in the world,  but it also breeds the ravages of failure, in those who feel as though they cannot achieve or have been left behind.

We self medicate on drugs and alcohol to cover up feelings of inadequacy or pain, because we place a astigmatism against mental illness. We do not tolerate those who expose our own weaknesses. The people who cause such carnage as was done in NewTown Connecticut, are usually those who are coming down off of a bad drug trip, are feeling neglected, powerless,weak,or worthless. Behind a gun they feel omnipotent and powerful and ready to show others who they often feel have either ignored them or made them to feel less of the person than they are.

We as a Society ignore and deny the power of the gun in the hands of those who would not otherwise kill, because of the control of the N.R.A. in our Nation or the fear tactics used against us to protect ourselves. They are not the only ones who use fear tactics as home alarm companies call and exaggerate home invasions in areas where none exist along with those who promote gun sales and under ground bunkers. The home alarm companies calls are being made in homes illegally as I have received the same  even though I am on the government “Do not call list.” They get around the law by claiming to offer a free prize. People rush gun stores and buy military weapons that have no business in any of our homes each time they think they will be denied their guns by law.

Those who act out in total disregard of human life do so because they lack empathy for anyone but themselves or they feel disrespected. In neighborhoods where drugs are sold on street corners,others die over drug sales. Others feel that they have been so ridiculed that they can only seek justice behind a gun. They may suffer from irrational beliefs  but they know full well that they will leave behind pain and destruction. Many times they feel that they will be a person whose name will go down in history as having made a difference, while knowing full well the misery they cause.  We as a Nation have romanticized people like Jesse James,Billy the Kid, Bonney and Clyde, Annie Oakley and other outlaws of the old West as heroes over generations, and in doing so we have romanticized the use of the gun to settle disputes.

Those who cause a silent suicide or one that does not draw attention to the outside World often do so because they are suffering, or cannot face the future, or feel that they are a burden on their loved ones.  Others are fearful of the future because they become so steeped in Religious conviction of Armageddon, or that God wants them or their children saved  from a sinful World, or suffer severe mental illness to the point they hear voices from the devil to kill. Other suicide/murders are committed over child custody or domestic disputes when they have access to a gun. Often times those who are afraid that they are lacking because Societal norms do not accept them for the person they are, will feel that life is not worth living or are driven by the need to gain revenge and do not consider the pain they leave behind because the act of murder/suicide itself, is most often an act of “Me Only.”

People who are sensitive to those who criticize, and often times are made to feel they are inadequate or weak are made to feel powerful behind the gun. It is just as likely to be a meek personality as it is an aggressive personality that uses a gun to kill.  America has 18,000 suicides a year where other Civilized Nations, who keep records of suicide, do not reach higher than into the 200′s. In total of murders and suicides we have 32,000 people lost each year. All other advanced Nations who have a much lower suicide and murder rate offer free mental health services that give parents more control over the treatment of mental health and much stricter gun laws.  It does not take a rocket Scientist to understand why America excels in the numbers of suicides and murders over all other advanced Nations in the World

Along with the greatest Democracies in the World comes the freedom to misuse that freedom through both abuse of others and self-inflicted wounds. With freedom comes the need to protect its citizens through just laws.  Americans should have a much greater right to live over the right to own guns.  We need to do a better job in understanding that our people as well as our children should never have to feel that they are less than the need or greed of Capitalism in a free Society. If we keep electing a Republican majority in Congress and in our States, who refuses to act in the best interests of our people, then don’t we have some responsibility to bear for the same? We are coming out lacking as a Nation because of our own lack of demand and insistence on the fact that our politicians can do better.

It brings some comfort to me to see that at long last we have hope at least that those responsible will do something but the proof still remains in the pudding. I long for the days when we can again promote the many qualities of all of the American people who are supported by all of our elected politicians, instead of a few.  America is still the best Country in the World but we need to be honest about our faults in order to make much-needed changes. May all of our politicians be strong enough to stand up against the lobbyists and brave enough to bring forth all the good qualities that are representative of America.  Wishing all of us hope this Holiday Season!

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Being Genuine

Webster dictionary describes genuine as actually having the reputed or apparent qualities or character.  To many times we have people using words to describe others when they do not own or practice the qualities needed to possess or own character, themselves.  It was a repeated error made by candidates for election throughout the Nation this past election year.

When Governor Chris Christy of New Jersey showed his own Party what real character was or expressed genuine feelings in his praise of President Barack Obama’s quick response to the disaster in his State, due to the hurricane, men who like to refer to  themselves, as men who protect the standards of family values in America,criticized Christy for being genuine in his complement to our President.

When we as a Nation have leaders who criticize others who are genuine or fail to compliment others and treat it as a heresy when they compliment  or speak to a member of the opposite side of the aisle, can we really expect them to do what is genuinely in the best interests of those of us who are in need of their leadership?  Will men like Paul Ryan,Scott Walker, or Rubio, meeting and discussing the need of the Republican Party to become inclusive of the Hispanics, lead us to believe that they are genuine if they continue to vote against the equal rights of women to make decisions on their own procreation or to their own health, or when their Republican members in Washington filibusters immigration reform?

Are these, the often spoken about, the young new hopefuls of the Republican Party, any better than what has destroyed the “Grand Old Party?”When they speak about the Americans who fall on hard times as being the “takers”, while they vote against the needs of the people or refer to those of us who paid into government as, “people with their hands out who feel entitled”,or try to pass laws against victims of rape in defining legitimate rape, will we see any genuine change in the Republican Party when these young men are chosen to lead our Nation?

Doesn’t the Republican Party need men in it instead like Bob Dole who was genuine in his actions towards the disabled, the poor, and the need of the Republican Party to know and understand the needs of the people?  Aren’t these new young Tea Party members only an extension of what is wrong in the Republican Party?  Aren’t we the American People totally tired of words that are opposite of the actions they practice when it comes to voting against our rights and needs?

Too many times in our own personal lives we make allowances for those who practice disingenuous behavior because they are the beautiful people,the most charming of our children or friends, or because we want to be more like them or a part of their group. The new generation just wants to be respected by their parents instead. When we ourselves are less than genuine it shows all over our bodies and faces to those of us who recognize phony or shallow values.

When these politicians do the same, too many people, who are less than honest themselves, will be taken in by those who are not genuine. I once had a person tell me that my biggest problem was that I was too moral for the group as they did not place a high value on morality.  Isn’t that also at the root of why we keep electing people who are less than genuine in their leadership? I applaud the American people who did not accept or support the practice of lies , that won these men the elections in our States and Washington in 2010.

Have we forgotten already the way they won or their legislation that brought in the right to work laws that eliminated our protection from the Unions against unfair labor laws?  Will we forget the bills that they tried to pass against a woman’s right to choose or the involvement of the Tea Party militia in hate groups?  Will the Corporate Press be able to convince us of all the wonders done by these men of the future who stormed our States in 2010 and began laying off teachers,firemen and police while decreasing the wages of the workers?

When Republicans are promoted to run in the highest office of the land in 2014 and 2016 by the GOP, will we forget that they have been less than genuine in their practice towards the needs of the middle class when it came to an economic recovery and of giving us real jobs with fair hours and wages? Will we forget the passage of the right to work laws that denied the American workers and their Unions the right to vote because 27 States had Republican governors who were financed by the Koch Brothers? Didn’t many of the Republican governors lie to the people while they denied the workers their right to Democracy? Isn’t this currently  happening with Republican Governor Rick Snyder in Michigan?   Don’t these Governors represent the future of the Republican Party and the mentality of the Tea Party while the wages of the middle class continue to decline but the wealth of the rich increases two-fold?

Despite their argument that without the right to work laws corporations fail to move to their States and that these laws release people from having to join the Unions; they fail to say that Federal law already states people who do not want to join a Union need not do so.  These Republicans offer absolutely no proof of the truth in their Statements.  There is a simple explanation for the same and that is because there is no proof in what they state.  The proof that does exist is that the average worker’s income drops by $5500.00 per year along with benefits while their working conditions worsen.

The Corporations continue to win while the workers continue to lose is the fact with the right to work laws and there is no proof when 22 States have adopted these laws that corporations do move in. Why should they change from the States they already do set up residence in, when the majority if not all of the Red States where these laws have passed previously, have always offered corporate welfare to Corporations previously to these laws being passed in swing States? Are we the middle class foolish enough to believe that these Corporations will give up all their bread and honey, along with their facilities, equipment and trained staffs in the Red States in order to take less in the swing States?

If they should happen to move to the swing States, which is unrealistic, how much more concessions and job lost do we think it will cost the middle class workers? Would the workers in the Red States continue to believe that they lost their jobs,health care,and pensions because they were taken over by vulture Capitalists in the claim their Company was losing money? Don’t we already know the truth is that the greed of the Republican Party along with the greed of Wall Street is responsible for job lost over job gain?  What will it take for all Americans to understand this concept?

Michigan Republican Governor,Rick Snyder, like so many other Republican Governors in 21 other States,totally ignored the right of the workers to vote when the polls showed that only 6% of the people in the State of Michigan favored this move. Many in the Red States do not even know if they are a right to work State because they have such a heavily backed Republican legislature along with a conservative media, who does not keep them informed.

Do we feel that the current Republican Party is genuine in their representation of the truth when it comes to balancing the budget and avoiding the fiscal cliff in Washington?The truth is that the Tea Party members have dug in their heals again, just as they did the last time, and refuse to accept President Obama’s proposal of at least lowering the taxes on those who make less than $250,000. and John Boehner, is blaming President Obama instead of himself when it is his job to lead his own Party as Speaker of the House in Congress. They all appear on camera instead for their photo opts and profess in unison that the problem is that President Obama has sent them nothing while they reject his offer of cutting 4 trillion dollars and raising the taxes on the wealthy.  The only thing they seem to be able to agree on is to lie in unison to the American people. They began as “the Do Nothing Congress and they will finish out the four years” as the same.

Are they any different from the Republican Governors in our States? Have we already forgotten their 100 plus filibuster attempts against the middle class that would have protected the needs of the people and gave jobs to the same over their protection of Corporate? Don’t we realize their main goal was to make certain that President Barack Obama was a one term President?  Do we really believe that these same men will now compromise in order to keep the economy improving when they have fought against President Barack Obama’s attempts to do the same in the past?

With all their excuses as to why they lost just how genuine are they in understanding their need to be all-inclusive of the American people?  Is it just another example of empty words on their part? Does our own belief system fail us when we are asked  to remember the behavior directed against us by them? Do we learn to hate others who do us no harm, because we have a genuine belief system that tells us that hate is acceptable? Does our own belief system excuse us from making excuses for ourselves instead of taking action?

Is our problem that we long- ago lost touch with practicing any kind of value system based on genuine values, ourselves? Do we have a clue what we believe when we are called on to fight for the same?  Do we believe instead what we have been told to believe so we go into denial when we see or hear a real lack of sincerity in the same?Are those who promote family values, actually those who talk about values but find morality too difficult to maintain themselves?  We need to be interested in politics and the history of our politicians if we are to hold them and ourselves to a higher standard.

When we fail to hold those who would lead us to higher standards, it is we who lose.  This is true when it comes to raising our children and in teaching them right from wrong because we practice what we preach.  When we fail to make morality a priority in our own life the first to understand that our words do not match our actions, are our children.

Many a straying spouse does not just prove to their spouse that they are not trustworthy but they also teach their children that adults cannot be trusted or the person they most admire lacks morality when it comes to being an adult. Many children will turn a deaf ear to what they feel is nothing more than gibberish when they recognize that the behavior of the adult in their lives does not match the words they speak. Sadly, others will emulate the same behavior when they become adults but they will many times prove to their parents that they can do a better job of failing  than what their parent or parents did when it comes to being less than genuine.

When we talk about how busy we are but our children never see us get off the couch they believe the ”busy talk” in us is less than genuine.   When  our children’s  needs to be disciplined go unprovided for, but are replaced by wants instead, we raise children who grow up feeling entitled without them making any efforts towards justifying the same in themselves; too often some will adopt a grandiose image of themselves while being totally void of human empathy for others while they often lack the understanding of what it takes to be ambitious.  If we never teach our children to take genuine responsibility for their own behavior or to care for their own needs in the home, but instead we make excuses for them or wait on them, we deny them the right to find genuine satisfaction in their own accomplishments.

When children are left untrained and untaught they often grow up fearful of being independent from us or to immature to leave home and to form their own belief system.  If we always treat work as something to be dreaded, we teach our children to be lazy instead. Too often we adults will go into denial before we accept the truth of the fact that our child’s behavior is out of control. The lives our children live while they watch us, when it fails to match the genuineness of the words we speak, often leads to denial in us and confusion in our children.

This is true about any behavior or words that leave our lips.  When we are less than genuine the first to accept it as being normal behavior in adults, are our children.  The fact that the youth vote went over whelmingly for President Barack Obama should show all of us who fear the “Me first and now” traits in the youth vote, that we are dead wrong in our judgements. Just as sometimes  the callous of heart appear to belong to the Tea Party or National Rifle Ass., we totally over look the value in the young who would put many of our generations to shame. President Ronald Regan means nothing to them and invoking his name did nothing towards winning their votes.

We forget that this generation of young people learned from us not to trust.When one out of every three homes on the block experience some form of  abuse in it, they have learned that they cannot trust adults to protect them.  We cannot turn around and place the blame on them without taking our share of the blame and pretend to begin to solve the problems that we face as a Nation, while talking about family values,if we do not understand that as adults our generations were far from perfect,as well.

The 1950′s were anything but what they have been romanticized to be but instead were hidden under the lies of injustice and under the veil of secrecy. The same environment allowed for the inhumane and violence of the Jim Crow laws to continue unchecked along with the violence and inequality of not just the tragedies of those laws but also the lack of laws that protect women and children against extreme abuse.

Those who would advocate the return to the 1950′s are not being fully cognizant or honest of the hardships and lack of humanity of the era.  When we fail to act out of genuine concern for all of our people, ourselves, we are certain to elect officials who would ignore the tragedies of the era,and instead repeat a history of genuine injustice. We as a Nation cannot return to a time of ignorance and injustice but we need to move forward by electing legislatures who  protect all Americans by making certain that the laws protect our children regardless of race,creed,gender or gender orientation, who are the most vulnerable amongst us. The spread of half truths and ignorance only makes hate breed.

Just as those who are aware of past injustices, and fight against the return to the same, we need to acknowledge in more recent times our children were victims of their babysitters, Ministers,coaches, and Priests,others their uncles,neighbors or Boy Scouts leaders,still others their step fathers, dads or mothers, others grew up with drugged,beaten,or alcoholic parents, and still others were prostituted by their own parents. They were warned about pedophiles and terrible behavior in adults that many of our generations were not aware of even existing.

Much of this same behavior happened throughout previous generations as well, but when it is kept as a secret in the closet to take to the grave we grew up being told it was our sin to bear and an isolated happening or worse yet, normal behavior, to practice as adults ourselves.  In keeping the secrets of those we were led to believe we should emulate, we lived our lives in turmoil being convinced we were the demon seed, where as todays generation understands that it is not their fault but the fault of the adult, once they are of voting age. This behavior is not limited to poor neighborhoods but happens on every block regardless the socio-economic conditions.

Many of our young people grew up to find their Sports heroes, steroid addicts or shot or killed in drunken accidents. Others were given drugs by their coaches and told to take it or else.  We adults left them devoid of the heroes we took for granted.  They did not have Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, or Martin Luther King to offer them hope in their lives.  They have no reason to trust the adults in their lives because if they were not victimized they have a friend who was.  They certainly are not going to take a politician’s word for something when their actions are less than genuine and they watched their mom’s work two or sometimes three jobs because they were not paid the wage that their Dad’s were.

They were not bought off as Mitt Romney said with “free birth control” but they have seen too much disingenuous behavior in adults in their lives to be bamboozled by less than genuine politicians. Many of them have no reason to any longer fall for the charismatic who will lie to them.  When abuse was not a part of their life they grew up with the ability to express themselves.

The fortunate ones had parents who encouraged them because they had parents who did or are doing a better job of instilling morality in the next generations than our parents or we did, so the young amongst us who are our future, do recognize the lack of words matching the actions in those who would lead us. It is way past time that we, just as the youth vote does, demand proof of the genuine actions of our politicians to hear us the American Public, and to act as our leaders over lying to us. If the Republican Party continues to fail to understand that their behavior and performance has been exposed and has come out failing,  they will continue to lose elections.

When the Republican Party learns to run legitimate candidates who are genuine in their words matching their actions, then the Grand Old Party will return fully vindicated of its past history and will again be representative of the needs of the people. Talking about it will prove nothing when the conversations are about play acting warm and fuzzy feelings or concerns for the middle class,women, and minorities but their actions taken, prove otherwise.   They cannot deny the voters the truth when their own votes, platform,voter suppression, and actions betray them as less than genuine, nor will it win them votes of the American people.

When the Republicans refuse to accept genuine actions speak to the heart of the youth vote and those votes that they are accustomed of getting, are the votes of the dying generations, then they must change their own actions or become distinct along with the dinosaurs. Unlike those of our generation and before, young people do not buy into the belief that a candidate is a “Nice Young Man”, nor do they vote the way they are told to vote.

Todays’ young people grew up on the internet and are much more likely to check  out the voting records of the candidates  against  their campaign speeches. Bullshippers in politics are on their way out with tomorrow’s voters. The Republicans need much more than empty words or the Hispanic vote in their corner and in most cases, they are assuming that the Hispanics have a short memory and are not computer savvy as well.  No one takes the privilege of voting more seriously than an immigrant, denied.

I wish all of us the appreciation of having genuine people in our lives who surround us this Holiday Season.  May we all be so Blessed as to attract the same with our own honesty while understanding the need of it in all of our own lives. The Holiday Season is not about making comparisons with our neighbors, but about taking pride in the generosity of the American spirit that we helped inspire, while embracing those of us who express the truth of that same spirit.  Celebrate the genuine goodness in all of us by giving of ourselves to what ever Religious or Spiritual belief we hold dear, or as a sign of our genuine love expressed, and give what we can spare to the less fortunate, as a reminder of the real purpose of this Holiday Season.  God bless us all!

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The Fiscal Cliff

Speaking as someone who has been the majority tax payer, and speaking for many others, it is a crime how low our taxes really are in America.  We have not paid as low of a tax rate as we are paying today since the 1950′s when a cup of coffee was a nickel and a Coke cost a dime.  We are paying the same taxes that we paid when a child could take a dime into a candy store and come out with a sack full of candy or a comic book. The cost of gasoline was 22 cents for a gallon of gas and a Ford automobile cost $1500.00.  A baby could be born in a hospital for $200 and a good quality dress cost $25.00 while we could buy dresses from stores like J.C. Penney for $5.00 each.

The average wage that was considered good pay was $1.06 per hour in the 1950′s, and was years prior to minimum wage going into effect.  When minimum wage went into effect in 1968 it started at $2.25. Companies said they would go broke and got around the law then by hiring two part time workers to replace the full-time worker.  If you were considered a service then you did not have to pay minimum wage.  There were no benefits from healthcare to 401ks. The taxes went up and climbed higher in the 1960′s,  over what we pay today.  If they and we could pay the taxes then or more than we do now, and it was long before the baby-boomers were retiring,  then something is terribly wrong when the Republicans dig in and refuse to let the taxes go higher to meet the needs of the people at today’s prices.

We do not want people going hungry in America or our children and the elderly unable to buy medicines just because a bunch of Tea Party members cheered when one of their own said that the poor in a coma should be left to die if they did not have the funds to pay their hospital bill.  The majority of us are not of the mentality of The Koch Brothers and are not the kind of people who the Republican Congress claims to be representing by not letting all of the Bush tax cuts run out.

The richest Nation on earth should be able to pay for the needs of its people without it being called socialism.  We are the only Nation  of the civilized world that currently refuses to pay for the total healthcare needs or to invest in the educational needs of its people, as a priority, because of the current Republican Party. When they put greed of Capitalism before the needs of  ”We the People”, and refuse to believe that the American people have given them a referendum to put us first, then it is time we all question their motives to do otherwise. We can no longer make excuses for them as they make excuses for themselves as well.  We are not against Capitalism but when its greed continues to be protected by the Republican Party over the needs of the people, then it is time that we tell the Congress we are watching your stall tactics and judging you accordingly.

To have a bunch of Congressmen who operate on the Grover Norquist tax pledge to continue to hold the middle class hostage in an effort to deny food stamps for the hungry or healthcare to our children or elderly is the same disgrace that is represented in the Republican Party and encouraged by the Tea Party.  The Congress has the misguided idea that they won a mandate instead of accepting the fact that they won a handful of people with the hope they would bring better clarity to their own Party in an effort to force the Congress majority into hearing the needs of the people over the greed of the Country.

Does the Republican Party believe that the middle class who have already been stuck with the fact that the Republicans spent the “lock box” on Social Security that provided for the future healthcare needs of the retirees through 2072 and were asked to bail out the greed of Wall Street, while the same Republicans refused to pay for two wars and stuck the middle class with all the same, that they can now convince the middle class that we have a Republican majority who are looking out for a balanced approach to the economic woes that we  face? Do they assume that the middle class is so out of touch as not to be aware of Republicans insistence to back the same programs that have failed us will be supported by us?

The real American majority re-elected President Obama in the hopes that the Republican Party would quit arguing amongst themselves and accept President Obama’s agenda for the middle class.  The Republican Congress do not have a leg to stand on. When people like myself, who truly do pay the highest tax rates in America, are saying we  pay too little in order to support the needs of the people and therefore we are willing to pay more in order to balance the budget in Washington, then how can the Republicans deny that they are dug in so far, in order to represent  American men such as Sam Adelson or Donald Trump, over “We the People”?.

When we add to that the  fact that Billionaires for tax increases have gone to Washington to lobby the Congress to increase their taxes then we realize the Republican Congress is operating on their own agenda and totally ignoring the mandate that they were given by “We the People.” We did not hear about the Billionaires lobbying because that was a little secret kept by many in the media in order for them to use their own fear tactics spread against the dangers of going over the fiscal cliff.  The truth is that it will cost little to nothing if we do because even the Republican Party are smart enough to know it will cost them elections for years to come, since they will be blamed for it and their own ideology is responsible for the same.  Most of what the media are reporting is just more of the Republican hype while they continue to stall.

As a Nation, none of us can any longer afford the Bush tax cuts and we are all willing to pay our fair share as long as it is fair and balanced for everyone.  If the only way we will get resolution and fairness or have the Republican Congress hear us, when we are telling them. “we are willing to pay more,”  is if we go over the fiscal cliff then I say,” let’s go over it.”  Hell lets even jump over it.  Does anyone have a  parachute or a bungee cord, they do not need? Its time we stop the bullies in Congress and if the only way we can do that is to go over the fiscal cliff, then let’s go!

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It Is Not About Us

As Congress looks for and finds blame with their insistence that the deficit be balanced on the backs of the middle class,the students,the elderly,and the poor while refusing to look at the role they play by the continuation of the same, there is plenty going on in our lives that is about us.  While Corporations refuse to hire here but instead send jobs overseas to increase the wealth of its board members, it is about us. When we are not educated to meet the demands of the ever-changing market place it is about us. When weather causes havoc and turmoil in our lives, it is about us.  When we lose loved ones and are left to grieve our lost, it is about us. When others who can afford to do so, refuse to carry healthcare and we get stuck with their healthcare costs with increased premiums because Congress wants to eliminate Obama care, it is about us. With so much in our lives that affects us it is sometimes difficult to understand a lot of other things in our lives is not about us,as well.

Many times things happen around us and unless we understand that “it is not about us”, but rather our response to it, that causes us to get involved and often times it leads to our own pain, we will waste way to much precious time in our lives that will keep us from enjoying life. When a couple divorces to often,if we allow them to drag us into their lives by taking sides, we will end up feeling like we are the loser as well.  If it is a special friend and we take sides while the couple separates, it will to often cost us what we feel is a close friend, if the couple decides to reunite.  Even if we do not take sides but try to help the couple to understand each other, many times they will regret what they confided in us and feel uncomfortable around us because they told us to much about themselves, and too often we lose both friendships, even when they divorce.

The above situation had nothing to do with us but it is when we get involved in other people’s problems that it can become about us unless we realize it is they who have lost a valuable friend in us, and we cannot call ourselves a friend unless we do try to help, that we realize it is not about us but instead all about them.

I had an incidence in my life that took place when I won at the Casino and the person I was treating said,”God let me win because He knew I would be more generous and share than she would have been if she won.”  First of all, I do not believe that God had anything to do with my winning nor does He have anything to do with money.  I think people use the idea that God is in control of every facet of our lives to the point that if we even sneeze that God caused us to, instead of the fact that it was an allergy or cold that caused us to sneeze. I choose to believe that God is with those who suffer and give of themselves instead, since He gave us all free will and helps those who helps themselves. If God was responsible for everything in a person’s life then He would have no time left for those who call on Him in time of need.  My winning was not necessary for me to live,eat,breath, or find joy in my life,nor did my gambling cause us any hardship.I was thrilled when the machine hit, just as all of us are when we win.

I won because I went to the casino, without the other person even being in the same State much less the same Casino, I took the risk that gambling involves, and I chose the right machine at the same time it was ready to pay off.  Any person in the Casino could have put the same dollar amount in as I did and won the same jackpot. Our generous spirit may be a gift from God, as He does reward the generous in spirit ten fold, but my winning at the Casino had nothing to do with God nor the person who said I won instead of her.  We to often in our lives look at other people’s success or failure and think that either has anything to do with us.

We may all make mistakes as parents but once our children become adults they also take on the responsibility for their own behavior and if they allow others to mistreat them or they mistreat themselves,we can not help them if they refuse our help. If they become a success,then they deserve the credit over us because, “It is not about us.”  We can be concerned about them or proud of them but ultimately as adults they do decide what road they travel, with or without our approval.

As their parents,we only have control over our own response to our adult children’s actions and can only offer support when they ask us for the same. To force our beliefs on them robs them of the ability to form their own ideas or beliefs or to accept the mixing of their belief system with that of their spouses. Our adult children, and especially once they marry, need to make their own decisions even when we do not approve of it and they refuse to listen to what we often think is sound reasoning. “Sink or swim” our adult children’s behavior,  is no longer about us beyond our own reactions to it.

The sadder part of life is when our own children, who are not adults, emulate that character flaw in us that thinks everything is all about us, by thinking it is their fault when bullies bully them.  Bullies are made at home by over demanding parents in some cases or by neglectful parents in other cases.  If a child feels defenseless against the parent who thinks they are disciplining but instead the parent makes the child feel like they are  being bullied by the parent or a child cannot find reprieve from their own hurt feelings, many times they will bully others who they feel cannot or will not fight back.  When parents tell their children to hit back they help create another bully on the playground.  When teachers punish both children because they fear the parent of the bully or have not seen who is being bullied then to often it can lead to tragedy.

If we could as a Society tell our children that the anger that is unleashed by the bully is “not about them”,but instead about the home the child who bullies comes out of, then we could begin sitting down and discussing our differences with the bully. When Schools refuse to play a role in the discussion when the bullying takes place on their property, they fail the child who is being bullied by expelling them from school for the equal amount of time they expel the bully. When negative behavior is enforced by negative responses we teach our children that the adults in their lives cannot be trusted to do the right thing.

I had a case,myself, where I thought it might be possible to have an adult conversation with the parent of the bully, but instead the parent went into name calling and telling me it was not her problem when the child I was speaking about did not haul off and hit her daughter back.  It was not about us, but the children that needed to be heard, and it was lost on the mother of the bully.  Teachers run into this same attitude of these same parents, when they do show up but many times it is the concerned parents who show up instead.

We parents first, need to understand that there are people who are going to try to control the circumstances in their own lives by controlling those around them and it has nothing to do with us, unless we demand zero tolerance of bullies in our own homes,schools, or environment and do something about it instead of obsessing over it.  When we make everything about us, and then do nothing but complain we teach our children the same. When worry or inaction is viewed from the seat of children, they learn to tolerate what we have tolerated for to many generations,as being normal behavior. If schools,businesses, or we do not punish small children who bully,or permanently expel people who play on our fear or lack of action, then we all tolerate the bullies and it does become about us. Our children learn nothing through fists or violence but to be violent in return.

Just as there are kind-hearted people, there are mean-spirited people as well. Both types of people will co-mingle in almost any kind of group.  It has been my experience that a majority of men will just consider the source of an insult when issued by a woman, but some will fight it out when it comes from a man.  Not many people look at a fist fight as much of anything other than plain stupidity, so why do we tell our children to do the same?  If we ourselves cannot treat the person as having their own problems and know they treat everyone else the same way, then how can we tell our own children that, “It is not about us, if we do nothing to protect them when we do have supervision over them?”

I ask everyone this Holiday Season to consider what I am saying.  Store policy is not about us but about others who do shop lift or steal.  We may pay for their theft but if we feel that the questions being asked are about us, instead of policy, too often tempers will flare and our children are watching our own performance.  The same is true when someone is rude enough to cut in line; for us to allow someone else to spoil the experience of the Holiday shopping, when,” it is not about us” because we lose sight of the fact,that angry words will never make it right, but instead is a negative response from us who only adds to the chaos, then we understand what our own response does to inflame the problem.  Two wrongs never does make a right.  As Bill Clinton said,”it’s about the math.”

We need to spend more time thinking and communicating civilly if we are going to succeed as a Nation,as parents, or as the person we most want to spend time with during the Holiday Season.  If we ourselves are filled with anger that is spreading all around us,if we are rude to others, if we have a need to control, if we take a bad day out on others around us, if we are mean-spirited, then it is about us.

If we are none of those things, “Then It Is Not About Us.” When we understand the reality of another person’s bad behavior “is not about us”, we refuse to let their bad dispositions destroy our own joy.  If we insist on the opposite, then we are making our feelings dependent on their negative feelings which they are responsible for, and  as adults who said or did nothing to harm them, we are not responsible for their lack of respect.  Everyone will have a bad day but everyone is not entitled to ruin our day unless we give them permission to do so.

Have a good day everyone and enjoy the responses in yourself that you create ,that ARE about you, and let the other things that you allow to destroy your day go. The majority of harm that is done to us as individuals are many times as a result of our own reactions to life and is often created by our reactions to a disagreeable human being, who has their own issues to deal with, without our taking their negativity to heart. Enjoy the Holidays and celebrate!

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The Herd Mentality

In the beginning of mankind it was necessary for us to form together in a herd just as it is for animals to form herds and to gather together in flocks for survival.  A group of people or a tribe could defend against danger or against predators more effectively if they maintained a large group or herd.

They could forage together more effectively for roots,grains and berries,hunting that provided the meat, and gather together for warmth. Absolutely everything was shared by the group with a leader chosen by them to lead and he,because rarely was a woman trusted as a leader,was entitled pretty much  to anything he felt entitled to, as long as he kept the needs of the people first. He would always be served first before the group and any gem stones,feathers,or tools made were presented to him first before the others could share the spoils.  Just as the animal world has a hierarchy so did mankind.

In the animal world the male fights for the position against the weaker and the same was often true in the early days of mankind until after mankind advanced enough to the point that the title of leader was then passed down to the first borned son, generation after generation. Long before there was a government, long before there were Democracies,long before politics and political Parties, long before there was a Republican Party who referred to working together and picking a just leader of the people, who made sure the people were provided for,Socialism; mankind depended on a just and fair leader of the people. The people in return rewarded their leaders, so to declare as Mitt Romney did that the people were jealous of his wealth, made as much sense as too many other ridiculous statements he made in his campaign.In a civilized World today we still need leaders who care as much for the needs of the people as they did then, even though we no longer need to gather together in herds for our survival.

The protests that we often see in the Streets of a free Nation only arise because the people feel that they are being disenfranchised or starved to death by leadership.  The fact that the Republican Party with the help of the media, such as Fox News, only scoffed at the Occupy movement moving across America to stop the greed of the 1% over the needs of the 99%, has a great deal to do with why the Republican Party lost the election this year.  They had become so accustomed to ignoring the needs of the workers that they apparently felt they could run any candidate that they wanted to that would bend to the wishes of the far right and we the poor and middle class would succumb to their wishes because they used the herd mentality against their followers by whipping them into a feeding frenzy against President Obama.

So convinced were they that the deck was stacked in their favor to win that even when they lost Paul Ryan said,”We only lost because of the turn out in the Urban area” while denying they lost 40% of the over 55 vote,the youth vote, the women’s vote in the suburban areas,the gay vote,the Asian vote,the Hispanic vote,the Jewish vote, as well as the agriculture and blue-collar vote in States like New Hampshire,Iowa,Colorado, and Ohio as well.  They even lost the Catholic vote as well as both Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney lost their own home States, and yet in their denial, they are still trying to claim they ran a good campaign.

None of us are so stupid that we do not realize that when Republicans like Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney speak of the Urban vote they are talking about the poor and the African-American vote and when they insult one of us they insult all of us.  We know that first and foremost, we all are Americans together, and the Republicans are not granted leadership unless the American majority,made up of all American minorities, say they are our choice.

They cannot divide us even while they claim that our President is responsible for doing so. When Mitt Romney in his continued arrogance claimed they only lost because of the gifts (Obama care) given to those in the Urban area and free birth control to the young women, by President Obama, he only added more insults to the already bruised majority of us combined, who voted against the arrogance of the Republican Party as much as we voted in favor of the man we felt could better care for all of the American people.

If the GOP continues to refuse to accept the fact that they cannot run a bunch of clowns who are not interested in the people but instead pretend they are by spending billions of dollars and making voting against those who will not vote for them,as miserable as possible, they will continue to lose.  The middle class has lost too much income while the wealth of the wealthy has grown,for to long for the Republican Party to think they can continue to disenfranchise us as a group.

Modern mankind, often led by women who are also the majority voters, will not be fooled into subjection by their leaders, on a pact of lies and  billions of dollars. Adding conservative women to your party that are led by the beliefs of the far right will not fool those of us who do know that we are as equal as anyone else in America. The GOP’s problem runs much deeper than just winning back the Latino/Hispanic voters.  As Haley Barbour said,”The GOP needs to find a good Proctologist”, or as I say,” they need to get their heads out of their b….s long enough to understand they lost overwhelmingly,” and we both mean the same thing.  Republicans lost this election because they offered nothing different from what we have been paying for the last decade and will be paying for  generations to come,  and because we are not a right-wing Nation who denies equality to its people.

The blue-collar workers cannot be forced into giving up their Unions in favor for less pay and longer hours under the Republican control in our States,nor can they continue to fire teachers,policemen, and firemen and then expect our votes.  They may have won 53% of the white vote but basically that is about all they won and with those numbers they lost. It is no one’s fault but their own so it is time they quit making ugly excuses instead.  It is time that men like John McCain accepts that he lost in 2008 and give his along with the bigots like John Sununu, in the Republican Party, bitterness from his and their lost, a rest.

If the GOP wants to continue with their insistence that women are denied the right of equality to their own bodies while they try to win back the Latino/Hispanic vote while dismissing the rest of the minorities in America, they are going to continue to lose because just as the leadership in early mankind needed to be ever cognizant of the needs of the members in the herd,or be threatened by the uprise of the herd, today’s leadership needs to be aware of the fact that the needs of the people are fair and just as well.

We may be modern mankind with all of our own flaws but we still recognize a group of Bullshippers when we see and hear them.  You lost Republicans so lick your wounds and start rebuilding a Party that reflects the needs of the people over your own greed and run legitimate candidates with legitimate concerns for the people of all races,genders,gender orientations,and religious beliefs, over the lobbyists and the bigots, and you will again win over the vote of some of the people who do accept the needs of capitalism to grow as well.

Capitalism cannot continue to stockpile trillions while the workers go without food and homes and then turn around and  expect the workers to vote for the Republican Party who protects Wall Street at the expense of the people.  You lost, accept it, and get to work rebuilding a respectable Party over the disaster based in greed that you now own.  You fooled no one but a few but mainly yourselves.  The truth hurts sometimes but only when we own it can we make necessary improvements towards change in ourselves.  No one doubts that the GOP needs to tear down their structure and rebuild except those of you who march to the drum of  Carl Rove,Grover Norquist, the Tea Party, and the far right,still.

Good Luck and get to work adding moderates to your Party because the angry old white men are a dying breed and it is time you all learn to accept it. We do want to see two healthy political parties again,but it must be based on the needs of the people and have some truth in what it tells the people as well as the needs of capitalism, with a genuine leader at its helm.  We the voters are not going away.  Once burnt twice learned.  We do not need another Bush as in Jeb Bush, either. We are sincere in our wishes to see the Republican Party and their platform rebuilt on reality and on a new foundation. Once we do, and are convinced the people matter, then some of the voters will return to the GOP.

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What Causes People to Hate?

Hate comes from an inner turmoil within the thoughts of an individual and can commonly rise to the level of anger that explodes out of control in individuals or groups. What may begin as a neighborhood dispute between two people can end up becoming a neighborhood dispute involving the entire block if people begin taking sides. The same thing often happens in families with everyone being forced into taking sides, when any issues should remain between the two individuals to work out together.

We often find the similar thing happening in divorce cases where each of the members try to convince their friends, and sometimes their children who were the victims in a marriage, while an over-whelming amount of the time the divorce couples themselves divide the loyalty of their friends or their children’s affections. Too often because the real abusers in the relationship are often charismatic by nature, people will side with the abuser over the victims; Even when marriages remain intact children will often side with the abuser since they are so starved for affection from the parent who abuses they can be manipulated by the abuser who often with holds affection or pays them off with praises or money. Hate can arise from extreme dislike of ourselves and others.  Hate arises from:oppression,fear, envy,greed,ignorance,jealously or any number of negative feelings that arises from an individual person and can spread from that individual through a group.

In organizations,gangs,or groups that demand membership surrenders its own ability to think for themselves to the leaders of these groups, hate can spread through intimidation,brain washing techniques or come from a person who longs to be accepted.  Because these groups often seek out  individuals who feel that they have been disrespected by others all their lives, to join their group or gangs hate spreads through ignorance. When the majority of membership when left on their own really would have nothing against the groups they are trained to hate, they are taken advantage by the leadership that works them into a frenzy of hate.  What often comes out of these groups is the by-product of hate against people that they have absolutely no rational reason to dislike,much less hate.

Rarely if ever is hate based on rational feeling. Greed is involved in gang wars that kill over drug territory for instance.  People get killed without even having so much as discussed their differences with the ones they kill. Many times people who have no knowledge of the beliefs of the Hindu or Muslim Religions will hate entire groups who practice their religious belief.  We find irrational hate against both Religions because a radical, Osama Bin Laden,outside of the beliefs of Muslim Faith, attacked us on 9/11.  The Hindu Religious group in Milwaukee was attacked out of the same ignorance of what appears to be a deranged individual.  Many times people are harassed or attacked for nothing more than skin color while it is supported by law in States like Arizona.

We can hate the spread of hate and we can insist our leaders stop hate but unless mankind educates themselves to understand their own irrational fears or learns to  control  negative feelings, hate can spread like a wildfire and has been a part of history since the beginning  of human existence.

The Middle East has been at war between Religious sects that vary in their beliefs and who view the other as their enemy since 76 AD. Children are taught at a very young age there, just as they are here, who they should hate. Hate is not just a product of America but it spreads around the World with apartheid in Africa and Dictatorship in Cuba.  A mistrust always lays as the basis of hate.

When we have groups like the NRA,The White Supremacy,The Skin heads, 330 Militia Groups Of the Tea Party, gaining support in the Republican Party due to the growth of the Tea Party within its membership, then we see acceptance of hate when it should not be tolerated by government. Some believe there is a  total of 1000  hate groups currently in America.  They range from the radical of animal rights to the anarchists that often are sent to protests in our Streets from across the Canadian border. In these groups we  find the leaders working the members into a feeding frenzy of hate while telling those who already feel disenfranchised from America’s Social fabric, that they are being victimized.  When  hate is spoken about and bandied about combined with drinking cases of beer,hate often begins in one individual and spreads through an entire group of people.

Other times hate is spread against the gay community in Churches with preaching of the Bible verses against the gay population. A huge sector of the internet and social media will spread lies against the innocent or tell half-truths to try to turn people to their cause through hate. Members of hate groups will send out their hate propaganda to friends through email.  Many times gossips will do the same in offices or small communities or neighborhoods. The Conservative Republican legislature refuses to even recognize the gay community as existing, as they claim they have not been recognized by law. In many cases the Bible that was intended to be a guide to lead mankind out of hate and a guide to lead us instead into acceptance of each other, gets misused by Churches and is used instead to stir up hate against groups that they profess to be marked for, “Hell and Damnation.”

The only way any of us can stop the spread of hate is through education and acceptance of all of us.  When we have the very groups who should be helping to educate people against hate responsible for helping spread hate, then it often takes the citizenry to educate those who hate one at a time.  Even when we do we still will find that students who feel like outcasts,those who feel they are superior even though they are often times filled with fear of inadequacy themselves, and workers who get laid off will still be a threat to Society because of the irrational thinking that explodes in the individual who seeks out revenge through hate.

As a Nation we need to recognize the compassion that we have and to do a better job of dealing with the treatment of the mentally ill. Too many even in the medical profession, refuse to promote real and comprehensive reform in healthcare for those who suffer from mental illness because too many times their hands are tied due to Insurance Companies refusal to carry mental patients long-term.  Churches need to take another look at the way they handle the gay issue and abortion and be ever cognizant of those in their own midst that will use either as an excuse to be a hero in the eyes of the Church, by gong on a killing rampage.

As a Nation we need to enforce hate crimes while not enforcing them to the point that they infringe on our rights to freedom of Speech, and that is such a delicate line to cross, that often times law enforcement is damn if they do and damn if they don’t. We need to better educate people in the different religious beliefs and the history of the races without parents yelling Fowl.  We need to teach respect for all people and religions in America but too often when civil rights leaders attempt to do this they are ridiculed and derided for infringing on the rights of white  Americans.  We need to start educating and not stop even while the far right continues to fight against education.

With the younger generations coming up and making friends with people of different beliefs and skin colors we always look for hope in them teaching acceptance and educating the adults to become more tolerate but too many times schools produce the worse kind of hate because the parents accuse the teachers for promoting unity amongst their students, when the parents do not want their children co-mingling due to their own hate issues. Other times parents themselves are so desperate to have their children accepted and popular that they deliberately encourage feelings of superiority in their children when the children themselves feel an inferiority. Some children, who form cliques and are held together by hate, will spread it through phone calls or the internet when they are intimidated by the group to do so if they wish to remain a part of the group.

Due to the mixed emotions  we parents too many times instill in our own children,  groups often form in schools that learn to either co-exists or it leads to disenfranchising a whole group of children because they are not a part of the “cool group” or “one of us.” To often parents create the hate that surfaces in their own children.  This mentality exists in the parents just as bullies are a product of home environment and are a by-product of hate.

The long and short of hate is that it is very complicated and comes from all directions. Even if we could make laws to counter act hate we would have protests from another group that their rights were being infringed on.  The best solution of all is when”We The People” hear words of hate from our children or their friends we take the time to educate our children and support both our Schools and Church leaders in doing the same.  We need to be the leaders against intolerance in our own homes,neighborhoods, schools, and Churches without passing the buck onto another day or another time.  If it is going on in our schools and Churches ,then we the membership, must stand up against it by demanding that the spread of hate stops and is replaced instead by understanding our differences and acceptance of all Americans as equals.

It often only takes one of us speaking out to turn hate into acceptance in our own neighborhoods, one block at a time. We need to get started making a difference now.  Our Republican Congressmen and  Senators need to quit making excuses and start making comprehensive laws of acceptance of Native Americans, the gay population, and Hispanics that grant them rights. The Republican Senate who has filibustered it, can now rethink their previous objections, by passing the Violence Against Women Act that includes Native Americans, the gay populations and Hispanics.

Anyone who has hate issues themselves needs to get help before you help raise the next generation of people made miserable by their own intolerance and feelings of hate. One thing people who hate never find is joy or contentment.  To think that our child or grandchild will never be happy but instead only hate should spring all of us into action by stopping the spread of hate each time we hear it. The media are easy to deal with as all we need to do is switch stations or turn them off, when they spread their hate. ”We The People”, are not so easy to deal with, so we need to get started and lead by example for the next generations coming up, so they never hear the hate that we have heard escalating and spreading these last four years. The voters have spoken.  God Bless all of us!

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A Message To The, “Good Old Boys”

I cannot sign off of politics until I say Thank You Voters! Three times I have watched elections, in my life time ,where the “Good Old Boys” tried to disenfranchise us. Never have I ever seen it get this close to the edge of destroying Democracy and I hope I never do again.

Until and unless, you the Republican Party, recognizes that women,African-Americans,Asians,Latinos,Hindus,Muslims,Jews,Hispanics,the gay community,American Natives,the elderly, the poor,the handicapped, the youth, and any other minority group are as protected by our Constitution and as equal to all the rights of life,liberty, and pursuit of happiness, as the white Christian male or the Plutocrat, the Republican Party will be rejected by us.   Tonight we proved to you that we are the growing majority. We are born with all the same rights as any American citizen or immigrant who comes here and works,loves,and breathes on American soil. We did send you, the Republican Party, a mandate because it is our numbers that are growing.

If anyone doubts our unity or the Republican lack of the same, all anyone needs to do is look at the tape of the limited races who were in the Romney crowd as verses the diversity of races in our President’s crowd.  The differences of representation were massive. When we join together in unity and tell you, the Republicans, that we must be recognized as equals by you, have no doubts about it, we are unified. None of us will ever deny any of the rest of us the right to our own healthcare,procreation,or equality in the job force or on the pay scale. Each of us will protect the full right to equality for all of us, and you did get a mandate from us.

As soon as our President won the elections tonight the Republicans started talking about now President Obama is going to have to make the effort to go to Congress and work with the Republicans, because he did not win a mandate.  As a member of the new majority, I think I speak for all of us when I say,” you are wrong.”  It is you who needs the new attitude adjustment.  Tonight you got a mandate from us that you will not treat our President like he is less than you are and YOU will work with him on His agenda, and compromise. We are tired of your filibusters and witch hunts and you must stop the behavior and instead use your time to help “We the People” who elects you secondarily to our President and Vice President.

If you as a Republican or one of the “Good Old Boys’ refuse to accept the fact that “We the People” spoke tonight and told you that President Barack Obama and Joe Biden are our choice, and now you must compromise, then you will find a Taxi-cab waiting at the corner for you when you come up for re-election too. We will not tolerate a Congress ran on filibusters or bills being attached that denies any of us our right to our own health decisions or our own bodies or Constitutional rights. It is clear to all of us that you refused to take our message to heart and to listen to us, the American voters, the first time we elected President Obama from your horrid disrespect of him and your refusal to hear us through him, these last four years.

We will not Tolerate another CPAC retreat where all Republican members must sign a pledge to vote against our President’s Agenda or not raise taxes on the wealthy. We will not vote for people who do not tell us the truth or whom we cannot trust because their lies are self-evident.  Too many of us would prefer to see all the Bush tax cuts run out  on those of us who can afford it, so we can replenish our Treasury.

We know that affordable health care needs more work and we expect you to make concessions and to co-operate with our President, so we can take temporary care of the unemployed middle class, the students who are our future, the abused and mistreated, the hungry, ill,elderly,handicapped and,any others of the groups you have chosen to disenfranchise, when they need a hand up.  We will not tolerate anymore bigots in our government who feel superior to anyone member or feel entitled to encourage their own to disrespect our President or any one group in our new majority nor can you ever run another campaign as dishonorable as the one that was ran this year.

We expect you to stop paper capitalism for the lobbyists, by recognizing that regulations do not eliminate profits but instead it eliminates greed. When you work together to cut the deficit you must first deny Corporate and oil company welfare, before denying us Medicare and Medicaid. We will not continue letting you convince us that the EPA is heavy-handed while we watch our children gasp for air. You must not interfere as President Obama appoints his own Federal and Supreme Court judges simply because they are not Conservative judges.

We know we will have to listen for a month at least, while you, the pundits, and Conservative media refuse to accept that you, the Republicans, lost because you offered your own party such pathetic choices both in the primaries and the general election.  I know you will never put the blame on your own backward mentality nor acknowledge the fault lies in the GOP. If you cannot eliminate the Tea Party and “Good Old Boys” from your own ranks, then we the American voters will have to do it for you. We have the power to disenfranchise you because we want to live in a United Nation where everyone is treated equal.   We much prefer that you sweep out your own trash.

Thank goodness this year and half of an election is over.  I never thought for a minute the polls were right as I know too many Republicans who said they could not vote for Mitt Romney, even while my State went 100% Republican. The Republicans were embarrassed watching the long list of right-wingers step forward in the Republican primary debates and shook their heads saying,”There isn’t a one of them I can vote for if they do win the primary,” and their minds never changed. My great concern all along was not that we didn’t want President Barack Obama and Joe Biden back but that your dirty tricks would cause them to lose.

I am always moved to tears of joy, when I see Democracy is still alive and well and that we will never be anything less than a Great Democracy,because character and hope will always win out over fraud and cynicism. No matter how hard you Republicans try to stack the deck against us, Democracy and the entitlement of freedom granted to all of us through our Constitution and Equal Rights Amendment, will eventually  always win.  We the majority, will recognize anyone who tries to return under another cloak of lies or to  deny our rights to our own health issues or equality for all.

You do not have nor will you ever have a monopoly on,”We the People.”  Good day,good luck, and happy thoughts to all of us. I am so proud of all of us regardless of how we voted because I know the hate and lies comes from them and not the majority of us! We want a strong two Party system where everyone plays by the same rules and understands and respects that we are all entitled to make our own decisions,we are Free, and we belong, regardless of the playing field. America belongs to all of us regardless of race,gender,creed,color or gender orientation.  As the 1970′s Helen Reddy song said,”Hear us Roar!

P.S. to Lars—We aren’t dead yet.  America is on its way back to being better and stronger than ever with a new majority! Just watch us as we move forward and grow by doing what Denmark has, and invest in our people.:)

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Are Independents Really Independent?

This will be my final political post,thank Goodness!  After having written on the truth of the far right and the Tea Party and their negative effects on the Republican Party and the cynicism across America that they lap up, with their below par candidates for two years, I welcome the end of writing anymore on the subject of politics.

My husband will be retiring at the end of the year and we hope to travel.  I welcome and look forward to being out of the loop on the political scene and playing in the sunshine.  Since this is my last political post and I have watched Americans throw away 6 Billion dollars on campaigns of lies, it leaves a bitter taste in my mouth.  The sad thing is that the majority of the large donors spent it to buy their candidate of choice.  I applaud those who spent in an effort to stop the corrupt from taking office.

I am afraid that those who want a prostitute to perform in their favor in their politicians do so, to get their own greed fulfilled and are the largest contributors.  It would be nice to think the Republican Party itself would be spending those dollars instead to throw the bums out.  Men such as Sam Adelson and the Koch Brothers in the Republican Party, are stealing the votes from American citizens who are either to flip-flop themselves to make decisions or too bored to care. The sad thing is when the greed is coming from the Christian ministries who are more business driven than Christ driven and give of the money collected for the poor, in their efforts to sway the elections in their own Churches.

Unless and until men like Carl Rove and Grover Norquist are shaken loose from the strong hold or the bully pulpit of the Republican Party the Republican Party will continue to prostitute themselves for the Tea Party and the ridiculous right who will and are destroying Democracy in America. This Tea Party driven Party will not even stand for a Republican saying “Hi” to a Democrat when they meet in the hall without threatening them on their re-election support.  Both parties use to break early for a drink together and now they cannot even acknowledge they know each other due to this insane hatred driven by the Tea Party.

The Republicans instead blame President Obama for not working with them when they filibustered more than anytime in our history against President Obama’s agenda and they met ten days after he was signed into office where all Republicans were forced to sign a pledge making President Obama a one term President, at their CPAC retreat. Those who refused to sign the pledge along with  Senator Dick Lugar of Indiana, were ran out of the Republican Party by the Tea Party in the primaries because he had the audacity to say,”We need to work together on a healthcare program.”  The ironic part is that the Democrats never ran against Senator Lugar all these years because he was respected by both sides of the aisle before the Tea Party entered the fray on the lie of paying down the deficit.  The good news is the Democrat is leading in the Senate race in Indiana against the Tea Party selected Republican who defeated Senator Lugar, and for the first time in 30 plus years, a Democrat is  expected to win the Senate seat the Tea Party forced Senator Lugar to leave.

We keep hearing from the media that all of this money being spent is necessary in order to win over the Independent vote. We see the polls changing every time they are taken and I don’t know about the rest of Americans, but  this election smells like rotten eggs.  It has been the biggest disgrace ever enacted on the American public, in all the years that I have been following politics.  These corrupt politicians and the people who back them have destroyed any decency left in the election system in America.  The voter suppression belongs in a third world Country governed by a dictatorship and certainly not in America! Instead the “true to the vote group” which is a self-appointed watch dog group of the Tea Party are claiming voter fraud where none exists and intimating voters at the polls who would vote for President Obama in States ran by Tea Party and Republican Governors. This same group have mailed out misleading information confusing the minority voters with erroneous information.

Sure politics have always had a stretching of the truth and we always needed to read between the lines.  In the 1950′s Democrat candidate Adlai Stevenson said to the Republican majority,”If you quit lying about us we will quit telling the truth about you.”The biggest difference is that we saw two men who would stand on the stage of their Parties and accept their Party’s election because they were driven to help the American people over a need to fill their own pockets.  We could believe that they were men of honor until Richard Nixon exposed them for the fraud that they were.  Even so they did not promote or refuse to stop the hate and lies that we have seen this year in candidate Romney, and his campaign contributors.   May we never see it again!

The political season use to be fun before the venom and mean spirited of the Tea Party and the far right won the majority control of the Republican Party and they along with their hate groups entered the picture. It is impossible to have an honest debate with them today because they can only come back with the lies and half-truths that have been programmed into them.  They do not have an original or independent thought or reasoning for their explanation or debate when we do try to press them into doing so. We use to be able to join together and have parties with red,white, and blue banners hung for decorations and discuss our differences and our own reasoning without name calling.  Elections were a time of celebration with both Parties being represented and now they are just a screaming match or those who judge the harshest get up and leave in a huff.

Anyone who believes the accuracy of the polls taking place this year must be in that undecided column that put the blame on Independents. Polls simply do not swing as much or as frequently as the polls have swung this year unless the majority of American pollsters are schizophrenic and the majority of us know better than to believe that they have lost touch, to that degree with reality,yet. Certainly the polls have not shown the conviction of the Americans voters. We may be getting close to a Nation of shallow voters but we are not quite there yet.  The media, depending on their own choice of candidates, just kept changing to the polls they preferred that were closer to the truth they wanted to hear, I suspect is closer to the truth.

I maintain many Independents are not Independent but instead uninterested in a two-party system or politics in general,looking for an utopia that doesn’t exist on earth or in our lives,has special interests of their own they want promoted over the view of the majority, or are ashamed to have their name tied to the far right of the Republican Party but in truth will either not vote or will vote Republican once they walk in the booth anyway.  They just don’t want their friends to know.

It works the same way with the Independents who use to call themselves Democrat but the liberals have been so maligned by the Christian community, in which they are a member of, that they fear to stand up for their beliefs that are opposite of their religious community. They too will vote Democrat when they enter the booths to vote. The fastest way to get attention is America is to tell the politicians or your friends that you are undecided or Independent. Neither will stop trying to convert you to their cause if you do.  I can’t imagine why anyone would tell anyone that they were either unless they do love the attention.

True Independents saw absolutely nothing this year that they would vote for because it is a sin to discuss Science and environment in the Republican Party today. Because the Liberals are accused of trying to be Jesus Christ and dividing the Red Sea or mocked when they talk about things like global warming that threatens the coast of our Great Nation, they play it safe and say nothing.

This election year was a disgrace to all of us, who do believe in the political system and like a good healthy debate with the opposition, but instead the waters were poisoned by both hate and lies by the far right and the media that feeds into it.  We heard absolutely nothing on details from Mitt Romney, other than, “I will not answer that before the election,I’ll have to check on that and get back to you on that, or No I will not show you my taxes.”

Anyone who would vote for a candidate, who would represent himself as Mitt Romney has, is voting strictly because they believe all the lies and hate that have been spread across America by the Tea Party and the people who would call themselves Christian or the Far right; or they would vote for Romney’s dog, as long as it was Republican.

These American citizens will continue until their deathbeds to either vote out of ignorance for what the Republican Party today represents, or against their own best interests.  Too many think that as a Nation we pay too much out in welfare for the poor and it is socialism to do so.  The real truth is: far more money goes out in welfare to the wealthy,oil companies, and corporations and is protected by the Republican Party.

I have yet to meet the person who did not give back for the Blessings they received ever become a true success in life.  Many of them if they do gain wealth, find that they are alone in life, without any real friends. Even their own children stand around with their hands out.  Those who hold the attitude of resentment against the less fortunate, in my experience, almost always fail in life. The true joy in life comes from giving back and making a difference in someone else’s life, without them knowing we did.

For the Romney campaign to tolerate an ad stating American generosity is supporting socialism because many of us enjoy giving,in my estimation is inexcusable.The more generous we are to others the more happiness and contentment we gain for ourselves.  This is un-imaginable to the selfish who collects things and people for their own needs and pleasure, so they hide behind the lie of Socialism instead. Obviously a self-professed Billionaire who made his money in one generation did not experience socialism in America so to profess his concern for the same lies is just more of the disgrace that was allowed to run by the Romney campaign. It is the same kind of campaign ad that was offered to the John McCain campaign and refused by him for being in poor taste.

Our economy is coming back thanks to the tireless efforts of President Barack Obama and these American citizens would rather see Mitt Romney get the credit for it while President Obama takes the blame for the Republican greed that caused the mess he inherited.  Throughout history messes made by Republicans and paid for by the middle class have been cleaned up along with budgets balanced  by Democrat Presidents. It is a total misconception that Democrats spend money and Republicans balance budgets.

Who in their right mind, who lives on the planet earth, would elect a President, like Mitt Romney, who refused to come clean with the people of his own Party and those who would vote for him? He has only shared what he feels about us, the 47% ,with the “fat Cats” whose taxes he has promised to decrease by 5 trillion more dollars and have it added to our deficit while he lies to his own constituency. It befuddles the mind and reasoning of common sense. I repeat:  May we never see another election year like the one we have seen this year! Please Vote on Tues. if you do not have an opportunity to vote sooner.  We need to get rid of the spread of hate in America before it consumes yet more American minds and drives reality and common sense out of our elections, entirely. Vote the bums out!

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