As we enter into the Holiday Season, first up is Thanksgiving. Although I thouroughly enjoy getting together with my family, eating, drinking and fellowshipping, I am always cognizant of the true history of the Holidays we have been brainwashed to celebrate. Being 50% Narragansett Indian, I feel it my duty to educate people as to the true story and history involved. Please enjoy your family; food and coming together but know what the underlying history is. Ask yourself where have I seen or heard this story before. History continues to repeat itself because we are not being given history as it really takes place. We are given a whitewashed version tailored to keep us in the dark and totally asleep. HAPPY THANKSGIVING and I give to you,
THE REAL THANKSGIVING: The Hidden History of Massachusetts
Much of America's understanding of the early relationship between the Indian and the European is conveyed through the story of Thanksgiving. Proclaimed a holiday in 1863 by Abraham Lincoln, this fairy tale of a feast was allowed to exist in the American imagination pretty much untouched until 1970, the 350th anniversary of the landing of the Pilgrims. That is when Frank B. James, president of the Federated Eastern Indian League, prepared a speech for a Plymouth banquet that exposed the Pilgrims for having committed, among other crimes, the robbery of the graves of the Wampanoag’s. He wrote:
"We welcomed you, the white man, with open arms, little knowing that it was the beginning of the end; that before 50 years were to pass, the Wampanoag would no longer be a free people."
But white Massachusetts officials told him he could not deliver such a speech and offered to write him another. Instead, James declined to speak, and on Thanksgiving Day hundreds of Indians from around the country came to protest. It was the first National Day of Mourning, a day to mark the losses Native Americans suffered as the early settlers prospered. This true story of "Thanksgiving" is what whites did not want Mr. James to tell.
What Really Happened in Plymouth in 1621?
According to a single-paragraph account in the writings of one Pilgrim, a harvest feast did take place in Plymouth in 1621, probably in mid-October, but the Indians who attended were not even invited. Though it later became known as "Thanksgiving," the Pilgrims never called it that. And amidst the imagery of a picnic of interracial harmony is some of the most terrifying bloodshed in New World history.
The Pilgrim crop had failed miserably that year, but the agricultural expertise of the Indians had produced twenty acres of corn, without which the Pilgrims would have surely perished. The Indians often brought food to the Pilgrims, who came from England ridiculously unprepared to survive and hence relied almost exclusively on handouts from the overly generous Indians-thus making the Pilgrims the western hemisphere's first class of welfare recipients. The Pilgrims invited the Indian sachem Massasoit to their feast, and it was Massasoit, engaging in the tribal tradition of equal sharing, who then invited ninety or more of his Indian brothers and sisters-to the annoyance of the 50 or so ungrateful Europeans. No turkey, cranberry sauce or pumpkin pie was served; they likely ate duck or geese and the venison from the 5 deer brought by Massasoit. In fact, most, if not all, of the food was most likely brought and prepared by the Indians, whose 10,000-year familiarity with the cuisine of the region had kept the whites alive up to that point.
The Pilgrims wore no black hats or buckled shoes-these were the silly inventions of artists hundreds of years since that time. These lower-class Englishmen wore brightly colored clothing, with one of their church leaders recording among his possessions "1 paire of greene drawers." Contrary to the fabricated lore of storyteller’s generations since, no Pilgrims prayed at the meal, and the supposed good cheer and fellowship must have dissipated quickly once the Pilgrims brandished their weaponry in a primitive display of intimidation. What's more, the Pilgrims consumed a good deal of home brew. In fact, each Pilgrim drank at least a half-gallon of beer a day, which they preferred even to water. This daily inebriation led their governor, William Bradford, to comment on his people's "notorious sin," which included their "drunkenness and uncleanliness" and rampant "sodomy"...
The Pilgrims of Plymouth, the Original Scalpers
Contrary to popular mythology the Pilgrims were no friends to the local Indians. They were engaged in a ruthless war of extermination against their hosts, even as they falsely posed as friends. Just days before the alleged Thanksgiving love-fest, a company of Pilgrims led by Myles Standish actively sought to chop off the head of a local chief. They deliberately caused a rivalry between two friendly Indians, pitting one against the other in an attempt to obtain "better intelligence and make them both more diligent." An 11-foot-high wall was erected around the entire settlement for the purpose of keeping the Indians out.
Any Indian who came within the vicinity of the Pilgrim settlement was subject to robbery, enslavement, or even murder. The Pilgrims further advertised their evil intentions and white racial hostility, when they mounted five cannons on a hill around their settlement, constructed a platform for artillery, and then organized their soldiers into four companies-all in preparation for the military destruction of their friends the Indians.
Pilgrim Myles Standish eventually got his bloody prize. He went to the Indians, pretended to be a trader, and then beheaded an Indian man named Wituwamat. He brought the head to Plymouth, where it was displayed on a wooden spike for many years, according to Gary B. Nash, "as a symbol of white power." Standish had the Indian man's young brother hanged from the rafters for good measure. From that time on, the whites were known to the Indians of Massachusetts by the name "Wotowquenange," which in their tongue meant cutthroats and stabbers.
Who Were the "Savages"?
The myth of the fierce, ruthless Indian savage lusting after the blood of innocent Europeans must be vigorously dispelled at this point. In actuality, the historical record shows that the very opposite was true.
Once the European settlements stabilized, the whites turned on their hosts in a brutal way. The once amicable relationship was breeched again and again by the whites, who lusted over the riches of Indian land. A combination of the Pilgrims' demonization of the Indians, the concocted mythology of Eurocentric historians, and standard Hollywood propaganda has served to paint the gentle Indian as a tomahawk-swinging savage endlessly on the warpath, lusting for the blood of the God-fearing whites.
But the Pilgrims' own testimony obliterates that fallacy. The Indians engaged each other in military contests from time to time, but the causes of "war," the methods, and the resulting damage differed profoundly from the European variety:
Indian "wars" were largely symbolic and were about honor, not about territory or extermination.
"Wars" were fought as domestic correction for a specific act and were ended when correction was achieved. Such action might better be described as internal policing. The conquest or destruction of whole territories was a European concept.
Indian "wars" were often engaged in by family groups, not by whole tribal groups, and would involve only the family members.
A lengthy negotiation was engaged in between the aggrieved parties before escalation to physical confrontation would be sanctioned. Surprise attacks were unknown to the Indians.
It was regarded as evidence of bravery for a man to go into "battle" carrying no weapon that would do any harm at a distance-not even bows and arrows. The bravest act in war in some Indian cultures was to touch their adversary and escape before he could do physical harm.
The targeting of non-combatants like women, children, and the elderly was never contemplated. Indians expressed shock and repugnance when the Europeans told, and then showed, them that they considered women and children fair game in their style of warfare.
A major Indian "war" might end with less than a dozen casualties on both sides. Often, when the arrows had been expended the "war" would be halted. The European practice of wiping out whole nations in bloody massacres was incomprehensible to the Indian.
According to one scholar, "The most notable feature of Indian warfare was its relative innocuity." European observers of Indian wars often expressed surprise at how little harm they actually inflicted. "Their wars are far less bloody and devouring than the cruel wars of Europe," commented settler Roger Williams in 1643. Even Puritan warmonger and professional soldier Capt. John Mason scoffed at Indian warfare: "[Their] feeble manner...did hardly deserve the name of fighting." Fellow warmonger John Underhill spoke of the Narragansett’s, after having spent a day "burning and spoiling" their country: "no Indians would come near us, but run from us, as the deer from the dogs." He concluded that the Indians might fight seven years and not kill seven men. Their fighting style, he wrote, "is more for pastime, than to conquer and subdue enemies."
All this describes a people for whom war is a deeply regrettable last resort. An agrarian people, the American Indians had devised a civilization that provided dozens of options all designed to avoid conflict--the very opposite of Europeans, for whom all-out war, a ferocious bloodlust, and systematic genocide are their apparent life force. Thomas Jefferson--who himself advocated the physical extermination of the American Indian--said of Europe, "They [Europeans] are nations of eternal war. All their energies are expended in the destruction of labor, property and lives of their people."
Puritan Holocaust
By the mid-1630s, a new group of 700 even holier Europeans calling themselves Puritans had arrived on 11 ships and settled in Boston-which only served to accelerate the brutality against the Indians.
In one incident around 1637, a force of whites trapped some seven hundred Pequot Indians, mostly women, children, and the elderly, near the mouth of the Mystic River. Englishman John Mason attacked the Indian camp with "fire, sword, blunderbuss, and tomahawk." Only a handful escaped and few prisoners were taken-to the apparent delight of the Europeans:
To see them frying in the fire, and the streams of their blood quenching the same, and the stench was horrible; but the victory seemed a sweet sacrifice, and they gave praise thereof to God.
This event marked the first actual Thanksgiving. In just 10 years 12,000 whites had invaded New England, and as their numbers grew they pressed for all-out extermination of the Indian. Euro-diseases had reduced the population of the Massachusetts nation from over 24,000 to less than 750; meanwhile, the number of European settlers in Massachusetts rose to more than 20,000 by 1646.
By 1675, the Massachusetts Englishmen were in a full-scale war with the great Indian chief of the Wampanoag’s, Metacomet. Renamed "King Philip" by the white man, Metacomet watched the steady erosion of the lifestyle and culture of his people as European-imposed laws and values engulfed them.
In 1671, the white man had ordered Metacomet to come to Plymouth to enforce upon him a new treaty, which included the humiliating rule that he could no longer sell his own land without prior approval from whites. They also demanded that he turn in his community's firearms. Marked for extermination by the merciless power of a distant king and his ruthless subjects, Metacomet retaliated in 1675 with raids on several isolated frontier towns. Eventually, the Indians attacked 52 of the 90 New England towns, destroying 13 of them. The Englishmen ultimately regrouped, and after much bloodletting defeated the great Indian nation, just half a century after their arrival on Massachusetts soil. Historian Douglas Edward Leach describes the bitter end:
The ruthless executions, the cruel sentences...were all aimed at the same goal-unchallengeable white supremacy in southern New England. That the program succeeded is convincingly demonstrated by the almost complete docility of the local native ever since.
When Captain Benjamin Church tracked down and murdered Metacomet in 1676, his body was quartered and parts were "left for the wolves." The great Indian chief's hands were cut off and sent to Boston and his head went to Plymouth, where it was set upon a pole on the real first "day of public Thanksgiving for the beginning of revenge upon the enemy." Metacomet's nine-year-old son was destined for execution because, the whites reasoned, the offspring of the devil must pay for the sins of their father. The child was instead shipped to the Caribbean to spend his life in slavery.
As the Holocaust continued, several official Thanksgiving Days were proclaimed. Governor Joseph Dudley declared in 1704 a "General Thanksgiving"-not in celebration of the brotherhood of man-but for [God's] infinite Goodness to extend His Favors...In defeating and disappointing... the Expeditions of the Enemy [Indians] against us, And the good Success given us against them, by delivering so many of them into our hands...
Just two years later one could reap a$ 50 reward in Massachusetts for the scalp of an Indian-demonstrating that the practice of scalping was a European tradition. According to one scholar, "Hunting redskins became...a popular sport in New England, especially since prisoners were worth good money..." . I hope this clears up a lot of the misconceptions we have been fed about the fellowship and enjoyment this Holiday represents. This is the true history and I for one will never forget.
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
The New Face of American Racism
There is a “liberals are hypocrites” post that is going viral among right-wing zealots on Facebook, with thousands of shares and hundreds of comments on some of them, in which a news story about two African Americans who committed a violent crime against a white is, once again, proffered as proof that 1) George Zimmerman was right to pursue and shoot Trayvon Martin, 2) “Stand Your Ground” laws are good and necessary, 3) those who oppose them are trying to turn good, law-abiding (i.e., “white”) folks into unarmed innocent victims of bad, law-breaking (i.e., “black”) folks, and 4) Liberals are hypocrites because we aren’t concerned enough about black-on-white violence.
My following response, which is an expression of sheer disgust at continuing to see this ugly bigotry repeated over and over again, apparently resonating with far too many people, only addresses the first three of these issues. (The fourth can be summed up as follows: There is virtually no one defending black-on-white violence, and no laws bringing into question whether some incidents of it –or, more precisely, acts of violence by those you DON’T identify with against those you DO identify with– can be prosecuted or not. The reason the white-on-black violence of the Trayvon Martin shooting is a larger issue is because there are people defending it as a non-issue and advocating laws that make it more likely to occur more often.)
The news story (about an incident of black-on-white violence), used in this way, highlights the fundamental difference between almost all variations of right-wing ideology and almost all variations of left-wing ideology: The former is firmly rooted in fear and hatred, while the latter aspires to hope and humanity. Those on the right scoff that those on the left would be so naive, though, in reality, hope and humanity is not only a more positive orientation, but, when leavened with reason and information, is also more pragmatic, better serves one’s own self-interest, than the fear and hatred that informs those on the right.
Those on the far-right are blithely indifferent to the death of an unarmed black teen at the hands of an armed white vigilante, because the armed white vigilante, in their mind, had every right to defend himself against any and all potential or perceived dangers, while the unarmed black teen lacked even the right to life, as long as it is one of them rather than the government that deprives him of it. One rationalization that is used is the presumption of guilt laid on the teen due to the possibility that he reacted violently to being pursued, something that these ideologues should respect rather than condemn, if we each have a right to protect ourselves against perceived threats! Ironically, however, they only defend the armed pursuer’s right to “defend” himself, and not the unarmed pursued’s right to do so!
If these right-wing ideologues had any integrity, any consistency, were anything other than implicitly racist hypocrites, they would not point to the possibility that Martin was beating Zimmerman before he (Martin) was shot as justification for the shooting, but rather with approval that Martin was defending himself against the armed individual pursuing him! Why aren’t they chanting that it’s a shame Martin didn’t kill Zimmerman before Zimmerman killed Martin, since it was Zimmerman who was the armed pursuer, and Martin who was the unarmed pursued?
But, of course, that’s not the way their little minds work, because it’s all about whom they identify with, and who they identify as their implicit enemy. The armed vigilante is LIKE THEM, and that’s all that counts. The unarmed victim is THE OTHER that they fear and hate, and so his innocence, the fact that he had his life taken away unjustly, is just no big deal. They excuse the armed pursuer, because they identify with him (racially, and ideologically as an armed pursuer of someone he thought was a criminal); they implicitly condemn the unarmed teen to a death sentence without a trial because they don’t identify with him (racially, and as someone who someone like them was inclined to suspect of being up to no good). It’s the very nature of their way of thinking, and the reason why it should be odious to all rational people of goodwill.
What an amazingly convoluted ideology it is that does such contortions to be indignant that anyone would raise any objections to an armed pursuer shooting to death an unarmed teen apparently doing absolutely nothing illegal at the time the pursuit began, but spares no indignation whatsoever on behalf of the unarmed teen who was shot to death! The imagined threat to Zimmerman, who was both the pursuer and the wielder of deadly force in this instance, is more salient to them than the real danger to Martin, who was the pursued and unarmed victim of a shooting death!
What gets me most about this is what it indicates about how far we’ve sunk as a nation. This isn’t just a fringe ideology that a few grease-painted jack-asses adhere to. This has become a mainstream ideology, a cult of implicit violence and hatred justified by fear and generalized enmity.
It goes beyond the rationalization of offensive deadly violence by an armed pursuer against an unarmed victim, justified only by the pursuers “reasonable” fear of crime in general (!), essentially legalizing paranoid racist violence. It goes beyond conveniently targeting those “scary blacks” (as the news story used to stoke the right-wing indignation so poignantly illustrates) whose crimes justify Zimmerman acting as police, judge, jury, and executioner at the sight of a black kid in his neighborhood. It even goes beyond their assertion that there is no racism in America, that their now oft-invoked fear and hatred of those blacks who have not proven that they are not a threat isn’t racism at all, but rather merely the rational response to the “racism” of those who think that laws that facilitate killing unarmed black teens due to a generalized fear of crime are a bad idea.
It includes and goes beyond all of this. It extends to and is fed by the delusion that there is no social injustice in America, that people fare well or poorly primarily by virtue of their own merit, a notion that is not only absurd on the face of it, but is also thoroughly disproved by statistical evidence. It combines a blithe indifference to the legacies of history that relegate people to sharply unequal opportunity structures at birth, with the equally blithe willingness to subtly loathe the entire categories of people who, born into such opportunity structures, are overrepresented among the poor. But irrational bigots are not swayed by such things as fact and reason and human decency.
The fact that such a belligerent, inhumane, and just generally dysfunctional ideology can survive as a major ideological strain in American culture is scary beyond belief. This cultural virus has always been with us, but never before in my memory so virulent and widespread as it is today. Anyone who has any desire for us to remain or become a rational and humane people needs to take stock of this, to repudiate it, and to oppose it, passionately and constantly, because it is truly ugly and destructive insanity.
Friday, November 9, 2012
A Response to Mindless Belligerence
This post is inspired by a recent interaction on Facebook, far too similar to far too many other interactions, in which someone appalled by the fact that human beings are capable of thinking and acting like human beings (or what human beings should be) responds with a spittle-laden string of childish pejoratives, including such timeless gems as “retard.”It is a stock post, to be linked to each time, thus saving me both the time and tedium of actually responding to these creatures.
I prefer to be neither the person who initiates such mindless belligerence, nor the person who responds to it in kind, because both are unappealing and assertively unimpressive. If I respond by, for instance, noting that my detractor appears to be a bit of troglodyte, my detractor is likely to note that while he merely “referenced” the empirically demonstrable fact that I’m a “retard,” I engaged in “typical liberal name calling” in response, which is “pathetic.” (True story.)
Far be it from me to knowingly engage in such “typical liberal name calling” (as opposed to the more respectable conservative preference for calling those they disagree with “retards,” of something similar, over and over again, in this case always in all caps…). Instead, I offer this one word response: Really?
It’s telling what you focus on most about my posts: their length. Not their content, but their length. Those long posts, that discuss economics, history, law, demography, and numerous other lenses that are relevant to the political and social issues discussed on these threads, err by having any substance, by failing to be shallow expressions of blind and reactionary bigotry.
To you, economics is irrelevant to economic arguments, history irrelevant to historical ones, an understanding of how law works irrelevant to an argument about legality, reality irrelevant in general. The realization that good public policy isn’t defined by legality but that we must continue to refine legality in service to good public policy is completely beyond your grasp. The notion that one must use their minds to understand their world is completely foreign to you. The possibility that your arbitrary and unconsidered beliefs could possibly be anything but the absolute truth is as beyond your reach as it has been to Inquisitors and Jihadists, who share with you the same destructive modality of blind ideological certainty, expressed more in terms of hatred than of hope, more antagonistic toward humanity than constructively in its service. That’s what defines you.
You often assure me that I wasted my time, that there’s no way I could ever change your minds. Of course I know that: Changing the minds of the mindless is beyond the reach of the best formed arguments; appealing to human decency a joke to those steeped in the toxin of belligerence and bigotry. But juxtaposing what reason in service to humanity looks like with what you represent is a lesson for any others who are not as far gone as yourselves. These threads are read by an unknown number of silent lurkers, who have the chance to choose to be reasonable and decent human beings.
So, my spittle-spattering spokespeople for the far-right rejection of reason and civility, of concern for humanity, may you enjoy the elongated reach of your pre-human limbs to all the more effectively pat yourselves on the back for such wit and wisdom. Such simian sophistication deserves only praise, and certainly a treat from one another as mutual trainers, for it far surpasses the prowess of, say, single celled invertebrates. And, truly, how much higher do any of us expect you to aim at this point?
I prefer to be neither the person who initiates such mindless belligerence, nor the person who responds to it in kind, because both are unappealing and assertively unimpressive. If I respond by, for instance, noting that my detractor appears to be a bit of troglodyte, my detractor is likely to note that while he merely “referenced” the empirically demonstrable fact that I’m a “retard,” I engaged in “typical liberal name calling” in response, which is “pathetic.” (True story.)
Far be it from me to knowingly engage in such “typical liberal name calling” (as opposed to the more respectable conservative preference for calling those they disagree with “retards,” of something similar, over and over again, in this case always in all caps…). Instead, I offer this one word response: Really?
It’s telling what you focus on most about my posts: their length. Not their content, but their length. Those long posts, that discuss economics, history, law, demography, and numerous other lenses that are relevant to the political and social issues discussed on these threads, err by having any substance, by failing to be shallow expressions of blind and reactionary bigotry.
To you, economics is irrelevant to economic arguments, history irrelevant to historical ones, an understanding of how law works irrelevant to an argument about legality, reality irrelevant in general. The realization that good public policy isn’t defined by legality but that we must continue to refine legality in service to good public policy is completely beyond your grasp. The notion that one must use their minds to understand their world is completely foreign to you. The possibility that your arbitrary and unconsidered beliefs could possibly be anything but the absolute truth is as beyond your reach as it has been to Inquisitors and Jihadists, who share with you the same destructive modality of blind ideological certainty, expressed more in terms of hatred than of hope, more antagonistic toward humanity than constructively in its service. That’s what defines you.
You often assure me that I wasted my time, that there’s no way I could ever change your minds. Of course I know that: Changing the minds of the mindless is beyond the reach of the best formed arguments; appealing to human decency a joke to those steeped in the toxin of belligerence and bigotry. But juxtaposing what reason in service to humanity looks like with what you represent is a lesson for any others who are not as far gone as yourselves. These threads are read by an unknown number of silent lurkers, who have the chance to choose to be reasonable and decent human beings.
So, my spittle-spattering spokespeople for the far-right rejection of reason and civility, of concern for humanity, may you enjoy the elongated reach of your pre-human limbs to all the more effectively pat yourselves on the back for such wit and wisdom. Such simian sophistication deserves only praise, and certainly a treat from one another as mutual trainers, for it far surpasses the prowess of, say, single celled invertebrates. And, truly, how much higher do any of us expect you to aim at this point?
Wednesday, November 7, 2012
Realizing Our Potential
Of the many wonders that happily impose themselves on a curious and observant mind, there is one that relentlessly taunts my imagination and tries my patience: The degree to which we fail, as a people, as a species, in our communities and on our own to take what seems to me to be, even more than that taken by the late Neil Armstrong 43 years ago, one small step for us as individuals, but one giant leap for our nation and for humanity. In this case, the small step is a step forward in thought and habit, in perception, and the giant leap is what it would yield in terms of our ability to govern ourselves in a way more conducive to the liberation and mobilization of our collective genius in service to our collective welfare.
Even as I write, I know that, for reasons that defy reason, those words grate on the ears of a large and vocal political faction. The word “collective” scares them, as if there is nothing collective about our existence, as if, despite the manifest absurdity of it, we exist as mutually exclusive entities. Lost in a caricature of reality, anything that smacks of the least recognition of human interdependence, of an existence not only as individuals but also as members of a society and citizens of a nation, resonates in their tortured minds as an affront to something holy and inviolable.
As is often the case, such folly results from the drawing of the wrong lesson from a set of failed applications (and the refusal to notice the larger set of successful applications) of a sound and inevitable principle. But the sound and inevitable principle must be acknowledged and addressed: We are not only individuals whose individual liberty must be protected and preserved, but also members of a society whose interdependence must be recognized and negotiated.
Our Founding Fathers did not fail to know this, and frequently explicitly and implicitly emphasized it: “United we stand, divided we fall;” “e pluribus unum,” “We must all hang together or we will surely hang apart,” The Constitution itself, the arguments in The Federalist Papers (which were overwhelmingly about our interdependence and the mutual responsibilities as members of a society that it imposes on us), “The General Welfare.” So much a part of the fundamental assumption of human existence was it, such an essential pillar of their Enlightenment doctrine (committed to the application of Reason to the improvement of Society), that they could neither have intended nor foreseen that some of the heirs to their political experiment would manage to erase it from their consciousness.
But reality has frequently reasserted itself, revealed the complexities and subtleties, highlighted the need to articulate two views of the nature of human existence that are simultaneously in mutual tension and two sides of a single coin. Without our fundamental interdependence, our existence as members of a society, we have no existence as conscious human beings. The very languages we think in are expressions of generations of coexistence, concepts and symbols growing not in isolated minds but in interlinked minds. Our technologies, our social institutions, the physical products of our labors, everything that makes us human, are never incubated in a single mind or created by the labor of a single pair of hands, but always in the communication of the members of a society and in the articulation of individual efforts.
The man who builds his own house did not mine his own ores to forge his own nails, and, if he did, did not learn the techniques for doing so only through his own trial and error without reference to any knowledge that preceded him. The current political debate over whether our individual achievements and creations are solely the product of one individual’s efforts, or are always in myriad ways a product of our social contract, is one based on an absurd blurring of reality: Of course they are a product of a social process, brought to fruition, frequently, by the focused efforts of one individual working on the margins of that larger process. We want neither to denigrate that individual effort, nor pretend that the contributions of an entire society were not also involved.
We’ve discovered, through our lived history, that individual rights can rarely be absolute. The right to freedom of religion does not mean that you have the right to sacrifice human beings on an alter if that is something that your religion requires of you. The right to freedom of speech does not mean that you have the right to slander another, or to incite others to violence, or to maliciously ignite a panic. The right to dispose of your property as you see fit does not mean that you have the right to dump toxic waste on your own land in a way which poisons others’ water. The tension between individual rights and mutual responsibilities is not just an occasional anomaly; it is a part of the fabric of our existence.
The step of which I spoke at the beginning of this essay is one which, like Neil Armstrong’s, requires first this vast journey across a daunting expanse of untraversed space. It requires the voyage from the ideological delusion that individual liberty is a value that stands unqualified and without countervailing recognition of our social contract, to recognition of the reality of our interdependence. We must stop referring to individual liberty without also, simultaneously, implicitly or explicitly, recognizing our mutual responsibilities to one another. This isn’t socialism or communism; it isn’t a rejection of the values incorporated into our nation at its founding; it isn’t rejection of capitalism or a presumption of the answers to the questions that it poses. It’s simply a journey of consciousness we absolutely must take.
Once we take that journey together, once larger numbers of us follow that voyage across space to something that has always been shining in our sky and recognize it to be something other than a mirage, we can step from that vessel of consciousness onto the otherworldly realization that we can and should and must work together as members of a society to confront the challenges and seize the opportunities that this world and this life present to us.
On that lunar surface, freed to leap a little higher in the lighter gravity, we can rediscover it as common ground that belongs to all parties and nations. Taking that step is not a partisan agenda, it is a human one. It does not resolve all partisan disputes, but rather frames them in more functional ways. It narrows the conversation to that which is minimally required by reason and lucidity. It ends the reign of an ideological folly and partisan cold war that did violence to humanity.
Obviously, not everyone will take this journey of consciousness, will believe that we could land on that distant moon and take that momentous step. Some will refuse to recognize the fundamental truth of human interdependence. There will always be such denial. Ignorance and folly are not things we can banish from the human condition. But we can diminish their degree, sometimes in small ways that have dramatic effects.
I have argued frequently and passionately for others to join me in the formation of a social movement that is not for the promotion of an ideological or partisan agenda, not to affect election outcomes or influence policy positions, but rather to take as many of us as possible as far on this journey as possible. We need to travel to the moon before we can walk on its surface. We need to cultivate our consciousness before we can act under its influence.
Of course, we will continue to act under the influence of the consciousness that we have, even while we devote just a little more effort to cultivating one more conducive to more functional and humane public policies. These are not mutually exclusive. Nor am I speaking only of us each cultivating our own consciousness (though that is, as always, absolutely vital); I’m speaking of us organizing in service to the cultivation of our collective consciousness.
My purpose in life is not to promote the Progressive agenda. My purpose is to promote wise self-governance in service to human consciousness and well-being. I think it’s important that we continue to remind ourselves of the distinction, because we cannot move humanity forward until we can appeal to people who are not in the market for a partisan identity. And if we can appeal to people who already have one, especially those who would recoil at the thought of working to advance any liberal or progressive agenda, all the better.
It is not a subterfuge: it is a refocusing of all of our minds on what is truly essential and truly important. It is the commitment to look past competing blind ideologies shored up by shallow platitudes toward ultimate purposes and deep underlying values. And getting past these rigid ideological camps into which we have relegated ourselves is one of the necessary steps toward real progress.
It depends on robust discourse among people of differing views. It flourishes when more of us recognize that there’s only one ideology to which any of us should adhere: That of striving to be reasonable people of goodwill, wise enough to know that we don’t know much, responsible enough to try to understand and see the merit in opposing views, compassionate enough to recognize that the goal of these efforts should be a commitment to humanity, working together with all others willing and able to embrace such an ideology to do the best we can in a complex and subtle world.
This is my mission in life: To promote this simple ideology, encourage as many as possible to work toward encouraging as many others as possible to adopt it to the greatest extent possible, always as a work in progress, more focused on our procedures for arriving at the truth than on what we currently think is the truth, always open to the possibility that we are dramatically wrong on one or more crucial points. This is something we should do independently of what we do regarding electoral politics and issue advocacy, diverting some small portion of our time and effort and passion into the long-term investment in a deeper political paradigm shift, into traversing the space between here and that distant moon where we recognize that we are interdependent, that we are fallible, and that we are all in this story together.
It’s not the first time such spaces have been traversed, such thresholds have been reached. We’ve had a Renaissance and a Reformation, a Scientific Revolution and an Enlightenment and the political revolutions based on it, an industrial revolution and now an information technology revolution, a confluence of globalizing forces and a movement to recapture some of the wisdom and beauty of the cultures that were trampled underfoot by modernity’s advance, and human history is still accelerating in amazing ways full of both promise and danger. We are a part of that process, participants in it, with an opportunity to plant the seeds for a future that could be one of ever-more rapidly growing human consciousness and an ever-wiser realization of our role on this wonderful planet of ours.
We are a work in progress, and maybe the word “Progressive” needs to be understood by those who bear it to mean “still a work in progress,” because once people fall into the trap of thinking they have all the answers, they forget how to ask the right questions.
Here’s to us! I believe in our potential, but I’m also keenly aware of the obstacles that stand in our way of realizing it, obstacles that, for the most part, we create ourselves, and throw up in front of us, seemingly determined to perennially condemn ourselves to live in interesting times….
Even as I write, I know that, for reasons that defy reason, those words grate on the ears of a large and vocal political faction. The word “collective” scares them, as if there is nothing collective about our existence, as if, despite the manifest absurdity of it, we exist as mutually exclusive entities. Lost in a caricature of reality, anything that smacks of the least recognition of human interdependence, of an existence not only as individuals but also as members of a society and citizens of a nation, resonates in their tortured minds as an affront to something holy and inviolable.
As is often the case, such folly results from the drawing of the wrong lesson from a set of failed applications (and the refusal to notice the larger set of successful applications) of a sound and inevitable principle. But the sound and inevitable principle must be acknowledged and addressed: We are not only individuals whose individual liberty must be protected and preserved, but also members of a society whose interdependence must be recognized and negotiated.
Our Founding Fathers did not fail to know this, and frequently explicitly and implicitly emphasized it: “United we stand, divided we fall;” “e pluribus unum,” “We must all hang together or we will surely hang apart,” The Constitution itself, the arguments in The Federalist Papers (which were overwhelmingly about our interdependence and the mutual responsibilities as members of a society that it imposes on us), “The General Welfare.” So much a part of the fundamental assumption of human existence was it, such an essential pillar of their Enlightenment doctrine (committed to the application of Reason to the improvement of Society), that they could neither have intended nor foreseen that some of the heirs to their political experiment would manage to erase it from their consciousness.
But reality has frequently reasserted itself, revealed the complexities and subtleties, highlighted the need to articulate two views of the nature of human existence that are simultaneously in mutual tension and two sides of a single coin. Without our fundamental interdependence, our existence as members of a society, we have no existence as conscious human beings. The very languages we think in are expressions of generations of coexistence, concepts and symbols growing not in isolated minds but in interlinked minds. Our technologies, our social institutions, the physical products of our labors, everything that makes us human, are never incubated in a single mind or created by the labor of a single pair of hands, but always in the communication of the members of a society and in the articulation of individual efforts.
The man who builds his own house did not mine his own ores to forge his own nails, and, if he did, did not learn the techniques for doing so only through his own trial and error without reference to any knowledge that preceded him. The current political debate over whether our individual achievements and creations are solely the product of one individual’s efforts, or are always in myriad ways a product of our social contract, is one based on an absurd blurring of reality: Of course they are a product of a social process, brought to fruition, frequently, by the focused efforts of one individual working on the margins of that larger process. We want neither to denigrate that individual effort, nor pretend that the contributions of an entire society were not also involved.
We’ve discovered, through our lived history, that individual rights can rarely be absolute. The right to freedom of religion does not mean that you have the right to sacrifice human beings on an alter if that is something that your religion requires of you. The right to freedom of speech does not mean that you have the right to slander another, or to incite others to violence, or to maliciously ignite a panic. The right to dispose of your property as you see fit does not mean that you have the right to dump toxic waste on your own land in a way which poisons others’ water. The tension between individual rights and mutual responsibilities is not just an occasional anomaly; it is a part of the fabric of our existence.
The step of which I spoke at the beginning of this essay is one which, like Neil Armstrong’s, requires first this vast journey across a daunting expanse of untraversed space. It requires the voyage from the ideological delusion that individual liberty is a value that stands unqualified and without countervailing recognition of our social contract, to recognition of the reality of our interdependence. We must stop referring to individual liberty without also, simultaneously, implicitly or explicitly, recognizing our mutual responsibilities to one another. This isn’t socialism or communism; it isn’t a rejection of the values incorporated into our nation at its founding; it isn’t rejection of capitalism or a presumption of the answers to the questions that it poses. It’s simply a journey of consciousness we absolutely must take.
Once we take that journey together, once larger numbers of us follow that voyage across space to something that has always been shining in our sky and recognize it to be something other than a mirage, we can step from that vessel of consciousness onto the otherworldly realization that we can and should and must work together as members of a society to confront the challenges and seize the opportunities that this world and this life present to us.
On that lunar surface, freed to leap a little higher in the lighter gravity, we can rediscover it as common ground that belongs to all parties and nations. Taking that step is not a partisan agenda, it is a human one. It does not resolve all partisan disputes, but rather frames them in more functional ways. It narrows the conversation to that which is minimally required by reason and lucidity. It ends the reign of an ideological folly and partisan cold war that did violence to humanity.
Obviously, not everyone will take this journey of consciousness, will believe that we could land on that distant moon and take that momentous step. Some will refuse to recognize the fundamental truth of human interdependence. There will always be such denial. Ignorance and folly are not things we can banish from the human condition. But we can diminish their degree, sometimes in small ways that have dramatic effects.
I have argued frequently and passionately for others to join me in the formation of a social movement that is not for the promotion of an ideological or partisan agenda, not to affect election outcomes or influence policy positions, but rather to take as many of us as possible as far on this journey as possible. We need to travel to the moon before we can walk on its surface. We need to cultivate our consciousness before we can act under its influence.
Of course, we will continue to act under the influence of the consciousness that we have, even while we devote just a little more effort to cultivating one more conducive to more functional and humane public policies. These are not mutually exclusive. Nor am I speaking only of us each cultivating our own consciousness (though that is, as always, absolutely vital); I’m speaking of us organizing in service to the cultivation of our collective consciousness.
My purpose in life is not to promote the Progressive agenda. My purpose is to promote wise self-governance in service to human consciousness and well-being. I think it’s important that we continue to remind ourselves of the distinction, because we cannot move humanity forward until we can appeal to people who are not in the market for a partisan identity. And if we can appeal to people who already have one, especially those who would recoil at the thought of working to advance any liberal or progressive agenda, all the better.
It is not a subterfuge: it is a refocusing of all of our minds on what is truly essential and truly important. It is the commitment to look past competing blind ideologies shored up by shallow platitudes toward ultimate purposes and deep underlying values. And getting past these rigid ideological camps into which we have relegated ourselves is one of the necessary steps toward real progress.
It depends on robust discourse among people of differing views. It flourishes when more of us recognize that there’s only one ideology to which any of us should adhere: That of striving to be reasonable people of goodwill, wise enough to know that we don’t know much, responsible enough to try to understand and see the merit in opposing views, compassionate enough to recognize that the goal of these efforts should be a commitment to humanity, working together with all others willing and able to embrace such an ideology to do the best we can in a complex and subtle world.
This is my mission in life: To promote this simple ideology, encourage as many as possible to work toward encouraging as many others as possible to adopt it to the greatest extent possible, always as a work in progress, more focused on our procedures for arriving at the truth than on what we currently think is the truth, always open to the possibility that we are dramatically wrong on one or more crucial points. This is something we should do independently of what we do regarding electoral politics and issue advocacy, diverting some small portion of our time and effort and passion into the long-term investment in a deeper political paradigm shift, into traversing the space between here and that distant moon where we recognize that we are interdependent, that we are fallible, and that we are all in this story together.
It’s not the first time such spaces have been traversed, such thresholds have been reached. We’ve had a Renaissance and a Reformation, a Scientific Revolution and an Enlightenment and the political revolutions based on it, an industrial revolution and now an information technology revolution, a confluence of globalizing forces and a movement to recapture some of the wisdom and beauty of the cultures that were trampled underfoot by modernity’s advance, and human history is still accelerating in amazing ways full of both promise and danger. We are a part of that process, participants in it, with an opportunity to plant the seeds for a future that could be one of ever-more rapidly growing human consciousness and an ever-wiser realization of our role on this wonderful planet of ours.
We are a work in progress, and maybe the word “Progressive” needs to be understood by those who bear it to mean “still a work in progress,” because once people fall into the trap of thinking they have all the answers, they forget how to ask the right questions.
Here’s to us! I believe in our potential, but I’m also keenly aware of the obstacles that stand in our way of realizing it, obstacles that, for the most part, we create ourselves, and throw up in front of us, seemingly determined to perennially condemn ourselves to live in interesting times….
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
Reason and Compromise
Today’s writings will be A statement on the tension between a commitment to Reason and a practical need for joining organized efforts that are rarely if ever in perfect alignment with Reason:
When I consider what I’ll call Cultural Politics, which is the competition of narratives in the population at large, and which is what I consider the more fundamental arena in which the poltical contest takes place, I am all for non-partisanship: We should dump all of our ideological and partisan baggage, and merely strive to be reasonable and humane people, knowing that we don’t know, working with others in a disciplined and pragmatic way to do the best we can in a complex and subtle world. But when I consider what I’ll call Politics Proper, which is the competition over electoral victories and specific policies enacted through the political process in real time, I feel no choice but to become more partisan, because those more superficial but still significant and vital battles are determined by superior organization and mobilization of resources, and too much disintegration of efforts into divergent emphases undermines the ability of those so inclined to pass their preferred laws and policies.
I prefer Obama to Romney, a Democratic controlled Congress to a Republican controlled Congress, the passage of gay rights legislation, and humane immigration reform, and the preservation of our social welfare system, and more proactive investment in the extension of opportunity and the reduction of social injustice, and more attention to environmental and public health and safety issues. The reality is, in current election cycles, except very rarely at the more local levels, we are faced with an effective choice between two broad alternatives, and I will and feel that I must dedicate what effort I dedicate to Politics Proper working to see that my preference among those two choices prevails.
But there are many points of intersection between Cultural Politics and Politics Proper, in which the demands of both become more blended. While working, on the Cultural Politics side, for a less ideological and more imaginative and analytical approach to self-governance, I also work to move the political party I favor more in that direction (and often get as much flak from my own fellow Democrats for doing so as I get from Republicans for opposing them more broadly). And, if promising third parties emerge that seem better positioned to incorporate more of what I favor on the Cultural Politics side into their approach to Politics Proper, I will certainly work to raise their profile and viability so that at some point in the future they might actually become a reasonable investment in the electoral competitions that define Politics Proper.
But I will not relinquish the present to the party which I consider the less desirable of the two currently viable choices in service to some personal commitment to some dysfunctional purity of my own. We have to blend the pragmatic and idealistic and long-term and immediate demands that confront us, to articulate with the world in the most effective and beneficial way possible.
However, the demands of compromise move us toward reason in the next stage, after arguably moving it away from reason in the stage described above: Once we’ve organized in support of our preferred policies, we must compromise with those who have organized in support of theirs with which we disagree, in order to govern ourselves effectively and functionally. And, as a general rule, over the long-term, this requirement increases rather than decreases the rationality of our policies, and the quality of analysis and human consciousness that has gone into their design and implementation.
In theory, this process continues into the global arena, with nations that have hopefully developed to be more inclusive internally also developing in the direction of being more pacified and cooperative externally. There will always be divergent interests and orientations in play in this dynamic, within political parties, within nations, and throughout the world, nested and overlapping organizations of divergent and convergent interests, competing and compromising and moving toward arrangements that better serve humanity’s interests. The more we can rationalize and realize this process, the better off we all will be.
When I consider what I’ll call Cultural Politics, which is the competition of narratives in the population at large, and which is what I consider the more fundamental arena in which the poltical contest takes place, I am all for non-partisanship: We should dump all of our ideological and partisan baggage, and merely strive to be reasonable and humane people, knowing that we don’t know, working with others in a disciplined and pragmatic way to do the best we can in a complex and subtle world. But when I consider what I’ll call Politics Proper, which is the competition over electoral victories and specific policies enacted through the political process in real time, I feel no choice but to become more partisan, because those more superficial but still significant and vital battles are determined by superior organization and mobilization of resources, and too much disintegration of efforts into divergent emphases undermines the ability of those so inclined to pass their preferred laws and policies.
I prefer Obama to Romney, a Democratic controlled Congress to a Republican controlled Congress, the passage of gay rights legislation, and humane immigration reform, and the preservation of our social welfare system, and more proactive investment in the extension of opportunity and the reduction of social injustice, and more attention to environmental and public health and safety issues. The reality is, in current election cycles, except very rarely at the more local levels, we are faced with an effective choice between two broad alternatives, and I will and feel that I must dedicate what effort I dedicate to Politics Proper working to see that my preference among those two choices prevails.
But there are many points of intersection between Cultural Politics and Politics Proper, in which the demands of both become more blended. While working, on the Cultural Politics side, for a less ideological and more imaginative and analytical approach to self-governance, I also work to move the political party I favor more in that direction (and often get as much flak from my own fellow Democrats for doing so as I get from Republicans for opposing them more broadly). And, if promising third parties emerge that seem better positioned to incorporate more of what I favor on the Cultural Politics side into their approach to Politics Proper, I will certainly work to raise their profile and viability so that at some point in the future they might actually become a reasonable investment in the electoral competitions that define Politics Proper.
But I will not relinquish the present to the party which I consider the less desirable of the two currently viable choices in service to some personal commitment to some dysfunctional purity of my own. We have to blend the pragmatic and idealistic and long-term and immediate demands that confront us, to articulate with the world in the most effective and beneficial way possible.
However, the demands of compromise move us toward reason in the next stage, after arguably moving it away from reason in the stage described above: Once we’ve organized in support of our preferred policies, we must compromise with those who have organized in support of theirs with which we disagree, in order to govern ourselves effectively and functionally. And, as a general rule, over the long-term, this requirement increases rather than decreases the rationality of our policies, and the quality of analysis and human consciousness that has gone into their design and implementation.
In theory, this process continues into the global arena, with nations that have hopefully developed to be more inclusive internally also developing in the direction of being more pacified and cooperative externally. There will always be divergent interests and orientations in play in this dynamic, within political parties, within nations, and throughout the world, nested and overlapping organizations of divergent and convergent interests, competing and compromising and moving toward arrangements that better serve humanity’s interests. The more we can rationalize and realize this process, the better off we all will be.
Monday, November 5, 2012
Why It Is So Important To Vote
To be a citizen of this country we have certain rights and privileges. We also have certain responsibilities to be active in positive change. Society is a form of extended family. We all contribute to society, either in a positive way or a negative way. To vote is to give a voice in playing a role in positive change. Many men died for our right to vote, as well as the other rights we now take for granted. Women could not vote for many years because they were not considered an important part of decision making. Now we all have a responsibility to make the world a better place and we now have the right to do so. Women more than ever now should exercise their right to vote. All policies are made by the elected officials we get into office. All policies affect each and every citizen. Each one of us has a duty to leave the world a better place for the next generations because we lived. We can and should be aware of policies and officials. We should read the news and understand the direction our country is going in. Many important, critical issues are at hand currently. Healthcare issues are among the top of the list. Social Security for the aging and the disabled is in jeopardy. Even though these issues may not affect you right now, the day will come that they will affect you. Also, the issues are not just about us but about doing the best we can do for all citizens. The elderly should be our responsibility to care for them the best we can. They have worked all of their lives to make the world better for us and it is now our turn to see that they are properly cared for with issues such as Medicare, Social Security etc. Our children are also equally important and the primary education system is at risk for falling behind. We need to be proactive to make change for our children and future generations to come. Education is critical, many other countries are way ahead of us and we are falling behind. Legislation is where it all begins. We have had many devastating disasters recently and have seen many of our citizens not receiving the help needed, such as with Katrina. Federal funds are determined by legislation. We have many poor relations with many countries right now; we desperately need politicians in office who can work for peaceful relations with other countries. We have rising educational costs with colleges, which require effective solutions to ensure that we have educated adults entering the work force, without the funds available many will not get the education and the country will suffer. Crime is rising nationwide, prisons are failing and we need better solutions to deviant behavior. Mental health population is suffering due to lack of funds and interest from our leaders. Jobs are being outsourced to other countries mainly China. Immigration controversies are a huge issue now. We, as a people should stand together instead of being divided. The government represents the people and they are employed by the people. The people are made up by each and every citizen. The government and politicians have taken over our country and fail to listen to the people. We need to remind Washington DC that they do not dictate policy but assert the policies the people want.
Drug use, abuse, and addiction are at an all-time high. The drug situation is a host of multiple problems. Every time a person buys illegal drugs the money goes towards terrorism, which we are fighting a war against. We have addiction centers popping up all over the country, leading to increased medical costs that society absorbs due to most of the addicts not working and welfare footing the bill. WE have AID's which is leading to many other diseases to be on the rise. We have science looking for cures to diseases such as cancer. We still have issues like abortion, which are very controversial. We have a society at risk for losing the leadership status with the world. The list goes on and on. Watch the news and see all of the problems and think about the root of the problem, how we can solve the problems, and what it will take to get the job done. Many citizens today want the benefits of society but do not want to do their part in making good things happen. Life is not about taking, it is about giving. The old wise saying rings true today, "Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country" by JFK. We need to be a strong country once again....it can happen but each and every one of us must do our part. We are either part of the problem or part of the solution.
Why is it important to participate in the democratic process by voting? That's an interesting question with several different ways in which to answer it. Voting is the foremost way to exhibit good citizenship and civil responsibility.
First, voting in free elections is a right that should not be taken lightly. Millions of people in the United States and around the world have fought and even died for the seemingly simple right to vote. Should their sacrifices just fade away into some distant memory? Voting is a patriotic act and everyone should participate. By voting, a person conveys that sense of patriotism that he/she cares enough about the direction of the country to exercise the power available to millions and millions of people to make their voices heard.
Second, no matter how much a person feels their single vote does not count, they are dead wrong. In the mayoral election in Ann Arbor in 1977, the outcome was decided by a single, solitary vote. As another example, John F. Kennedy won the Presidential election of 1960 by as small a margin as one vote per election district in 12 states. If every person believes that his or her vote doesn't matter, the sheer volume of non-voters will destroy the democratic process.
Third, voting is the principle means of a representative government. The Framers left the future of the country in the hands of its citizens. How can a government be representative if roughly 45-50 percent of eligible voters don't vote? This makes a government only representative to half of the country.
In conclusion, everyone should recognize the importance of voting and act accordingly. Rather than just sit back and complain when something the government does isn't in your best interest, get out and vote and make a difference. Eligible voters who refuse to do so have absolutely no right to complain when they did nothing at all to protect their interests when they have that exact power.
Drug use, abuse, and addiction are at an all-time high. The drug situation is a host of multiple problems. Every time a person buys illegal drugs the money goes towards terrorism, which we are fighting a war against. We have addiction centers popping up all over the country, leading to increased medical costs that society absorbs due to most of the addicts not working and welfare footing the bill. WE have AID's which is leading to many other diseases to be on the rise. We have science looking for cures to diseases such as cancer. We still have issues like abortion, which are very controversial. We have a society at risk for losing the leadership status with the world. The list goes on and on. Watch the news and see all of the problems and think about the root of the problem, how we can solve the problems, and what it will take to get the job done. Many citizens today want the benefits of society but do not want to do their part in making good things happen. Life is not about taking, it is about giving. The old wise saying rings true today, "Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country" by JFK. We need to be a strong country once again....it can happen but each and every one of us must do our part. We are either part of the problem or part of the solution.
Why is it important to participate in the democratic process by voting? That's an interesting question with several different ways in which to answer it. Voting is the foremost way to exhibit good citizenship and civil responsibility.
First, voting in free elections is a right that should not be taken lightly. Millions of people in the United States and around the world have fought and even died for the seemingly simple right to vote. Should their sacrifices just fade away into some distant memory? Voting is a patriotic act and everyone should participate. By voting, a person conveys that sense of patriotism that he/she cares enough about the direction of the country to exercise the power available to millions and millions of people to make their voices heard.
Second, no matter how much a person feels their single vote does not count, they are dead wrong. In the mayoral election in Ann Arbor in 1977, the outcome was decided by a single, solitary vote. As another example, John F. Kennedy won the Presidential election of 1960 by as small a margin as one vote per election district in 12 states. If every person believes that his or her vote doesn't matter, the sheer volume of non-voters will destroy the democratic process.
Third, voting is the principle means of a representative government. The Framers left the future of the country in the hands of its citizens. How can a government be representative if roughly 45-50 percent of eligible voters don't vote? This makes a government only representative to half of the country.
In conclusion, everyone should recognize the importance of voting and act accordingly. Rather than just sit back and complain when something the government does isn't in your best interest, get out and vote and make a difference. Eligible voters who refuse to do so have absolutely no right to complain when they did nothing at all to protect their interests when they have that exact power.
Friday, November 2, 2012
A Discussion On Self Esteem
We are living in a society today where due to bad economics, lack of jobs, people losing their jobs, young adults graduating and finding out there are no jobs available, music degrading our woman, bullying in our school and my all time favorite, the way we allow others to treat us badly and somehow draw the conclusion that we deserve to be treated that way. Because of the above issues, I have chosen to speak today on a very important subject. That subject is Self Esteem
You can't touch it, but it affects how you feel. You can't see it, but it might be there when you look at yourself in the mirror. You can't hear it, but it's there when you talk about yourself or when you think about yourself.
What is this important but mysterious thing? It's your self-esteem!
What Is Self-Esteem?
Self-esteem can have a big part to play in how you feel about yourself and also how much you enjoy things or worry about things.
To understand self-esteem, it helps to break the term into two words. Let's first take a look at the word esteem (say: ess-teem), which means that someone or something is important, special, or valuable. For example, if you really admire your friend's dad because he volunteers at the fire department, it means you hold him in high esteem. And the special trophy for the most valuable player on a team is often called an esteemed trophy. This means the trophy stands for an important accomplishment.
And self means, well, yourself! So put the two words together and it's easier to see what self-esteem is. It's how much you value yourself and how important you think you are. It's how you see yourself and how you feel about the things you can do.
Self-esteem isn't about bragging, it’s about getting to know what you are good at and not so good at. A lot of us think about how much we like other people or things, but don't really think much about whether we like ourselves.
It's not about thinking you're perfect, because nobody is perfect. Even if you think some other people are good at everything, you can be sure they have things they're good at and things that are difficult for them.
The most important thing to know about self-esteem is that it means seeing yourself in a positive way that's realistic, which means that it's the truth.
Why Self-Esteem Is Important
Self-esteem isn't like a cool item you really want but can wait to get. All people have self-esteem, and having healthy or positive self-esteem is really important. It can help you hold your head high and feel proud of yourself and what you can do, even when things don't seem to be going so well.
Self-esteem gives you the courage to try new things and the power to believe in yourself. It lets you respect yourself, even when you make mistakes. And when you respect yourself, other people usually respect you, too.
Having positive self-esteem can also help you can learn to make healthy choices about your mind and body. If you think you're important, you'll be less likely to follow the crowd if your friends are doing something wrong or dangerous. If you have positive self-esteem, you know you're smart enough to make your own decisions. You value your safety, your feelings, your health — your whole self! Positive self-esteem helps you know that every part of you is worth caring for and protecting.
How Kids Get Self-Esteem
Babies don't see themselves in a good or bad way. They don't think "I'm great!" when they let out a big burp or worry "Oh, no, this diaper makes my legs look weird!" Instead, people around a baby help him or her develop self-esteem. How? By encouraging the baby when he or she learns to crawl, walk, or talk. They often say, "Good job. Good for you!" Or, they might just smile and look proud. When people take good care of a baby, that also helps him or her feel loved and valuable.
As kids get older, they can have a bigger role in developing their own self-esteem. Working hard to finish a project or assignment, getting a higher grade on a math test, or trying out for a new sport are all things kids can be proud of for trying. Some kids are not very athletic, but they might be good readers or know how to do magic tricks or are really good friends or help other people out — these are all accomplishments that help kids feel good about themselves.
A kid's family and other people in his or her life — like coaches, teachers, and classmates — also can boost self-esteem. They can help a kid figure out how to do things or notice his or her good qualities. They can believe in the kid and encourage him or her to try again when something doesn't go right the first time. It's all part of kids learning to see themselves in a positive way, to feel proud of what they've done, and to be confident that there's a lot more they can do.
Maybe you know people with low self-esteem who don't think very highly of themselves or seem to criticize themselves too much. This can also be called negative self-esteem, and it's the opposite of positive self-esteem. Maybe you have low self-esteem sometimes and don't always feel very good about yourself or think you're important.
Of course it's OK to have ups and downs in your feelings, but having low self-esteem isn't OK. Feeling like you're not important can make you sad and can keep you from trying new things. It can keep you from making friends or affect how hard you try at school.
Having strong self-esteem is also a very big part of growing up. As you get older and face tough decisions — especially under peer pressure — the more self-esteem you have, the better. It's important to like yourself.
Self-esteem can improve when you start trying things you thought were too hard and then do well at them, or when a parent, family member, or other adult encourages you, is patient, and helps you get back on track. When you start to do well, self-esteem will skyrocket!
Here are a few other things that you can try to increase your self-esteem:
•Give yourself three compliments every day. Don't just say, "I'm so great." Be specific about something good about yourself, like, "I was a good friend to Jill today" or "I did better on that test than I thought I would." While you're at it, before you go to bed every night, list three things in your day that really made you happy or that you feel thankful for.
•Remember that your body is your own, no matter what shape, size, or color it is. If you are worried about your weight or size, you can check with your doctor to make sure you're healthy. Remind yourself of things about your body that are cool, like, "My legs are strong and I can skate really well."
•Remember that there are things about yourself you can't change. You should accept and love these things — such as skin color and shoe size — because they are part of you.
•When you hear negative comments in your head, tell yourself to stop. Remind yourself of things you're good at and if you can't think of anything, ask someone else! You can also learn a new skill (for example, karate, dance, a musical instrument) so you can feel good about that!
By focusing on the good things you do and all your great qualities, you learn to love and accept yourself — the main ingredients for strong self-esteem! Even if you've got room for improvement (and who doesn't?), knowing what you're good at and that you're valuable and special to the people that care about you can really help you deal with growing up.
Part of growing up is learning to focus on your strengths and to accept and work on your weaknesses — and that, in a nutshell, is self-esteem
You can't touch it, but it affects how you feel. You can't see it, but it might be there when you look at yourself in the mirror. You can't hear it, but it's there when you talk about yourself or when you think about yourself.
What is this important but mysterious thing? It's your self-esteem!
What Is Self-Esteem?
Self-esteem can have a big part to play in how you feel about yourself and also how much you enjoy things or worry about things.
To understand self-esteem, it helps to break the term into two words. Let's first take a look at the word esteem (say: ess-teem), which means that someone or something is important, special, or valuable. For example, if you really admire your friend's dad because he volunteers at the fire department, it means you hold him in high esteem. And the special trophy for the most valuable player on a team is often called an esteemed trophy. This means the trophy stands for an important accomplishment.
And self means, well, yourself! So put the two words together and it's easier to see what self-esteem is. It's how much you value yourself and how important you think you are. It's how you see yourself and how you feel about the things you can do.
Self-esteem isn't about bragging, it’s about getting to know what you are good at and not so good at. A lot of us think about how much we like other people or things, but don't really think much about whether we like ourselves.
It's not about thinking you're perfect, because nobody is perfect. Even if you think some other people are good at everything, you can be sure they have things they're good at and things that are difficult for them.
The most important thing to know about self-esteem is that it means seeing yourself in a positive way that's realistic, which means that it's the truth.
Why Self-Esteem Is Important
Self-esteem isn't like a cool item you really want but can wait to get. All people have self-esteem, and having healthy or positive self-esteem is really important. It can help you hold your head high and feel proud of yourself and what you can do, even when things don't seem to be going so well.
Self-esteem gives you the courage to try new things and the power to believe in yourself. It lets you respect yourself, even when you make mistakes. And when you respect yourself, other people usually respect you, too.
Having positive self-esteem can also help you can learn to make healthy choices about your mind and body. If you think you're important, you'll be less likely to follow the crowd if your friends are doing something wrong or dangerous. If you have positive self-esteem, you know you're smart enough to make your own decisions. You value your safety, your feelings, your health — your whole self! Positive self-esteem helps you know that every part of you is worth caring for and protecting.
How Kids Get Self-Esteem
Babies don't see themselves in a good or bad way. They don't think "I'm great!" when they let out a big burp or worry "Oh, no, this diaper makes my legs look weird!" Instead, people around a baby help him or her develop self-esteem. How? By encouraging the baby when he or she learns to crawl, walk, or talk. They often say, "Good job. Good for you!" Or, they might just smile and look proud. When people take good care of a baby, that also helps him or her feel loved and valuable.
As kids get older, they can have a bigger role in developing their own self-esteem. Working hard to finish a project or assignment, getting a higher grade on a math test, or trying out for a new sport are all things kids can be proud of for trying. Some kids are not very athletic, but they might be good readers or know how to do magic tricks or are really good friends or help other people out — these are all accomplishments that help kids feel good about themselves.
A kid's family and other people in his or her life — like coaches, teachers, and classmates — also can boost self-esteem. They can help a kid figure out how to do things or notice his or her good qualities. They can believe in the kid and encourage him or her to try again when something doesn't go right the first time. It's all part of kids learning to see themselves in a positive way, to feel proud of what they've done, and to be confident that there's a lot more they can do.
Maybe you know people with low self-esteem who don't think very highly of themselves or seem to criticize themselves too much. This can also be called negative self-esteem, and it's the opposite of positive self-esteem. Maybe you have low self-esteem sometimes and don't always feel very good about yourself or think you're important.
Of course it's OK to have ups and downs in your feelings, but having low self-esteem isn't OK. Feeling like you're not important can make you sad and can keep you from trying new things. It can keep you from making friends or affect how hard you try at school.
Having strong self-esteem is also a very big part of growing up. As you get older and face tough decisions — especially under peer pressure — the more self-esteem you have, the better. It's important to like yourself.
Self-esteem can improve when you start trying things you thought were too hard and then do well at them, or when a parent, family member, or other adult encourages you, is patient, and helps you get back on track. When you start to do well, self-esteem will skyrocket!
Here are a few other things that you can try to increase your self-esteem:
•Give yourself three compliments every day. Don't just say, "I'm so great." Be specific about something good about yourself, like, "I was a good friend to Jill today" or "I did better on that test than I thought I would." While you're at it, before you go to bed every night, list three things in your day that really made you happy or that you feel thankful for.
•Remember that your body is your own, no matter what shape, size, or color it is. If you are worried about your weight or size, you can check with your doctor to make sure you're healthy. Remind yourself of things about your body that are cool, like, "My legs are strong and I can skate really well."
•Remember that there are things about yourself you can't change. You should accept and love these things — such as skin color and shoe size — because they are part of you.
•When you hear negative comments in your head, tell yourself to stop. Remind yourself of things you're good at and if you can't think of anything, ask someone else! You can also learn a new skill (for example, karate, dance, a musical instrument) so you can feel good about that!
By focusing on the good things you do and all your great qualities, you learn to love and accept yourself — the main ingredients for strong self-esteem! Even if you've got room for improvement (and who doesn't?), knowing what you're good at and that you're valuable and special to the people that care about you can really help you deal with growing up.
Part of growing up is learning to focus on your strengths and to accept and work on your weaknesses — and that, in a nutshell, is self-esteem
Thursday, November 1, 2012
DIsclaimer!!!
I would like to open today by saying THANK YOU to all of the readers who reached out yesterday in concern for me based on my writing yesterday. It was very heartfelt that there are genuine people reading my Blogs. I must say though that you will almost never read a Blog I write where I will include personal life information, that is not what this is about. What I attempt to do is make my writing palatable and easily understood by readers of all ages and levels of comprehension which sometimes requires me to set up a scenario by which the reader can then read my message and say "Thats what he meant by that" if it happens to be the type of read. I try to write about current events, things that are of concern to me and should be to you as well, and sometimes life experience to impart some wisdom to our youth and those that may need guidance. I will sometimes write in the first person if that helps to get my message across but please understand, I am almost never writing about my personal life although there may be bits of personal experience intertwined in the body of text.
Once again, THANK YOU all for the Love and Concern but no one loves themselves more than I love me and you all, I am good with me, with mine and I am truly God Blessed so I try to pass the Blessings on to you thru my Blog. Peace, God Bless and Love Someone Today!!!
Once again, THANK YOU all for the Love and Concern but no one loves themselves more than I love me and you all, I am good with me, with mine and I am truly God Blessed so I try to pass the Blessings on to you thru my Blog. Peace, God Bless and Love Someone Today!!!
I Think Romney Has a Christie Problem and a FEMA Problem
Like many others—though not the weather forecasters or the political authorities—I underestimated the scope of the storm. Now that at least thirty-eight people are dead, thousands have been driven from their homes, and millions are without power, the election campaign looks like something of a side show. But the fact remains that voting will go ahead next Tuesday, and the politicking continues, albeit in a different manner.
On the Democratic side, the devastation that Sandy has wreaked more than justifies President Obama’s decision to return to Washington on Sunday and to declare a pre-disaster state of emergency in a number of states. On Tuesday morning, he followed up these edicts by signing major disaster declarations for New York and New Jersey, which will make it easier for them to access federal assistance. First thing this morning, the White House let it be known that the President had been monitoring the storm’s progress throughout the night, and that he had spoken to a number of local officials, including Governor Cuomo, Mayor Bloomberg, and Chris Christie, the governor of New Jersey.
Appearing on the networks this morning, Christie, for the third day in a row, heaped praise on Obama’s handling of the storm. “The President has been outstanding in this,” he told the “Today” show. On “Morning Joe,” he said, “It’s been very good working with the President. He and his Administration have been coördinating with us. It’s been wonderful.” Speaking on CNN, Christie said that he had been mightily impressed by Obama’s accessibility throughout the crisis. “He gave me his number at the White House, told me to call him if I needed anything, and he absolutely means it.” Christie also pointed out that Obama didn’t once bring up politics in their conversations, and added, “If he’s not bringing it up, you can be sure that people in New Jersey are not worried about that, primarily if one of the guys running isn’t.”
Can you imagine what the strategists, flaks, and bagmen at Romney’s campaign HQ must have been thinking when they woke up to this stuff? Deleting the expletives, it probably went something along the lines of: Isn’t this guy ever going to shut up? Evidently, the answer is no. Appearing on Fox News—yes, Fox—Christie scoffed at the idea of Romney making a visit to New Jersey in order to inspect the damage. “I have no idea, nor am I the least bit concerned or interested,” he said. “I’ve got a job to do here in New Jersey that’s much bigger than Presidential politics, and I could care less about any of that stuff.”
Good for Christie, you might say. He’s just doing his job as the governor of New Jersey and saying what he thinks. The President was there when his state needed help, and it’s only right for him to acknowledge this publicly. O.K., I’m with you. But three days in a row? On practically every network in the country? Republicans could be forgiven for getting a bit apoplectic. Doesn’t Christie have other things to be doing, such as inspecting the damage, rescuing the stranded, and trying to get the power restored? Right about now, Romney must be feeling like calling him up and giving him the same advice that Clement Attlee, the postwar Labour Prime Minister of Great Britain gave to Harold Laski, the left-wing London School of Economics professor: “A period of silence from you would be welcome.”
The Mittster is unlikely to get much relief on this front, and he’s also got some self-inflicted damage to deal with: the fallout from his suggestion during the G.O.P. primaries that he was in favor of dismantling federal emergency management and privatizing relief efforts. At a CNN debate in June, 2011, the moderator John King engaged the candidates in a discussion about the role of government. When he got to Romney, the exchange went like this:
KING: What else, Governor Romney? You’ve been a chief executive of a state. I was just in Joplin, Missouri. I’ve been in Mississippi and Louisiana and Tennessee and other communities dealing with whether it’s the tornadoes, the flooding, and worse. FEMA is about to run out of money, and there are some people who say do it on a case-by-case basis and some people who say, you know, maybe we’re learning a lesson here that the states should take on more of this role. How do you deal with something like that?
ROMNEY: Absolutely. Every time you have an occasion to take something from the federal government and send it back to the states, that’s the right direction. And if you can go even further and send it back to the private sector, that’s even better.
Instead of thinking in the federal budget, what we should cut—we should ask ourselves the opposite question. What should we keep? We should take all of what we’re doing at the federal level and say, what are the things we’re doing that we don’t have to do? And those things we’ve got to stop doing, because we’re borrowing $1.6 trillion more this year than we’re taking in. We cannot…
KING: Including disaster relief, though?
ROMNEY: We cannot—we cannot afford to do those things without jeopardizing the future for our kids. It is simply immoral, in my view, for us to continue to rack up larger and larger debts and pass them on to our kids, knowing full well that we’ll all be dead and gone before it’s paid off. It makes no sense at all.
That seems pretty clear cut: FEMA and other federal disaster-relief efforts should be on list of things that should be eliminated in order to reduce the national debt. Not surprisingly, in the past few days the Romney campaign has been busy rowing back from that position. When a reporter from the National Journal asked the Romney campaign about the candidate’s stance on disaster relief, a press spokeswoman e-mailed back: “Gov. Romney believes that states should be in charge of emergency management in responding to storms and other natural disasters in their jurisdictions. As the first responders, states are in the best position to aid affected individuals and communities, and to direct resources and assistance to where they are needed most. This includes help from the federal government and FEMA.”
So Romney is in favor of keeping FEMA, after all—or is he? On Monday afternoon, even before Sandy had hit, the editorial page of the Times invoked Romney’s 2011 comments in the debate and asked, “Does Mr. Romney really believe that financially strapped states would do a better job than a properly functioning federal agency? Who would make decisions about where to send federal aid? Or perhaps there would be no federal aid, and every state would bear the burden of billions of dollars in damages.” So far, the Obama campaign hasn’t adopted this mode of attack, probably because it doesn’t need to. With the President sticking to the line that the election is the furthest thing from his mind, it can rely on the media to make life even more difficult for Team Romney, which is clearly struggling to come up with a post-Sandy strategy.
As of early Tuesday afternoon, the only mention of the storm on the home page of Romney’s Web site was a link to the Red Cross. The Mittster was scheduled to resume campaigning on Wednesday, in Florida. Paul Ryan, his running mate, is scheduled to be in his home state of Wisconsin. Before leaving for Florida, Romney attended a rally in Kettering, Ohio, which had hastily been converted to a storm-relief benefit: attendees were asked to bring non-perishable food, flashlights, and other items that could be sent to the victims of Sandy. Speaking for about five minutes, the G.O.P. candidate confined himself to the storm, saying, “We have heavy hearts, as you know, with all the suffering going on. There are a lot of people who were hurting this morning, who were hurting last night.”
There’s no reason to doubt the sincerity of what Romney said, or the usefulness of his efforts to help the victims. But six days before the election, this was just what he didn’t need.
Be Blessed, Be Safe and Pray for those still suffering in the wake of SuperStorm Sandy.
On the Democratic side, the devastation that Sandy has wreaked more than justifies President Obama’s decision to return to Washington on Sunday and to declare a pre-disaster state of emergency in a number of states. On Tuesday morning, he followed up these edicts by signing major disaster declarations for New York and New Jersey, which will make it easier for them to access federal assistance. First thing this morning, the White House let it be known that the President had been monitoring the storm’s progress throughout the night, and that he had spoken to a number of local officials, including Governor Cuomo, Mayor Bloomberg, and Chris Christie, the governor of New Jersey.
Appearing on the networks this morning, Christie, for the third day in a row, heaped praise on Obama’s handling of the storm. “The President has been outstanding in this,” he told the “Today” show. On “Morning Joe,” he said, “It’s been very good working with the President. He and his Administration have been coördinating with us. It’s been wonderful.” Speaking on CNN, Christie said that he had been mightily impressed by Obama’s accessibility throughout the crisis. “He gave me his number at the White House, told me to call him if I needed anything, and he absolutely means it.” Christie also pointed out that Obama didn’t once bring up politics in their conversations, and added, “If he’s not bringing it up, you can be sure that people in New Jersey are not worried about that, primarily if one of the guys running isn’t.”
Can you imagine what the strategists, flaks, and bagmen at Romney’s campaign HQ must have been thinking when they woke up to this stuff? Deleting the expletives, it probably went something along the lines of: Isn’t this guy ever going to shut up? Evidently, the answer is no. Appearing on Fox News—yes, Fox—Christie scoffed at the idea of Romney making a visit to New Jersey in order to inspect the damage. “I have no idea, nor am I the least bit concerned or interested,” he said. “I’ve got a job to do here in New Jersey that’s much bigger than Presidential politics, and I could care less about any of that stuff.”
Good for Christie, you might say. He’s just doing his job as the governor of New Jersey and saying what he thinks. The President was there when his state needed help, and it’s only right for him to acknowledge this publicly. O.K., I’m with you. But three days in a row? On practically every network in the country? Republicans could be forgiven for getting a bit apoplectic. Doesn’t Christie have other things to be doing, such as inspecting the damage, rescuing the stranded, and trying to get the power restored? Right about now, Romney must be feeling like calling him up and giving him the same advice that Clement Attlee, the postwar Labour Prime Minister of Great Britain gave to Harold Laski, the left-wing London School of Economics professor: “A period of silence from you would be welcome.”
The Mittster is unlikely to get much relief on this front, and he’s also got some self-inflicted damage to deal with: the fallout from his suggestion during the G.O.P. primaries that he was in favor of dismantling federal emergency management and privatizing relief efforts. At a CNN debate in June, 2011, the moderator John King engaged the candidates in a discussion about the role of government. When he got to Romney, the exchange went like this:
KING: What else, Governor Romney? You’ve been a chief executive of a state. I was just in Joplin, Missouri. I’ve been in Mississippi and Louisiana and Tennessee and other communities dealing with whether it’s the tornadoes, the flooding, and worse. FEMA is about to run out of money, and there are some people who say do it on a case-by-case basis and some people who say, you know, maybe we’re learning a lesson here that the states should take on more of this role. How do you deal with something like that?
ROMNEY: Absolutely. Every time you have an occasion to take something from the federal government and send it back to the states, that’s the right direction. And if you can go even further and send it back to the private sector, that’s even better.
Instead of thinking in the federal budget, what we should cut—we should ask ourselves the opposite question. What should we keep? We should take all of what we’re doing at the federal level and say, what are the things we’re doing that we don’t have to do? And those things we’ve got to stop doing, because we’re borrowing $1.6 trillion more this year than we’re taking in. We cannot…
KING: Including disaster relief, though?
ROMNEY: We cannot—we cannot afford to do those things without jeopardizing the future for our kids. It is simply immoral, in my view, for us to continue to rack up larger and larger debts and pass them on to our kids, knowing full well that we’ll all be dead and gone before it’s paid off. It makes no sense at all.
That seems pretty clear cut: FEMA and other federal disaster-relief efforts should be on list of things that should be eliminated in order to reduce the national debt. Not surprisingly, in the past few days the Romney campaign has been busy rowing back from that position. When a reporter from the National Journal asked the Romney campaign about the candidate’s stance on disaster relief, a press spokeswoman e-mailed back: “Gov. Romney believes that states should be in charge of emergency management in responding to storms and other natural disasters in their jurisdictions. As the first responders, states are in the best position to aid affected individuals and communities, and to direct resources and assistance to where they are needed most. This includes help from the federal government and FEMA.”
So Romney is in favor of keeping FEMA, after all—or is he? On Monday afternoon, even before Sandy had hit, the editorial page of the Times invoked Romney’s 2011 comments in the debate and asked, “Does Mr. Romney really believe that financially strapped states would do a better job than a properly functioning federal agency? Who would make decisions about where to send federal aid? Or perhaps there would be no federal aid, and every state would bear the burden of billions of dollars in damages.” So far, the Obama campaign hasn’t adopted this mode of attack, probably because it doesn’t need to. With the President sticking to the line that the election is the furthest thing from his mind, it can rely on the media to make life even more difficult for Team Romney, which is clearly struggling to come up with a post-Sandy strategy.
As of early Tuesday afternoon, the only mention of the storm on the home page of Romney’s Web site was a link to the Red Cross. The Mittster was scheduled to resume campaigning on Wednesday, in Florida. Paul Ryan, his running mate, is scheduled to be in his home state of Wisconsin. Before leaving for Florida, Romney attended a rally in Kettering, Ohio, which had hastily been converted to a storm-relief benefit: attendees were asked to bring non-perishable food, flashlights, and other items that could be sent to the victims of Sandy. Speaking for about five minutes, the G.O.P. candidate confined himself to the storm, saying, “We have heavy hearts, as you know, with all the suffering going on. There are a lot of people who were hurting this morning, who were hurting last night.”
There’s no reason to doubt the sincerity of what Romney said, or the usefulness of his efforts to help the victims. But six days before the election, this was just what he didn’t need.
Be Blessed, Be Safe and Pray for those still suffering in the wake of SuperStorm Sandy.
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
You Can’t Love Someone Else Till You Love Yourself
I had loved this girl unconditionally. I did everything to make her happy, even though I was not happy. I gave her everything she wanted without thinking about what I wanted. Everything I did was not enough, she still left me alone. I was the nicest companion she could ever have wanted, but what went wrong? Let me explain!
You see, when we broke up, I came to realize, everything that I said above was not what was right but what was wrong in our relationship.
I loved her unconditionally without loving myself first unconditionally. I was so down on myself that I thought I didn't deserve anyone that loves me. And so I made this pedestal to remind me, every woman, in fact everyone was above me. If you saw me, you would think I was so strong and confident, but inside, I was really weak. I did everything to make her happy, where in fact I should have done everything to make myself happy, then she would be happy being with me. I gave her everything she wanted without thinking what we needed. I had permitted her to disregard my feelings, losing my respect for myself and thus losing her respect too. I was the nicest person to her but I was not the nicest person to myself. I let myself get hurt. I let myself became a trash to the person I loved. I had not loved myself enough.
Of all the things that have happened, I am still thankful that she came into my life. I have learned the lessons in love in the hardest way. In order to love another person right, you must first learn to love yourself. If you are happy with yourself, anyone you love will be happy being with you. Your own happiness should not depend on other person’s happiness, always put yourself first. By that time you make yourself happy, you will have learned how to make others happy too. Love yourself, how can you accept a woman and her flaws when you can't accept your own? Be confident about yourself; learn the power of the mind. If you think that you are nothing, you will become nothing but if you think you can be anything, then you can be. Remember, everything we have and will become starts with the mind, then it becomes reality, so start thinking great things about yourself and thus you will become great. You should not put anyone on a pedestal or above you. In love, we are all equal. Remember, God loves us all even though he is God. Lastly, always keep your dignity. You may lose everything else but never lose respect for yourself. If you lose that respect then everything anyone does to you will be just fine with you.
If someone treats you badly, don't treat them bad in return, just tell them you won't tolerate rudeness or disrespect, if they won't listen, just walk away. You don't need people who treat you badly in your life; you just have to let them go. It is always said we should be kind to others. I agree but I also say, be kind to those who deserve your kindness... Loving yourself isn’t that bad at all. Actually, it feels great. Be Blessed and love someone today!!
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
The Arrogance of being President while being Black
I don't think anyone was under some real illusion that the election of Barack Obama actually means the end of racism in America. I'm pretty sure that the president-elect knew it better than anyone. After all, he saw it every day, from the moment he announced his candidacy. To some degree, he saw it within his own party during the primaries. And he saw it in all ugliness during the general election. For half of this country, he was "That One". No matter how big and clear his victory was. No matter how smart he is. No matter how decent he is. No matter what a true patriot he is. No matter how optimistic and positive his vision for America was. All that didn't matter. Because at the end of the day, he was still black.
I've seen so many presidents. Some were feared, some were hated, some were adored, some popular and some not. But all of them, without exception, were treated with the highest respect deserving the office of the president of the United States.
That is until a black man won the right to occupy this office. It's been 4 years now, and in the eyes of so many, Barack Obama is still that one. He is being disrespected and at the same time being held to the highest standard of any president I've ever seen – and not just by the Republican side! He has to perform three times better than any president in history and even that may not be enough.
For the media, he is many more times just "Obama" than "President Obama". They create scandals out of nothing issues. It took them at least 6 years to start giving Bush a small part of the shit he deserved. It took them 6 months to begin crap all over Obama because he's yet to fix the catastrophe that was left for him.
They use condescending tones when they talk about him, and only mildly less condescending when they talk TO him. With anyone else, CNN wouldn't dare go to commercials every time the president speaks, like they do. They wouldn't dare be counting how many minutes George Bush or Bill Clinton were talking. Chris Mathews wouldn't dare make an issue out of Ronald Regan calling members of congress by their first name, like he is not actually the president. They fully cooperate with the Right-Wing smear machine when it comes to president Obama's national security performance – even if almost every independent and military expert actually thinks that he's a terrific Commander-in-Chief. You'll never see them on TV and virtually no one from the Left, in congress and outside, defend the president on this matter.
I don't care about the Far-Right. They're just crazy ignorant Neanderthals. It's the way the beltway and the mainstream treats this president that is shocking. They look like they're going to vomit every time they had to say "Mr. President". They all had this Eric-Cantor-Smirk whenever he spoke. Then they went out and started to spit their stupid talking points, to the delight of the media.
Oh, those talking points. He is arrogant (because he knows the facts better than all of them combined). He is an elitist (because he uses big words that they don't understand). He is weak on national security (because he actually thinks about the consequences). He divides the country (well, he did that the day he had the audacity to win the election). Worst of all, he actually thinks that he's the president. He even dared to say so. How arrogant of him. You'd think that previous presidents didn't have any ego. Somehow it turned out that the one president who treats even his biggest opponents with the utmost respect – is the arrogant one. I wonder why?
I expected that his winning the Presidency would bring out some ugliness, but it's been far worse than I imagined. The racism coming from the Right is obviously clear and shameless, but there's also some hidden and maybe subconscious and disturbing underline tone behind some of the things that I read here and throughout the Left blogosphere, even before the end of Obama's first year - 'He's weak, he's spineless, he's got no balls, primary him in 2012'. It'll be dishonest to deny that.
The fact is that for millions in America, Barack Obama is this uppity black man (Not even a "real" black), who received good education only due to affirmative action, and has no right to litter the sacred Oval Office with his skin color. They just can't accept the fact that the president is a black man, who unlike his predecessor, was actually legally elected. But what's really sad is that it's not just the fringe, its deep deep in mainstream America.
Barack Obama's ability to remain above all this slob, to keep his optimism and his strange and mostly unjustified faith in people, while continuing to gracefully deal with an endless shitstorm – is one of the most inspiring displays of human quality I have ever seen. And I can only hope that the Cosmos is on his side because God is and He never makes a mistake.
Sometimes, they make me feel ashamed to be American!!
I've seen so many presidents. Some were feared, some were hated, some were adored, some popular and some not. But all of them, without exception, were treated with the highest respect deserving the office of the president of the United States.
That is until a black man won the right to occupy this office. It's been 4 years now, and in the eyes of so many, Barack Obama is still that one. He is being disrespected and at the same time being held to the highest standard of any president I've ever seen – and not just by the Republican side! He has to perform three times better than any president in history and even that may not be enough.
For the media, he is many more times just "Obama" than "President Obama". They create scandals out of nothing issues. It took them at least 6 years to start giving Bush a small part of the shit he deserved. It took them 6 months to begin crap all over Obama because he's yet to fix the catastrophe that was left for him.
They use condescending tones when they talk about him, and only mildly less condescending when they talk TO him. With anyone else, CNN wouldn't dare go to commercials every time the president speaks, like they do. They wouldn't dare be counting how many minutes George Bush or Bill Clinton were talking. Chris Mathews wouldn't dare make an issue out of Ronald Regan calling members of congress by their first name, like he is not actually the president. They fully cooperate with the Right-Wing smear machine when it comes to president Obama's national security performance – even if almost every independent and military expert actually thinks that he's a terrific Commander-in-Chief. You'll never see them on TV and virtually no one from the Left, in congress and outside, defend the president on this matter.
I don't care about the Far-Right. They're just crazy ignorant Neanderthals. It's the way the beltway and the mainstream treats this president that is shocking. They look like they're going to vomit every time they had to say "Mr. President". They all had this Eric-Cantor-Smirk whenever he spoke. Then they went out and started to spit their stupid talking points, to the delight of the media.
Oh, those talking points. He is arrogant (because he knows the facts better than all of them combined). He is an elitist (because he uses big words that they don't understand). He is weak on national security (because he actually thinks about the consequences). He divides the country (well, he did that the day he had the audacity to win the election). Worst of all, he actually thinks that he's the president. He even dared to say so. How arrogant of him. You'd think that previous presidents didn't have any ego. Somehow it turned out that the one president who treats even his biggest opponents with the utmost respect – is the arrogant one. I wonder why?
I expected that his winning the Presidency would bring out some ugliness, but it's been far worse than I imagined. The racism coming from the Right is obviously clear and shameless, but there's also some hidden and maybe subconscious and disturbing underline tone behind some of the things that I read here and throughout the Left blogosphere, even before the end of Obama's first year - 'He's weak, he's spineless, he's got no balls, primary him in 2012'. It'll be dishonest to deny that.
The fact is that for millions in America, Barack Obama is this uppity black man (Not even a "real" black), who received good education only due to affirmative action, and has no right to litter the sacred Oval Office with his skin color. They just can't accept the fact that the president is a black man, who unlike his predecessor, was actually legally elected. But what's really sad is that it's not just the fringe, its deep deep in mainstream America.
Barack Obama's ability to remain above all this slob, to keep his optimism and his strange and mostly unjustified faith in people, while continuing to gracefully deal with an endless shitstorm – is one of the most inspiring displays of human quality I have ever seen. And I can only hope that the Cosmos is on his side because God is and He never makes a mistake.
Sometimes, they make me feel ashamed to be American!!
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Providence Packers 2008 Season Begins
Hello All
Well, the 2008 Pop Warner season has begun and The Providence Packers Youth teams are representing. We had our round robin on August 23. The Pee-Wee team won 15-0 over the Cumberland Colts and the Midget team won 64-0 over the Cumberland Colts. August 31, 2008 was our first actual league game day and our Pee-Wee team lost to the Seekonk Jr. Warriors 15-0 but our Midget team beat the Coventry Rams 16-0. We would like to thank everyone who came out to support our kids Sunday and I hope the fan base grows exponentially as the season progresses. We are very proud of our kids in the way that they played on the field and behaved off of the field. I do intend to start blogging again soon but until then, come to our website so you can keep up with how our children are performing on the gridiron.
Big ups to our man in 2008, Barack Obama for history in the making. Everyone please go out and vote. Show this brother love not because he is a brother but because he is for real and has the answers to the question.
Also, big ups to my girl, Amber Campbell who went over to Beijing and represented in the 2008 Olympics. Although she did not bring home a medal, SHE NOW HOLDS A MAJOR RECORD FOR US WOMEN!!!! Great job Amber, we appreciate you holding us down.
Until the next time we meet.
Peace and Blessings
Well, the 2008 Pop Warner season has begun and The Providence Packers Youth teams are representing. We had our round robin on August 23. The Pee-Wee team won 15-0 over the Cumberland Colts and the Midget team won 64-0 over the Cumberland Colts. August 31, 2008 was our first actual league game day and our Pee-Wee team lost to the Seekonk Jr. Warriors 15-0 but our Midget team beat the Coventry Rams 16-0. We would like to thank everyone who came out to support our kids Sunday and I hope the fan base grows exponentially as the season progresses. We are very proud of our kids in the way that they played on the field and behaved off of the field. I do intend to start blogging again soon but until then, come to our website so you can keep up with how our children are performing on the gridiron.
Big ups to our man in 2008, Barack Obama for history in the making. Everyone please go out and vote. Show this brother love not because he is a brother but because he is for real and has the answers to the question.
Also, big ups to my girl, Amber Campbell who went over to Beijing and represented in the 2008 Olympics. Although she did not bring home a medal, SHE NOW HOLDS A MAJOR RECORD FOR US WOMEN!!!! Great job Amber, we appreciate you holding us down.
Until the next time we meet.
Peace and Blessings
Monday, August 11, 2008
Dropping In
Hey world. I know I have been M.I.A this past month or so and I would like to apologize. A lot has been going on with The Providence Packers Youth Football program. We are finally getting the kids on the field of play. After 2 years of struggling, begging and fighting to get this program to a viable state, my partner (Wayne Blackmon) and I can finally take a moment to smell the roses. Our 2008 2nd Annual Golf Classic was a booming success. We would like to thank all of the participants who showed us love this year. We also want to mention a few people who were instrumental in our tournament success. Thank you to the following people for their help and support. Bear in mind these names are not in any particular order:
Earl Nichols, Tom Leasca, Prince Reid (Amtrak), Camille's Roman Garden, Chris Gasbarros Liquors, Joe Brooks (Essex), Jennifer Hendrick (Exeter Country Club), Pink Women (URI), B.O.N.D (URI), Meagan and a multitude of others. If I forgot to include your name, please charge that to my mind and not my heart as we appreciate each and every one of you.
To all of the golfers who attended, thank you very much for your support and we hope to see you again next year.
Before closing, I would just like to send out our condolences to the families and friends of two of our American icons. Mr. Bernie Mac and Mr. Issac Hayes. There will be a large void left in the world with the passing of these two great men. They were shining examples of the greatness that can be achieved with hard work and determination. I for one will miss them greatly.
Now that our kids will be taking the field, our work is just beginning. I intend to update and keep current our website so please visit from time to time and see what we are doing. I will try to keep more current with this page as time begins to permit but until then.
Peace and Blessings
Rick V
Earl Nichols, Tom Leasca, Prince Reid (Amtrak), Camille's Roman Garden, Chris Gasbarros Liquors, Joe Brooks (Essex), Jennifer Hendrick (Exeter Country Club), Pink Women (URI), B.O.N.D (URI), Meagan and a multitude of others. If I forgot to include your name, please charge that to my mind and not my heart as we appreciate each and every one of you.
To all of the golfers who attended, thank you very much for your support and we hope to see you again next year.
Before closing, I would just like to send out our condolences to the families and friends of two of our American icons. Mr. Bernie Mac and Mr. Issac Hayes. There will be a large void left in the world with the passing of these two great men. They were shining examples of the greatness that can be achieved with hard work and determination. I for one will miss them greatly.
Now that our kids will be taking the field, our work is just beginning. I intend to update and keep current our website so please visit from time to time and see what we are doing. I will try to keep more current with this page as time begins to permit but until then.
Peace and Blessings
Rick V
Monday, July 7, 2008
Just Popping In
Been real busy getting the youth football program in full swing. The 2008 season is upon us and there is so much to do. We anticipate 250 kids this year and hopefully, a trip to the Pop Warner Finals in Orlando Fla. so wish us luck. If you get the chance, visit us for stats and updates at our website:
http://www.freewebs.com/providencepackers/
We are a federally recognized 501(c)3 non-profit organization so please feel free to hit the Donations button to your left and make a tax deductable donation to the program. Everything we do is for the youth and we appreciate your support
Now on to something I am very proud to announce. Amber Campbell, the sister of a very good friend of mine (Brian Jones) http://cbi5thgear.blogspot.com/ has qualified and is a member of the 2008 Olympic Track and Field team. She throws the hammer and we are all proud of her. I know she has worked very hard and i am glad the hard work paid off. Please check out her blogpage for info and updates. We really need more positive role models like her in these trying times. You can find her at http://ambercampbellthrows.blogspot.com/. The lady is fierce so lens her your support.
Well, gotta go as there is work to be done. I have not forsaken you and I will be returning with more food for the brain and soul soon but right now, it is all about the kids.
Amber Campbell in 2008. We got you!!!
Peace and Blessing
http://www.freewebs.com/providencepackers/
We are a federally recognized 501(c)3 non-profit organization so please feel free to hit the Donations button to your left and make a tax deductable donation to the program. Everything we do is for the youth and we appreciate your support
Now on to something I am very proud to announce. Amber Campbell, the sister of a very good friend of mine (Brian Jones) http://cbi5thgear.blogspot.com/ has qualified and is a member of the 2008 Olympic Track and Field team. She throws the hammer and we are all proud of her. I know she has worked very hard and i am glad the hard work paid off. Please check out her blogpage for info and updates. We really need more positive role models like her in these trying times. You can find her at http://ambercampbellthrows.blogspot.com/. The lady is fierce so lens her your support.
Well, gotta go as there is work to be done. I have not forsaken you and I will be returning with more food for the brain and soul soon but right now, it is all about the kids.
Amber Campbell in 2008. We got you!!!
Peace and Blessing
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Is George Bush Afraid of Water ?
Yo. Sorry I have been MIA. Youth football is starting to kick in and there is so much that needs to be done. The Providence Packers will be on the field in 2008. Stay tuned for updates. In the meantime, come on and take a little ride with me.
I was watching the BET Awards show last night and a statement was made that really got me to think. We (U.S.) have been the victims of some major flooding all across the country. Back when New Orleans was devastated by the floods, I often heard my counterparts state that anyone who lives in a state that much below sea level was not to bright and they deserved whatever they got so I did a little research. Although New Orleans is 8 feet below sea level, Death valley California is 282 ft below sea level. There are 23 states at sea level leaving 27 states above sea level ranging from 1 ft, the Potomac river in Washington D.C. to 3.250 ft above being the Arkansas River. I guess we should all just leave the country if we were to follow the thought process of my counterparts. Even though it is appalling that even now, nothing much has been done to correct the situation in New Orleans, it is equally bad that there is nothing currently being done in Iowa, Missouri and other flood ravaged states. We are supposed to be the most powerful nation on the planet and we consistently ignore the plight of our fellow Americans while we spend trillions of dollars abroad trying to fix other nations problems. I am not saying that we should not help out other countries, I am just a firm believer that charity begins at home.
Thru this whole dilemma, I feel great being able to bring one thing to light. Brother Kanye West once made this statement on national TV at an awards show that based on President Bushes slow response to the plight in New Orleans, he did not give a damn about black people. Well, from what I see, he has not made much of an impact and his response time has been equally as slow now in the mid-western regions.
I have concluded that President Bush's issue is not that he doe not like or care about black people,
" He just doesn't care or give a damn about WET people".
I think this is evident by his dry sense of humor, his dry delivery of speeches, his dry hairdo. If these people were flooded in oil, George Will would be there with the quickness scraping them off with a squeegee.
What a difference a day makes. Keep your head up and your feet dry.
Peace and Blessings
I was watching the BET Awards show last night and a statement was made that really got me to think. We (U.S.) have been the victims of some major flooding all across the country. Back when New Orleans was devastated by the floods, I often heard my counterparts state that anyone who lives in a state that much below sea level was not to bright and they deserved whatever they got so I did a little research. Although New Orleans is 8 feet below sea level, Death valley California is 282 ft below sea level. There are 23 states at sea level leaving 27 states above sea level ranging from 1 ft, the Potomac river in Washington D.C. to 3.250 ft above being the Arkansas River. I guess we should all just leave the country if we were to follow the thought process of my counterparts. Even though it is appalling that even now, nothing much has been done to correct the situation in New Orleans, it is equally bad that there is nothing currently being done in Iowa, Missouri and other flood ravaged states. We are supposed to be the most powerful nation on the planet and we consistently ignore the plight of our fellow Americans while we spend trillions of dollars abroad trying to fix other nations problems. I am not saying that we should not help out other countries, I am just a firm believer that charity begins at home.
Thru this whole dilemma, I feel great being able to bring one thing to light. Brother Kanye West once made this statement on national TV at an awards show that based on President Bushes slow response to the plight in New Orleans, he did not give a damn about black people. Well, from what I see, he has not made much of an impact and his response time has been equally as slow now in the mid-western regions.
I have concluded that President Bush's issue is not that he doe not like or care about black people,
" He just doesn't care or give a damn about WET people".
I think this is evident by his dry sense of humor, his dry delivery of speeches, his dry hairdo. If these people were flooded in oil, George Will would be there with the quickness scraping them off with a squeegee.
What a difference a day makes. Keep your head up and your feet dry.
Peace and Blessings
Friday, June 20, 2008
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY
OPEC sells oil for $136.00 a barrel.
OPEC nations buy Canadian and U.S. grain at $7.00 a bushel.
Solution: Sell grain for $136.00 a bushel.
Can't buy it? Tough! Eat your oil!
Peace and blessings
OPEC nations buy Canadian and U.S. grain at $7.00 a bushel.
Solution: Sell grain for $136.00 a bushel.
Can't buy it? Tough! Eat your oil!
Peace and blessings
Monday, June 16, 2008
"Bo Knows Music" Why Did We Not Know A Legendary and Historical Icon Passed
It is with deep regret I would like to acknowledge the death of Tim Russert. Known as one of the news medias shining stars of the decade. Alright, that being said,
Why has my television, radio, newspaper been inundated with stories about this gentleman. OK, he reported the news and that is important but there are millions of people doing it. Some better, some worse but why did I not get bombarded with the news of the death of Luther Vandross, Gerald Levert, James Brown, people who changed the face of history as we know it. To go a little deeper, Bo Diddley. I am sure there were whispers in the media but it blew thru quickly like a March wind. This gentleman set a standard of music for generation after generation, black and white, they all took a little piece of Bo. They all stole what "Bo Knows". Well, even though the media did not feel it was important an issue to bombard us with, I do so buckle up the seat belts and let's take a ride and find out exactly what "Bo Knows".
Peace and Blessings
Bo Diddley, a founding father of rock 'n' roll whose distinctive "shave and a haircut, two bits" rhythm and innovative guitar effects inspired legions of other musicians, died Monday June 2, 2008 after months of ill health. He was 79. Diddley died of heart failure at his home in Archer, Fla., spokeswoman Susan Clary said. He had suffered a heart attack in August, three months after suffering a stroke while touring in Iowa. Doctors said the stroke affected his ability to speak, and he had returned to Florida to continue rehabilitation.
The legendary singer and performer, known for his homemade square guitar, dark glasses and black hat, was an inductee into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, had a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame, and received a lifetime achievement award in 1999 at the Grammy Awards. In recent years he also played for the elder President Bush and President Clinton.
Diddley appreciated the honors he received, "but it didn't put no figures in my checkbook."
"If you ain't got no money, ain't nobody calls you honey," he quipped.
The name Bo Diddley came from other youngsters when he was growing up in Chicago, he said in a 1999 interview. "I don't know where the kids got it, but the kids in grammar school gave me that name," he said, adding that he liked it so it became his stage name. Other times, he gave somewhat differing stories on where he got the name. Some experts believe a possible source for the name is a one-string instrument used in traditional blues music called a diddley bow.
His first single, "Bo Diddley," introduced record buyers in 1955 to his signature rhythm: bomp ba-bomp bomp, bomp bomp, often summarized as "shave and a haircut, two bits." The B side, "I'm a Man," with its slightly humorous take on macho pride, also became a rock standard.
The company that issued his early songs was Chess-Checkers records, the storied Chicago-based labels that also recorded Chuck Berry and other stars.
Howard Kramer, assistant curator of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, said in 2006 that Diddley's Chess recordings "stand among the best singular recordings of the 20th century."
Diddley's other major songs included, "Say Man," "You Can't Judge a Book by Its Cover," "Shave and a Haircut," "Uncle John," "Who Do You Love?" and "The Mule."
Diddley's influence was felt on both sides of the Atlantic. Buddy Holly borrowed the bomp ba-bomp bomp, bomp bomp rhythm for his song "Not Fade Away." The Rolling Stones' bluesy remake of that Holly song gave them their first chart single in the United States, in 1964. The following year, another British band, the Yardbirds, had a Top 20 hit in the U.S. with their version of "I'm a Man."
Diddley was also one of the pioneers of the electric guitar, adding reverb and tremelo effects. He even rigged some of his guitars himself. "He treats it like it was a drum, very rhythmic," E. Michael Harrington, professor of music theory and composition at Belmont University in Nashville, Tenn., said in 2006. Many other artists, including the Who, Bruce Springsteen and Elvis Costello copied aspects of Diddley's style.
Growing up, Diddley said he had no musical idols, and he wasn't entirely pleased that others drew on his innovations.
"I don't like to copy anybody. Everybody tries to do what I do, update it," he said. "I don't have any idols I copied after."
"They copied everything I did, upgraded it, messed it up. It seems to me that nobody can come up with their own thing, they have to put a little bit of Bo Diddley there," he said.
Despite his success, Diddley claimed he only received a small portion of the money he made during his career. Partly as a result, he continued to tour and record music until his stroke. Between tours, he made his home near Gainesville in north Florida.
"Seventy ain't nothing but a damn number," he told The Associated Press in 1999. "I'm writing and creating new stuff and putting together new different things. Trying to stay out there and roll with the punches. I ain't quit yet."
Diddley, like other artists of his generations, was paid a flat fee for his recordings and said he received no royalty payments on record sales. He also said he was never paid for many of his performances. "I am owed. I've never got paid," he said. "A dude with a pencil is worse than a cat with a machine gun."
In the early 1950s, Diddley said, disc jockeys called his type of music, "Jungle Music." It was Cleveland disc jockey Alan Freed who is credited with inventing the term "rock 'n' roll."
Diddley said Freed was talking about him, when he introduced him, saying, "Here is a man with an original sound, who is going to rock and roll you right out of your seat."
Diddley won attention from a new generation in 1989 when he took part in the "Bo Knows" ad campaign for Nike, built around football and baseball star Bo Jackson. Commenting on Jackson's guitar skills, Diddley turned to the camera and said, "He don't know Diddley."
"I never could figure out what it had to do with shoes, but it worked," Diddley said. "I got into a lot of new front rooms on the tube."
Born as Ellas Bates on Dec. 30, 1928, in McComb, Miss., Diddley was later adopted by his mother's cousin and took on the name Ellis McDaniel, which his wife always called him.
When he was 5, his family moved to Chicago, where he learned the violin at the Ebenezer Baptist Church. He learned guitar at 10 and entertained passers-by on street corners.
By his early teens, Diddley was playing Chicago's Maxwell Street.
"I came out of school and made something out of myself. I am known all over the globe, all over the world. There are guys who have done a lot of things that don't have the same impact that I had," he said.
Why has my television, radio, newspaper been inundated with stories about this gentleman. OK, he reported the news and that is important but there are millions of people doing it. Some better, some worse but why did I not get bombarded with the news of the death of Luther Vandross, Gerald Levert, James Brown, people who changed the face of history as we know it. To go a little deeper, Bo Diddley. I am sure there were whispers in the media but it blew thru quickly like a March wind. This gentleman set a standard of music for generation after generation, black and white, they all took a little piece of Bo. They all stole what "Bo Knows". Well, even though the media did not feel it was important an issue to bombard us with, I do so buckle up the seat belts and let's take a ride and find out exactly what "Bo Knows".
Peace and Blessings
Bo Diddley, a founding father of rock 'n' roll whose distinctive "shave and a haircut, two bits" rhythm and innovative guitar effects inspired legions of other musicians, died Monday June 2, 2008 after months of ill health. He was 79. Diddley died of heart failure at his home in Archer, Fla., spokeswoman Susan Clary said. He had suffered a heart attack in August, three months after suffering a stroke while touring in Iowa. Doctors said the stroke affected his ability to speak, and he had returned to Florida to continue rehabilitation.
The legendary singer and performer, known for his homemade square guitar, dark glasses and black hat, was an inductee into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, had a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame, and received a lifetime achievement award in 1999 at the Grammy Awards. In recent years he also played for the elder President Bush and President Clinton.
Diddley appreciated the honors he received, "but it didn't put no figures in my checkbook."
"If you ain't got no money, ain't nobody calls you honey," he quipped.
The name Bo Diddley came from other youngsters when he was growing up in Chicago, he said in a 1999 interview. "I don't know where the kids got it, but the kids in grammar school gave me that name," he said, adding that he liked it so it became his stage name. Other times, he gave somewhat differing stories on where he got the name. Some experts believe a possible source for the name is a one-string instrument used in traditional blues music called a diddley bow.
His first single, "Bo Diddley," introduced record buyers in 1955 to his signature rhythm: bomp ba-bomp bomp, bomp bomp, often summarized as "shave and a haircut, two bits." The B side, "I'm a Man," with its slightly humorous take on macho pride, also became a rock standard.
The company that issued his early songs was Chess-Checkers records, the storied Chicago-based labels that also recorded Chuck Berry and other stars.
Howard Kramer, assistant curator of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, said in 2006 that Diddley's Chess recordings "stand among the best singular recordings of the 20th century."
Diddley's other major songs included, "Say Man," "You Can't Judge a Book by Its Cover," "Shave and a Haircut," "Uncle John," "Who Do You Love?" and "The Mule."
Diddley's influence was felt on both sides of the Atlantic. Buddy Holly borrowed the bomp ba-bomp bomp, bomp bomp rhythm for his song "Not Fade Away." The Rolling Stones' bluesy remake of that Holly song gave them their first chart single in the United States, in 1964. The following year, another British band, the Yardbirds, had a Top 20 hit in the U.S. with their version of "I'm a Man."
Diddley was also one of the pioneers of the electric guitar, adding reverb and tremelo effects. He even rigged some of his guitars himself. "He treats it like it was a drum, very rhythmic," E. Michael Harrington, professor of music theory and composition at Belmont University in Nashville, Tenn., said in 2006. Many other artists, including the Who, Bruce Springsteen and Elvis Costello copied aspects of Diddley's style.
Growing up, Diddley said he had no musical idols, and he wasn't entirely pleased that others drew on his innovations.
"I don't like to copy anybody. Everybody tries to do what I do, update it," he said. "I don't have any idols I copied after."
"They copied everything I did, upgraded it, messed it up. It seems to me that nobody can come up with their own thing, they have to put a little bit of Bo Diddley there," he said.
Despite his success, Diddley claimed he only received a small portion of the money he made during his career. Partly as a result, he continued to tour and record music until his stroke. Between tours, he made his home near Gainesville in north Florida.
"Seventy ain't nothing but a damn number," he told The Associated Press in 1999. "I'm writing and creating new stuff and putting together new different things. Trying to stay out there and roll with the punches. I ain't quit yet."
Diddley, like other artists of his generations, was paid a flat fee for his recordings and said he received no royalty payments on record sales. He also said he was never paid for many of his performances. "I am owed. I've never got paid," he said. "A dude with a pencil is worse than a cat with a machine gun."
In the early 1950s, Diddley said, disc jockeys called his type of music, "Jungle Music." It was Cleveland disc jockey Alan Freed who is credited with inventing the term "rock 'n' roll."
Diddley said Freed was talking about him, when he introduced him, saying, "Here is a man with an original sound, who is going to rock and roll you right out of your seat."
Diddley won attention from a new generation in 1989 when he took part in the "Bo Knows" ad campaign for Nike, built around football and baseball star Bo Jackson. Commenting on Jackson's guitar skills, Diddley turned to the camera and said, "He don't know Diddley."
"I never could figure out what it had to do with shoes, but it worked," Diddley said. "I got into a lot of new front rooms on the tube."
Born as Ellas Bates on Dec. 30, 1928, in McComb, Miss., Diddley was later adopted by his mother's cousin and took on the name Ellis McDaniel, which his wife always called him.
When he was 5, his family moved to Chicago, where he learned the violin at the Ebenezer Baptist Church. He learned guitar at 10 and entertained passers-by on street corners.
By his early teens, Diddley was playing Chicago's Maxwell Street.
"I came out of school and made something out of myself. I am known all over the globe, all over the world. There are guys who have done a lot of things that don't have the same impact that I had," he said.
Thursday, June 12, 2008
"It Takes A Village To Raise A Child"
It is no surprise that for “social decline” to exist there must be a level of prenatal buffoon development in every community. Every leader that has dared to unset this agenda in the last 40 years has either been assassinated or financially defanged. It is no mystery to the end result of this agenda when you look at the effects of low black birth rates to high black incarcerations and social impotence.
Almost forty years ago this was a no issue. Consider that the black community’s drug problem began the instance black soldiers were denied drug treatment returning from Vietnam that was readily available to their white counterparts. Heroin and later Crack cocaine became the epidemic of the black community after Vietnam had long been over with. This single event help create the effects that linger until today with our young folks.
At the end of the year when you or I file for our tax return, we will never be asked per a question for a tax break, “Have you helped any one get off dope”. It is not in the drug industry, law enforcement, or social pandering organization’s best interest for “Us the People” to help ourselves and each other.
The penal system has become a big money business and we as a people seem to be investing more of our time and value in that than into the stock market, banking etc. There needs to be a major revamp in our government system yes but we also need to take responsibility for our own actions and say enough is enough. You and I know every person incarcerated will tell you they are honest and did not do it and I am sure there are those in there with whom that story rings true, but I venture to say that is a small minority.
We have to adjust our thinking and the teaching of our young. We need to get to them at an early age and instill some of the old morals and values we were taught growing up.
“I come from a single parent household” was never an excuse back then because your whole neighborhood was your parent. If you did something wrong down the street, you might get scolded or slapped several times before you arrived home and then mom or dad was waiting to finish the job.
The old saying “It takes a whole village to raise a child” rings so true and we need that now more than ever, so hey, slap a child ( just kidding) but if you see a youth doing something that could affect him or herself in a negative way, take the time and try to sit and explain that they have other options.
Let’s be the village and raise our children. I know I am trying, will you help me out. I would love to have you along.
Peace, Love and Blessings
Almost forty years ago this was a no issue. Consider that the black community’s drug problem began the instance black soldiers were denied drug treatment returning from Vietnam that was readily available to their white counterparts. Heroin and later Crack cocaine became the epidemic of the black community after Vietnam had long been over with. This single event help create the effects that linger until today with our young folks.
At the end of the year when you or I file for our tax return, we will never be asked per a question for a tax break, “Have you helped any one get off dope”. It is not in the drug industry, law enforcement, or social pandering organization’s best interest for “Us the People” to help ourselves and each other.
The penal system has become a big money business and we as a people seem to be investing more of our time and value in that than into the stock market, banking etc. There needs to be a major revamp in our government system yes but we also need to take responsibility for our own actions and say enough is enough. You and I know every person incarcerated will tell you they are honest and did not do it and I am sure there are those in there with whom that story rings true, but I venture to say that is a small minority.
We have to adjust our thinking and the teaching of our young. We need to get to them at an early age and instill some of the old morals and values we were taught growing up.
“I come from a single parent household” was never an excuse back then because your whole neighborhood was your parent. If you did something wrong down the street, you might get scolded or slapped several times before you arrived home and then mom or dad was waiting to finish the job.
The old saying “It takes a whole village to raise a child” rings so true and we need that now more than ever, so hey, slap a child ( just kidding) but if you see a youth doing something that could affect him or herself in a negative way, take the time and try to sit and explain that they have other options.
Let’s be the village and raise our children. I know I am trying, will you help me out. I would love to have you along.
Peace, Love and Blessings
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
NAACP Elects A New President
Today is FYI day. No social or political commentary. Just the facts. Hope you are as excited about this as I was. Until we meet again
Peace and blessings
The NAACP chose 35-year-old activist and former news executive Ben Jealous as its president Saturday, making him the youngest leader in the 99-year history of the nation's largest civil rights organization.
The 64-member board of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People met for eight hours before selecting Jealous in the early morning. He was formally introduced Saturday afternoon and will take over as president in September.
"I'm excited," Jealous told The Associated Press. "I think that it's a real affirmation that this organization is willing to invest in the future, to invest in the ideas and the leadership of the generation that is currently raising black children in this country."
Though he is not a politician, minister or civil rights icon, Jealous provides the organization with a young but connected chief familiar with black leadership and social justice issues.
He takes the helm as the NAACP's 17th president just months before the organization's centennial anniversary and as the group looks to boost its coffers.
"There are a small number of groups to whom all black people in this country owe a debt of gratitude, and the NAACP is one of them," Jealous said. "There is work that is undone. ... The need continues and our children continue to be at great risk in this country."
Jealous succeeds Bruce Gordon, who resigned abruptly in March 2007. Gordon left after 19 months, citing clashes with board members over management style and the NAACP's mission as his reasons for leaving. Dennis Courtland Hayes had been serving as interim president and chief executive officer.
Jealous was born in Pacific Grove, Calif., and educated at Columbia University and Oxford University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar.
He began his professional life in 1991 with the NAACP, where he worked as a community organizer with the Legal Defense Fund working on issues of health care access in Harlem. His family boasts five generations of NAACP membership.
During the mid 1990s, Jealous was managing editor of the Jackson Advocate, Mississippi's oldest black newspaper.
From 1999 to 2002, Jealous led the country's largest group of black community newspapers as executive director of the National Newspaper Publishers Association.
Jealous left the Publishers Association for Amnesty International to direct its U.S. Human Rights Program, for which he successfully lobbied for federal legislation against prison rape, public disapproval of racial profiling after Sept. 11, and exposure of widespread sentencing of children to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Since 2005, Jealous has served as president of the Rosenberg Foundation, a private institution that supports civil and human rights advocacy. His experiences caught the attention of the NAACP's search committee, and Jealous said mentors encouraged him to take the job.
"Like all black people in this country, I am deeply grateful for what the NAACP has accomplished in the 20th century, and I want to make sure it's as strong and as powerful in the 21st century," he said. "If I thought that I could help rebuild, if I thought that I could help bring in more funds and give direction to the national staff and increase morale, I needed to take it very seriously, and that's what I've done."
The NAACP was founded in 1909 by an interracial coalition that battled segregation and lynching and helped win some of the nation's biggest civil rights victories. But in the wake of racial advances, the organization has struggled financially.
Despite his own successes, Jealous said that blacks in America still have a hard row to hoe, and that the gains of recent decades have created a false sense of progress.
"Those of us who are 45 and younger were told, 'The struggle has been won. Go out and flourish. Don't worry about the movement,'" he said.
Among his plans for the group are strengthening its online presence to connect with activists, mobilize public opinion and build a database for tracking racial discrimination and hate crimes; ensuring high voter turnout among blacks in the November election; pushing an aggressive civil rights agenda, regardless of the makeup of the Congress or White House; and retooling the national office to make it more effective at helping local branches affect change in their communities.
He said he does not see expect to have the challenges with NAACP leadership of which his predecessor complained.
"I was raised in the civil rights movement," Jealous said. "I don't see anything special here that would be a challenge that I haven't confronted and dealt effectively with before. These are my people."
What Jealous lacks in oratorical appeal, he makes up for as an administrator — skills he honed during his tenure with the Publishers Association, said the Rev. Joseph Lowery. And his foundation experience could help with fundraising — especially as the NAACP looks to raise $100 million in conjunction with its 100th anniversary in February.
"Ben would be a good administrator and a thorough and detailed kind of executive," Lowery said. "He would meticulously follow through on details."
Lowery said Jealous' Publishers Association experience also gave him an edge with national black leadership and maturity — not that Lowery thinks his age is an issue.
"That's not young," Lowery said when told Jealous was 35, pointing out that the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was 26 when he led the Montgomery bus boycott. "I wouldn't say he's too young. He's an emotionally and intellectually mature fellow."
Jealous said having the energy of a 35-year-old will be an asset to the organization.
"It means having somebody who is impatient and outraged that race is still a factor in our society," he said.
He added that he can attract 25- to 50-year-olds — the missing demographic among most chapters — back to the organization. And he said he is eager to work with other groups to push his agenda.
"This is the century when white people will become a minority in this country," he said. "What that means is right now, we need to have a clear picture of where we're headed and work together diligently with Latinos, Native Americans, Asians and progessive white groups as if our collective future depends on it. I'm committed to that."
It's a tall order that isn't likely to happen overnight, but Jealous — whose resume doesn't reflect a record of longevity — said he's ready to settle in for the long haul. He has spent much of his life in California but has roots in Baltimore, where the NAACP is based. His mother was born in Baltimore, and his parents met while teaching at a junior high school in the city.
"As a black child growing up in this country, there was no higher ambition possible than to lead the NAACP," he said. "No one should be concerned about me going anywhere too soon."
Peace and blessings
The NAACP chose 35-year-old activist and former news executive Ben Jealous as its president Saturday, making him the youngest leader in the 99-year history of the nation's largest civil rights organization.
The 64-member board of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People met for eight hours before selecting Jealous in the early morning. He was formally introduced Saturday afternoon and will take over as president in September.
"I'm excited," Jealous told The Associated Press. "I think that it's a real affirmation that this organization is willing to invest in the future, to invest in the ideas and the leadership of the generation that is currently raising black children in this country."
Though he is not a politician, minister or civil rights icon, Jealous provides the organization with a young but connected chief familiar with black leadership and social justice issues.
He takes the helm as the NAACP's 17th president just months before the organization's centennial anniversary and as the group looks to boost its coffers.
"There are a small number of groups to whom all black people in this country owe a debt of gratitude, and the NAACP is one of them," Jealous said. "There is work that is undone. ... The need continues and our children continue to be at great risk in this country."
Jealous succeeds Bruce Gordon, who resigned abruptly in March 2007. Gordon left after 19 months, citing clashes with board members over management style and the NAACP's mission as his reasons for leaving. Dennis Courtland Hayes had been serving as interim president and chief executive officer.
Jealous was born in Pacific Grove, Calif., and educated at Columbia University and Oxford University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar.
He began his professional life in 1991 with the NAACP, where he worked as a community organizer with the Legal Defense Fund working on issues of health care access in Harlem. His family boasts five generations of NAACP membership.
During the mid 1990s, Jealous was managing editor of the Jackson Advocate, Mississippi's oldest black newspaper.
From 1999 to 2002, Jealous led the country's largest group of black community newspapers as executive director of the National Newspaper Publishers Association.
Jealous left the Publishers Association for Amnesty International to direct its U.S. Human Rights Program, for which he successfully lobbied for federal legislation against prison rape, public disapproval of racial profiling after Sept. 11, and exposure of widespread sentencing of children to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Since 2005, Jealous has served as president of the Rosenberg Foundation, a private institution that supports civil and human rights advocacy. His experiences caught the attention of the NAACP's search committee, and Jealous said mentors encouraged him to take the job.
"Like all black people in this country, I am deeply grateful for what the NAACP has accomplished in the 20th century, and I want to make sure it's as strong and as powerful in the 21st century," he said. "If I thought that I could help rebuild, if I thought that I could help bring in more funds and give direction to the national staff and increase morale, I needed to take it very seriously, and that's what I've done."
The NAACP was founded in 1909 by an interracial coalition that battled segregation and lynching and helped win some of the nation's biggest civil rights victories. But in the wake of racial advances, the organization has struggled financially.
Despite his own successes, Jealous said that blacks in America still have a hard row to hoe, and that the gains of recent decades have created a false sense of progress.
"Those of us who are 45 and younger were told, 'The struggle has been won. Go out and flourish. Don't worry about the movement,'" he said.
Among his plans for the group are strengthening its online presence to connect with activists, mobilize public opinion and build a database for tracking racial discrimination and hate crimes; ensuring high voter turnout among blacks in the November election; pushing an aggressive civil rights agenda, regardless of the makeup of the Congress or White House; and retooling the national office to make it more effective at helping local branches affect change in their communities.
He said he does not see expect to have the challenges with NAACP leadership of which his predecessor complained.
"I was raised in the civil rights movement," Jealous said. "I don't see anything special here that would be a challenge that I haven't confronted and dealt effectively with before. These are my people."
What Jealous lacks in oratorical appeal, he makes up for as an administrator — skills he honed during his tenure with the Publishers Association, said the Rev. Joseph Lowery. And his foundation experience could help with fundraising — especially as the NAACP looks to raise $100 million in conjunction with its 100th anniversary in February.
"Ben would be a good administrator and a thorough and detailed kind of executive," Lowery said. "He would meticulously follow through on details."
Lowery said Jealous' Publishers Association experience also gave him an edge with national black leadership and maturity — not that Lowery thinks his age is an issue.
"That's not young," Lowery said when told Jealous was 35, pointing out that the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was 26 when he led the Montgomery bus boycott. "I wouldn't say he's too young. He's an emotionally and intellectually mature fellow."
Jealous said having the energy of a 35-year-old will be an asset to the organization.
"It means having somebody who is impatient and outraged that race is still a factor in our society," he said.
He added that he can attract 25- to 50-year-olds — the missing demographic among most chapters — back to the organization. And he said he is eager to work with other groups to push his agenda.
"This is the century when white people will become a minority in this country," he said. "What that means is right now, we need to have a clear picture of where we're headed and work together diligently with Latinos, Native Americans, Asians and progessive white groups as if our collective future depends on it. I'm committed to that."
It's a tall order that isn't likely to happen overnight, but Jealous — whose resume doesn't reflect a record of longevity — said he's ready to settle in for the long haul. He has spent much of his life in California but has roots in Baltimore, where the NAACP is based. His mother was born in Baltimore, and his parents met while teaching at a junior high school in the city.
"As a black child growing up in this country, there was no higher ambition possible than to lead the NAACP," he said. "No one should be concerned about me going anywhere too soon."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)