Political Races - A Good Investment?

It is almost the end of one of the earliest Primary Election seasons in U.S. History. By next week. The country will have a clear idea of their choices for President for November's election, but in the intervening months there will be many who will regret the decisions that were made in the early months, which others have termed, "Buyer's Remorse". Will this remorse extend to other parts of the campaign?

I have often wondered about the monies that are collected by candidates for this early election period. So far Baraq Obama has raised $138 million, Hillary $134 million and John McCain $53 million (see website). Mitt Romney had raised $105 million before he dropped out of the race. By my simple math-brain, that makes John McCain the best investment with the best return. Campaigns have become a black-hole for waste, with campaigners spending millions on temporary, get-out-the-vote rallys and party-party-parties. Can you imagine anything more debaucherous than spending money on political campaigns? Well, maybe a duplicate security clearinghouse because it is located within your congressional district and providing useless jobs for voting constituents. Can't we think of a better use of valuable resources? I thought that during the previous 7-yrs. the politicians were concerned about how we were spending the money that went to defense and tax relief to "taxpayers", but not a second thought for tossing money down the political rat-hole.

At this point Obama looks like the riskiest investment, but I think that Hilary poses the biggest risk. With Obama forging ahead and Hilary spending money like there is government-run healthcare tomorrow, there is no hope of Hilary being able to pay back any large amounts of money, due to lack of support.

In the end it all comes down to how you want to spend your disposable, or in some cases, only income.....But for me and my house, this is....Just an Observation.

"The Natural" is a metaphor for Life?

I spent the afternoon yesterday with my wife watching the Robert Redford movie, "The Natural". I would get into the technical accolades of this movie, but that is for another website... It is amazing, though, how many up-and-coming & veteran stars were in this movie, let alone seeing it for the first time in H-dizzle (pardon my unhip use-of-slang reference; my kids would cringe, and probably are, at this reading). Back to The Natural....we come into this life full of talents and optimism, just like Roy Hobbs, when he went against the Whammer. He acknowledged that he was "the best there ever was" and thought he was invincible. He didn't just stick with the fundamentals and do his job. He had to get all flashy and arrogant. Well, along came the psycho hose-beast (played magnificently by Barbara Hersey) who dashed all his hopes, and saw an opportunity to grab his coat-tails of fame...Fast forward to 16-years later and he has fought back (a much wiser and humbler Roy Hobbs) to fulfill the dreams he had from boyhood, at the same time fighting of the cynical manipulators and hangers-on (especially when he asks Max Mercy played by Robert Duvall, if he has ever played the game. Max says, "....well, no").

The point: We come to life with lots of promise, talent and gifts, but sometimes we are beaten down by life. Do we let it keep us down and do we fight with all our might to not only help ourselves, a secondary benefit, but first to help others and lose ourselves in the service to others, who can't do it for themselves? You be the judge, but of course.....this is just an observation.

This Time, Look Behind the Curtain

Much has been said about immigration and the poor immigrants that come to America looking for a better life, and doing the jobs that most Americans won't do and sacrificing even their families to get money to live on.....and on. All this amounts to political slight-of-hand. Most of these arguments occur in the larger urban areas, where the "wannabes" need slaves to maintain their lifestyles.

Historians have said that it is the Roman Legions that built the Roman Empire as they went about conquering different lands and peoples, showing their superior knowledge, culture and engineering....But the Legions didn't do most of the work, it was the slaves that they captured and had to continually conquer in order to get things built. It was the elite classes that took in slaves and allowed the elites to spend their time in debauchery. What about the Egyptians?? Their empires lasted for centuries. Was it because of their superior intellect? Was it because of their cultural superiority? Was it because of their intermarriage within the same family? No, it was because of their slaves! The same with the Babylonian and Assyrian empires. They became "great" because of their oppression of other peoples and used them to do their dirty work.

The U.S. is going down this same road. The cultural elites may assuage their conscience by paying them a pittance, but it amounts to slavery. The circumstances may be a little different because they are not being conquered and brought into the U.S., but come here willingly, but nonetheless they are being used as slaves.

I was reading about Pres. Calderon of Mexico calling the U.S. racist (see article) for the way we treat immigrants. I wish he were a little bit smarter, or maybe more precise in his language (it might be the translation), because the immigrants are actually treated just fine. It is the people that enter the U.S. illegally that aren't treated well. It begins at the U.S./Mexico border where on the Mexico side the Mexican police and armies actually abuse, rape and extort their own people. You don't have to take my word for it, see the latest issue of National Geographic Magazine.

Does Pres. Calderon just kick in the spin machine (read "sincere lying") to draw sympathy to Mexico's failed social system/government. That is why I say, look behind the curtain (as in the Wizard of Oz) There is no substance to the bloviation of the political animal, and no truth as well. Do they cry equally for the immigrants coming into Mexico from poorer Central American countries? The Mexican Government encourages its poor to enter the U.S. illegally; Is that fair? If people desire to enter this country, they can do it legally, then the infrastructure to support them in the U.S. wouldn't be overwhelmed, as it is today. There are repeated stories about Emergency Rooms and hospitals throughout the country that have to close because of the inundation of illegals that don't/can't pay for services rendered. Lawyers representing illegals have taken advantage of property owners and have seized their properties unjustly, while the illegals were trespassing.....and on.

This country's priorities are upside down. The criminals are rewarded, while the innocent are punished, all while the politicians are pandering for voters (who are not citizens and are not legally allowed to vote). But this is ......just an observation.

Passing the Baton to the Next Generation

Being a part of the post-war, baby boom has caused me to be flexible and adaptable. I have seen change come quickly and often and to say that change is a constant is an understatement. When touch-tone phones became popular, it was all I could do to get my father to replace his rotary dial phone. His generation had gone through the Great Depression and if something worked, you didn't even consider replacing it, no matter how much easier it was to use...When wireless phones replaced the touch-tone phones, it was anathema. When it came time to go to a cellular phone, my father was okay with using one, but someone else had to operate it. Most of the time he tried to listen to it upside-down.

I am now reaching my father's age. I work among people that have been doing things the same way for years, even though the method of product delivery has been automated. They have been left in a wake of younger, more adaptable practicants. The do not have the ability to judge how long it takes to do something and as a result, tasks take as long as the subordinates would like to take it. We are now entering the era of building information modeling (BIM) which gives attributes to digital elements and makes work even easier...But....it takes the ability to set things up correctly. Who is going to teach the upcoming generation, if someone doesn't know what to teach them? Sure, we can do "old school", but if it only partial satisfies the implementation of the new technology, who will fill in the blanks?

The next 10-years will be interesting as the Baby Boomers begin to approach retirement and the work-force will diminish. Will jobs of necessity go overseas, where they didn't listen to the zero-population nonsense? Will imigration continue to be the method of getting an entry-level workforce? It seems our "do-your-own-thing" attitude is going to bite us in the buttocks of our retirement, as we try to get someone to do those tasks that we can no longer do, because we haven't passed our wisdom and knowledge to a coming generation. Aqui se hablan Castellano.

But this is ......just an observation.

Religion & Government - Part I

It has come to my attention recently by way of the current presidential campaign season, that politicians only know how to promise things that they can't deliver. First, I have to apologize to my spanish-speaking brothers that have come in-country from outside the U.S. You shouldn't have to endure such dissappointment. Where you come from is probably a perfect political system (sarcasm is an okay form of vituperation). Continuing with the campaign...I am continually in amazement of how the government increasingly considers any revenues gained by taxation, to automatically become their money and they have the right to spend it as they see fit...like they are some kind of political action committee (PAC), then doling goodies to their political cronies, like so many earmarks. What happened to the sacredness of the taxpayer and their contribution to the government. Shouldn't the elected leaders consider whether the money be correctly spent, before they go rewarding their friends (who also might be taxpayers recooping their disproportionate share).

The government should not be entrusted with money or programs. They have proven time and time again, that they cannot manage programs efficiently, without a bloated bureaucracy. There is nothing new under the sun....that the government cannot co-opt well; Look at education. It used to be the domain of the churches and in some countries, it still is. But here, in America the government has seen value in co-opting the schools to inculcate their ideas into young minds. Have you read a textbook lately? Take a simple thing like marriage...the domain of the churches and in many religions, a sacramental ordinance. Once the government got ahold of it, it has been broken-down, dissected and disemboweled of any purpose, except for a tax penalty. There are other instances of co-opting practices, too numerous to mention in this format.

Here is the heart of the matter...Why doesn't government just support religion, instead of trying to compete with it! All it will end up doing is killing itself, trying to be all things to all people. It cannot be the Savior of mankind. Politicians need to be reined-in by the people, but of course it is easier for a group of politicians to conspire, than all the people be of one-mind.

Only truth shall prevail.

There is hope...it is that religion thing. Maybe we should all give it a chance. Maybe going to the source of all truth would be better than getting it through a convoluted bureaucracy, or even the Transportation Safety Administration (TSA).

But this is ......just an observation.