Sweet Lemons and Cold Weather

Politically speaking things just go along. As a liberal liberal I am not alone in feeling this way.
Hope for real health care reform is low. (People like me always try to find a sweet lemon somewhere. Though, I am having a hard time finding one.)
We got pretty much “Insurance Reform”-sort of. The insurance companies are getting more to cover and with little change on their part. And money flows like water still. Yes, I know previous conditions will supposedly go out the window. (Ah, that slice of sweet lemon, maybe.) That really is a great thing. I don't trust them though. I can't wait to see how insurance companies get around this one.

I will say I have a new appreciation for Sen. Reid. I didn't think he had it in him to push and shove and keep our Senators at it until he got some sort of agreement. As far as the deals cut. Most of them are not terribly consequential at least not in the long term. I may not like it but what interesting meetings and “discussions” were held for the past week. Of course now the two houses must come together and reconcile the bills. Just for learning sake I would love to hear the out of the public deals. This stuff would all be so interesting if it wasn't about the lives of people.

Now I wait to see if there are any real regulations for the investment banking industry. Doubtful.
Too Big to Fail will probably stay that way. However, they may find that the taxpayers won't be there for them anymore. Hey where are we supposed to get money to pay taxes anyway.

Let's see. What about the nation's borrowing, the government in our name. I agree there are times we just have to urge the economy by printing and borrowing but thanks to previous happenings, don't forget the previous administration, we were already in debt up to our eyeballs. Unemployment is high and not much happening to help. A December 26th article from the NY Times, you will not enjoy reading Recession Hovers as Winter Halts Construction Work. We are going through another dramatic change in the ways we can earn income-buggy whips anyone?
I was hopeful for a green economy but people are slow to move and Congress has to argue. More money flowing. Then, what about those who cannot restart. We are not all young and flexible. Will it take a generation or just a few years? Read the article in the Dec. 26th, NYTimes about the Earth-Friendly Elements we use. We just can't learn can we.

I get so much information from progressive groups but I don't get many answers. I get calls for, you ready, sign our petition and contribute. So many petitions I wonder if Congress pays attention to any of them anymore. Who gets the money contributed and why? Progressives need to pool their resources for a little while. That would make for a bigger lobby. But who will hold them together and for how long.

Here some slices of that sweet lemon. We can relax a little now about torturing people in our name; our civil rights at home are not in as much jeopardy; a few more people admit global warming; the present administration did take a little time to decide to send more troops into war; the President didn't say God told him to do send them. Oh, our V.P. hasn't shot anybody. The Republican party suddenly loves Medicare and seniors. The Republican party tried to hold up that awful defense spending-we shouldn't question the why of it. The Republican party that spent so much of our money is now worried about our spending. So see there are sweet lemons to be found.

Now there is the weather. We didn't get hit as badly as many. Most people made it through Christmas safely here. But, why is it there are certain folks who just can't stand staying home for more than a day? It is boring for many but the rest of us would like to relax for a short spell. No, not if you belong to a family of “macho” folks. Does this sound bright to you? Driving when you don't really need to do so; getting stuck so you have to have someone else come to your rescue. Or worse.

Oh, these are actually the kind of people that pay no heed to things like a health-care crisis until there is no such thing as health care except for the wealthy; let banks get too big too fail; depend on the mid-east for energy, destroy the planet; depend on other countries for loans, not countries that exactly care either. Why think ahead we are too busy thinking in the moment.

P.S. Now we are having tougher security at airports. Uh after the fact. Well, at least we try to learn. (sweet lemon)

Now, don't you wish I had stayed quiet.

Find the NY Times HERE.

Protests at Home and Abroad?

Robert Reich's Blog post of November 17th: Obama, China, and Wishful Thinking About American Jobs is very interesting. You can find it here

He quoted Pres. Obama: “We cannot go back...”
“...we're taking out a bunch of credit-card debt of home equity loans, but we're not selling anything to them.” Dr. Reich is discussing here the wish that the many Chinese will become consumers of American goods and services.

He went on to describe one reason the Chinese government will not, cannot, let that happen. Why they are building more factories to produce more than they can consume. If they do not create more jobs for the poor that are heading for the factories, they face possible “massive disorder”.

Thus China wants American “know-how”. So in order to sell products in China, US companies must cut deals to make goods in China not in the US. He ends this blog post with the following:

Both societies are threatened by the disconnect between production and consumption. In China, the threat is civil unrest. In the U.S., it's a prolonged jobs and earnings recession that, when combined with widening inequality, could create political backlash.

Why is it that in the U.S. The fear is only of political backlash? Why isn't there more “civil unrest” here? Of course civil unrest here doesn't need to be the same as in China. We don't need to worry about deaths to the demonstrators. We don't need to worry about trials for the demonstrators. Well mostly we don't have to fear these reactions. Why?

There are many questions in that paragraph. Maybe you have some good answers? Here are a few of my thoughts.

Maybe we are getting older and lazier? Maybe we are too busy watching TV? Maybe we are just too depressed to march? Maybe we no longer feel we have any way to make changes- “Our government doesn't listen no matter what we do.” ? Maybe we don't have the money to make the trip to ...? Maybe we have so much going on, or not as the case may be, we are in a state of confusion? (Sometimes that is me) Too many groups asking you to email, write, call, or march about so many good causes?

As for the last Why: Maybe the government and the politicians have figured out that if you let people march in protest without a lot of push back they won't get much coverage and they will pack up and go back to their meager little lives after their little protests. Think about it.

With all these questions and the many answers, the vote becomes more important than ever. My idea is that maybe instead of dread and disgust with politicians and politics we should start to study them now.
Remember 2010 could get very interesting.
Don't forget Vote Smart. It is a good way to keep up to date and keep track.

Photo is an edited photo taken by my Baby Brother.

Thank You Vets, but ...

It seems that Veteran's Day this year was more solemn than usual. I know I felt more than in previous years. Yes, we are still at war but we were at war previous Vet's Days; I don't recall the same feelings for myself (could be age) or the difference in the coverage. The celebrations, if you call it that, I saw were smaller and quieter.

Some research I am starting for my self is on the guilt of those who didn't actually go to war. I don't mean that in the usual way. I don't mean the ones like my dad who was turned down because of health. I mean those who were drafted or chose to enlist during war but stayed somewhere in the U.S. Instead of “shipping out”. Their work was important but not in the movie way.

In the case of my spouse, he asked to go to Vietnam when he enlisted but the military said no-he spent the whole 4 years in the U.S. We were talking about the guilt of enlistees that stayed states side. He said he didn't feel guilt because he tried to go, actually the dope tried to go more than once. He was angry when he didn't get to go. You may have guessed he was very young when he enlisted. He just wanted to get away from home and had a yen to be a world traveler and or a helicopter pilot. Now he will tell you he is glad the military gave him those tests and assigned him where they did.

We know now that the WWII vets that did “ship-out” just “sucked it up”, didn't usually talk about it, many came home to drink and become unruly, one of my uncles, some probably committed suicide. Only now are we understanding or trying to understand. Then too what about those who served and serve in Korea? I was engaged years ago to a guy who went to Korea when it was no longer called the Korean War. He was definitely changed by the experience. He wrote to me about how surprised he was that it was still a dangerous duty that people here did not realize. So you know many Korean Vets suffered and suffer in silence too.

However, are there other Vets that have self-recrimination because they did not get sent “over seas” but yet they felt relief? I am sure there are. Do they suffer quietly for years or even know why their lives are not quite the same? I'll bet they do have changes with which they need to deal. I just doubt too that anyone would help them understand their own version of war-changes-all. If the military is just beginning therapies for PTSD and more, they probably aren't even thinking about this one.

I just wonder.

I looked up some notes from (yes, I keep notes when I really like a Twain piece of wisdom) another Mark Twain favorite of mine I would like to share part of it with you. It is sometimes called the War Prayer. Please read it carefully and more than once. Put it aside for a while, let it nag at you, then read it again. You can find the whole thing here or here.

Here is a part of it from my notes. The speaker is a messenger from God to a small congregation after they prayed for victory over their enemy.

Ponder this-keep it in mind. If you beseech a blessing upon yourself, beware! Lest without intent you invoke a curse upon a neighbor at the same time. If you pray for the blessing of rain upon your crop which needs it, by that act you are possibly praying for a curse upon some neighbor's crop which may not need rain and can be injured by it. “You have heard your servant's prayer-the uttered part of it. I am commissioned by God to put into words the other part of it-that part which the pastor and also you in your hearts, fervently prayed silently...”

When you have prayed for victory you have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow victory-must follow it, cannot help but follow it. Upon listening spirit of God the Father fell also the unspoken part of the prayer. ...

There is more but at least you have a good part of the point here.

Read the whole thing alone first if you can and think it over then share with someone.

This particular piece of writing, by one of my favorite authors, made me reconsider my views on any war at all. I still wonder if there really is such a thing as a just war. Part of me says yes while part of me says no. If all the “regular”, non-governmental people said no to war then what? But it would take ALL of the “governed-every person everywhere. So, that is a dream. For whatever reason or reasons, We humans must have a “leader” and many of us are easily led. I repeat-THAT IS A DREAM.

I can be grateful to the Veterans for what they did and what the soldiers are doing now but I now question the logic and the sense of those who decide to send people into the horrible “theater” of war. (It is not a theater, people are not pretending. People are really dying.)

Now how to get out once you are in?????



(The photo caption reads Just Say No. The bird is a female summer tanager)

Addendum to Klinger Syndrome Post-Mark Twain on Religion

Man is a Religious Animal. He is the only Religious Animal. He is the only animal that has the True Religion -- several of them. He is the only animal that loves his neighbor as himself and cuts his throat if his theology isn't straight. He has made a graveyard of the globe in trying his honest best to smooth his brother's path to happiness and heaven....The higher animals have no religion. And we are told that they are going to be left out in the Hereafter. I wonder why? It seems questionable taste.

- The Lowest Animal essay, 1897 (Mark Twain)

We despise all reverences and all the objects of reverence which are outside the pale of our own list of sacred things. And yet, with strange inconsistency, we are shocked when other people despise and defile the things which are holy to us.

- Following the Equator (ibid)

By the way can anyone remember exactly when to use ibid? Is it ok from the first note on or every other one? Now I find that in so using I am committing a grievous sin.

Mark Twain quotations

Corporal Klinger Syndrome? Or No Way Out!

After reading and watching the news about the Ft. Hood disaster, one picture being drawn of the shooter is of a psychiatrist that treated soldiers returning from these two stupid wars. A man who apparently was re-finding his religion. A doctor that heard such horror stories he feared his own deployment with more than the usual fear of soldiers being deployed. Think about it. Some of us can understand that picture. Of course another picture is of a religious terrorist or another-someone making a statement concerning the ills of society. The portrait is probably a mixture of all these. People are complicated.

Before I go on with this post I would like to say, for what it is worth, I am so sorry that this happened.

I am sorry that we live in a society where opening fire on groups of people is an answer to anything or for anyone. The families, the personnel at Ft. Hood, and many of our military, must be devastated. Our sympathies to all of them. This loss must feel just about as strange as when a parent losses a child-so wrong, so backwards, so out of the norm of death.

Without researching just think back through recent memory, it seems as though this type of suicide is becoming more common. I call it suicide because generally the shooter is killed or removed from living within this society of ours. There are various themes on this type of suicide. One type that comes to mind “death by cop”. Do we now add that to our law enforcement requirements? Does a law enforcement recruit have to be good at “death by cop”. The things we ask of the law enforcement agencies...

But back to the original thoughts on the shooter.
Maybe we should call it the Klinger syndrome. Do you remember MASH the movie and the TV show?
Corporal Max Klinger was the one who wore women's clothes trying to get out of the military by way of a section 8. We laughed at his attempts but did we pause to think how far these attempts could go. "I am going to live through this even if it kills me" (Corporal Klinger).

Do you wonder has this violent-take-others-with-you suicide been going on forever but not in public?
How many charges up San Juan Hill, that is just the one that popped into my head, have actually been a version of this NO WAY OUT mentality​?

The questions in my mind at this point concerning the shooter are many.

Why did the military decide the young high-school graduate would be educated as a psychiatrist in the first place? What did the recruiter tell the young Muslim American to get him to sign up? Or maybe he, like many others, just wanted the education. Had he felt he had to prove something to the rest of us, or himself, about Muslim Americans?

Actually, I doubt some of these reasons apply. This man apparently had been in the military for years. Too many years for his initial enlistment to be swayed by the Muslim reasoning mentioned here.

According to one story, report, this shooter was harassed because he is Muslim. Why did the military decide that a Muslim psychiatrist should be treating soldiers returning from combat where religion is in their face every day and many have radical Muslims trying to kill them and killing many of their “buddies”? Is it just not possible that any psychiatrist treating PT SD over and over might develop a version of the very disease he treats? How often did this psychiatrist get treatment or at least counseling?

We would hope that the military would periodically check the mental health of their mental health therapists. When this shooter sought a way out because of his religious beliefs, did the military have an analysis done? Or, did they just see the need for retention of all soldiers?

I know that hindsight is 20/20 but I still wonder about how this shooter in particular got missed. I realize too that it has to be difficult to get out of your “contract” with the military or most of the “volunteers” would leave. But I think there should be studies and thought about those who really should be allowed to break that contract.

For more on the story go to the NY Times articleshere

(I call the photo art here Wings of Peace.) The quotation from Corporal Klinger is here.