Sam mows his neighbor’s lawn all summer long, earning a total of $500.00 dollars, which he saves towards the purchase of a new iPad.
While Sam stands in line at the Apple store, a man dressed in a smart looking pin-striped suit politely introduces himself as a financial consultant and tells Sam he will guarantee him a lower price on the iPad he wants, if he is willing to wait for two weeks to purchase one. He explains that he has an agreement with Apple, that allows him to redeem Apple’s stock when it reaches a soon-to-be-triggered profit margin, if he guarantees to sell 100 iPads a week.
He continues to explain that he gets a volume discount for iPads and would gladly redeem him an iPhone for only $350.00 dollars payment now, on a derivative, and then exchange it for the iPad in two weeks.
Now, Sam is skeptical and understands the offer, but Sam is uncertain of the risks. “How do I know you will really keep your promise,” he asks? The man in the pin-striped suit pulls out an official looking piece of paper with a seal on it that says, “U.S. government guarantee for iPad discount.” It is dated and signed by Timothy Geithner of the U.S. Treasury. The piece of paper that Sam eventually swaps for $350.00 says “iPad Derivative,” in a big script font, in golden letters.
Well, Sam is a patient fellow. He returns to the Apple store in two weeks and tries to redeem his derivative with the big golden letters. The store clerk however, informs him that there has been a run on iPads, and that Apple has been unable to keep up with the demand.
“They should have a new shipment next week,” the clerk declares. Sam feels a little uneasy. He looks down at the derivative and slips it carefully back into his pocket. Since he feels hungry, he goes to a Deli and orders a huge Rueben sandwich and a large coke. He pays out $12.00 for lunch from his remaining $150.00, and spends another $60.00 for gas on his way home. Another week later, Sam returns to the Apple store and hands the derivative to the clerk, fully expecting to come into possession of an iPad. “I’m sorry, but there was a factory recall on this model . . . a few bugs in the screen had to be fixed. We won’t have the newer ones in for at least another week,” explains the clerk.
Sam is upset. He calls the man who sold him the derivative and demands to know if he can get his money back, but the man who answers the phone explains that he is not that man and that he is actually the new holder of the that man’s contracts. He also explains, that there were some irregular issues with the previous man’s business practices and that Sam could not get his cash until the company got paid by the U.S. federal government on its insured holdings.
It seems that the U.S. government has over extended its various guarantees for a large number of derivative transactions. Mortgage-based securities on properties which have been over-leveraged or erroneously represented, currency swaps, speculative technologies, bond backed retirement pensions, etc. have not performed and the U.S. government must step in to rescue a financial system that is now on the verge of collapse.
All these millions of dubious transactions must proceed or nobody will trust the value of their money anymore – and (Heaven forbid), may even try saving their money rather than spending it.
The entire world must come to the rescue (especially China) and since China has very large monetary reserves, it decides to buy more of the U.S. debt at what seems like a reasonable rate – (it actually needs to buy U.S. debt because China wants to keep supporting the American consumer by exporting more i-pads to people like Sam).
Soon China discovers that it does not have enough monetary reserves to exchange for any more US Treasury Notes, (pronounced American debt), and they complain to Timothy Geithner that China must slow down their purchase of treasury notes and that the U.S. should curb their accelerating debt.
In response Timothy brags that the US government can easily pay off its debts and later he calls the Fed Chairman requesting it purchase several billion dollars in treasury notes to cover a ‘shortfall’ in the U.S. treasury auctions for that month. (After all, unlike Geithner, China, Japan and Europe don’t understand how the U.S. can pay its existing debts – let alone trillions more.)
Sam eventually gets his iPad five weeks later. He is happy . . . until he opens his mail. His tax software has arrived. He runs his new TurboTax program for a quick look at April 15th.
It seems the U.S. Treasury is taxing him . . .
. . . for three hundred and fifty dollars.
Milton
Saturday, May 15, 2010
The Weight of Eternity
“But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.” Matthew 24:13 KJV
This scripture once annoyed me for two reasons. First, because it belongs to a long succession of texts, which fly in the face of a less convulsive, pre-tribulation theology – (I’m squeamish about torture) – and secondly, because the verse also seems to trumpet an obvious truism: “He who stands to the end still stands.” So I suppose being “saved,” is in reference to one’s soul.
Yes, I would like to be saved please, but do I really have to be burned alive, dismembered, disemboweled, etc.? Before the Inquisition there was Rome, and before Rome . . . Mankind rekindles a form of dark depravity and evil I am sure still lurks beneath our civilization. There is ample reason to be afraid of our humanity.
I’m sure also, that Christ simply wanted to cast the truth as simply and plainly as possible in this chapter. He knew some would prefer an easier, more interpretive stance. He was right. I would not prefer to suffer, but perhaps we should be encouraged to know that Jesus himself dreaded his crucifixion, as evidenced in his prayer to the Father . . . “Let this cup pass from me.”
I believe that one must love one’s self. If someone does not love his own soul enough to seek eternal salvation, then perhaps what fuels the desperate hedonism of today is a manifestation of an emergent fear of one’s mortality – and perhaps even one’s own subliminal belief in the existence of a bottom to one’s fall.
Perhaps the sensuality of this age is simply like the stereo volume knob people turn up to drown out the sirens from the street below.
Rock stars and movie stars frequent the headlines with drug overdoses, divorces, cellulite affliction, bad plastic surgery, and their sexual exploits. Suddenly one sees a headline featuring the same stars making a charitable donation to a good cause and that token to goodness bares the expectation of a salute.
These are the cultural rules of the Icon age and the celebrity. Nefarious, notorious and nasty deeds seem absolved by any good deed of sufficient magnitude as to eclipse the charities of the lower class audience. “There, see, I do care, top my million dollar donation.”
An audience is but a mirror. Celebrities are often caught looking at it for too long, and like the myth, if one looks at it long enough and becomes mesmerized like proverbial Narcissus, the obsession blocks the soul’s continued development – because it has stopped.
Imagine Michael Jackson’s addiction to plastic surgery after 1,000 years. On second thought . . . don’t. God be with him.
Imagine having to endure 10,000 years with a bad temper. You would lose friends and have to live with that accompaniment of regret for 10,000 years.
For example, what if you can’t cure your temper? What if you lived for a million years with your temper, and lost 10,000 friends, and had to live with that regret? And you had a perfect memory for that million years. What if you knew you would live forever, continually blowing your fuse and losing friends?
That would be sort of like Hell. Perhaps Hell is ultimately a place people make.
So, it behooves one to think about eternity, not only as a safe place for happiness, but also as a happy place that must be kept safe. We’re IT. Endurance is part of the equation. Behavior doesn’t just happen – it is practiced.
“But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.”
The word “endure” implies a state in which continued assaults are repelled. Here is an active, practiced insinuation that projects into the concept of eternity. In an ultimate pragmatic sense, I don’t want to be afraid of eternity. I want it to be fabulous and exciting. I’ll play it safe then, I’ll work out my salvation and surrender my faults...
... to my Savior.
Milton
This scripture once annoyed me for two reasons. First, because it belongs to a long succession of texts, which fly in the face of a less convulsive, pre-tribulation theology – (I’m squeamish about torture) – and secondly, because the verse also seems to trumpet an obvious truism: “He who stands to the end still stands.” So I suppose being “saved,” is in reference to one’s soul.
Yes, I would like to be saved please, but do I really have to be burned alive, dismembered, disemboweled, etc.? Before the Inquisition there was Rome, and before Rome . . . Mankind rekindles a form of dark depravity and evil I am sure still lurks beneath our civilization. There is ample reason to be afraid of our humanity.
I’m sure also, that Christ simply wanted to cast the truth as simply and plainly as possible in this chapter. He knew some would prefer an easier, more interpretive stance. He was right. I would not prefer to suffer, but perhaps we should be encouraged to know that Jesus himself dreaded his crucifixion, as evidenced in his prayer to the Father . . . “Let this cup pass from me.”
I believe that one must love one’s self. If someone does not love his own soul enough to seek eternal salvation, then perhaps what fuels the desperate hedonism of today is a manifestation of an emergent fear of one’s mortality – and perhaps even one’s own subliminal belief in the existence of a bottom to one’s fall.
Perhaps the sensuality of this age is simply like the stereo volume knob people turn up to drown out the sirens from the street below.
Rock stars and movie stars frequent the headlines with drug overdoses, divorces, cellulite affliction, bad plastic surgery, and their sexual exploits. Suddenly one sees a headline featuring the same stars making a charitable donation to a good cause and that token to goodness bares the expectation of a salute.
These are the cultural rules of the Icon age and the celebrity. Nefarious, notorious and nasty deeds seem absolved by any good deed of sufficient magnitude as to eclipse the charities of the lower class audience. “There, see, I do care, top my million dollar donation.”
An audience is but a mirror. Celebrities are often caught looking at it for too long, and like the myth, if one looks at it long enough and becomes mesmerized like proverbial Narcissus, the obsession blocks the soul’s continued development – because it has stopped.
Imagine Michael Jackson’s addiction to plastic surgery after 1,000 years. On second thought . . . don’t. God be with him.
Imagine having to endure 10,000 years with a bad temper. You would lose friends and have to live with that accompaniment of regret for 10,000 years.
For example, what if you can’t cure your temper? What if you lived for a million years with your temper, and lost 10,000 friends, and had to live with that regret? And you had a perfect memory for that million years. What if you knew you would live forever, continually blowing your fuse and losing friends?
That would be sort of like Hell. Perhaps Hell is ultimately a place people make.
So, it behooves one to think about eternity, not only as a safe place for happiness, but also as a happy place that must be kept safe. We’re IT. Endurance is part of the equation. Behavior doesn’t just happen – it is practiced.
“But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.”
The word “endure” implies a state in which continued assaults are repelled. Here is an active, practiced insinuation that projects into the concept of eternity. In an ultimate pragmatic sense, I don’t want to be afraid of eternity. I want it to be fabulous and exciting. I’ll play it safe then, I’ll work out my salvation and surrender my faults...
... to my Savior.
Milton
Thursday, October 15, 2009
There Is A Way
The adjutant to the Devil is always a fool. He will be dressed up the dandy with a hat to match, but the Devil never pays for the finery, he leased it from God and all the fool ever really gets, are ‘hand me downs’.
Fools vote. This much should be obvious by now. I do not presume to surrender a list, but their numbers are legion and growing. What was intended as a sacred trust to the thoughtful initiate has steadily devolved into a poll for ‘best dressed’. Pants first; then shirt, the time-honored ritual has protected legs from briar, maintained our genitalia as mystery and protected from element what skin does not favor.
Without engaging in another civil war to prove our point, we should endeavor to convince the fool to put his clothes on, if for no other reason to elude the embarrassment of the initiate who must focus fully on his uncertain future.
So what has the fool done, you may ask?
Plenty:
He has discarded God and therefore left the Devil to play.
He has enshrined opinion over wisdom. Oprah is a mime, lip-synched to a sound track skillfully dubbed from popular culture. Nothing of accountability ever comes out and hereby, substance, is the resultant tragedy.
He has voted for an untested Icon, and yes, the lips move as well on this one too. This Icon, the adjutant indeed, works on the careless assumption that when things are bad, changing everything will make it better.
Perhaps in an effort to appear responsible, the fool has made great effort to wag the finger, not only at human error, but to all humanity. It seems our existence is an affront to mommy earth. We must pay. Less gasoline, less babies, less wealth, less privacy, less security, etc. are the prescriptive punishments for absolution to some primal yet foggy remnant of guilt.
Before I underscore doom with a longer list (and it is very long) let me stop here to propose a remedy. We must fashion a trend not with a billion dollar campaign, and not with a media circus. It has to start with a whisper at one of those big Washington insider cocktail parties. It goes something like this:
“Hey Nancy, I heard Chris Matthews is looking for a plastic surgeon who has pioneered a procedure for turning white people into blacks, I mean African American. Nancy perceives a set up, “Oh stop it!” “No, seriously, Michael Jackson gave him a grant when he was in med school with the proviso that he would work on this. Seems he succeeded also on developing a hormone cocktail that triggers the immune system to fight the physical effects of aging.”
A conspirator calls your name holding his cell phone over his head, “Hey Dave, it’s that Doctor again.” “Nancy would you excuse me for a moment,” and you disappear into the crowd, cell phone in one ear and finger in the other.
“Hey Harry, Chris just called my answering machine, said he wouldn’t be able to pencil me in for Hardball this week, said he has a ‘procedure’ that reschedule him at some clinic. You saw him last week, is he O.K.?” Harry stares gloomily back and says innocently, “I thought he was O.K.”
Your fellow conspirator spills some Merlot on your sleeve, “Damn, I’m sorry mate . . . ‘fraid I’ve met my limit . . . get you a club soda there?” You feign some appropriate disgust, “It’s a cotton microweave. I’ll just dab it with some soap and water in the bathroom.”
Obama is posing at teleprompter angles in front of the bathroom mirror with one of his secret service agents. “Oh, Mr. President!” You appear surprised and pleased like an orgasm before church, “Just a little wine on the sleeve.” Chris Matthews gave me this shirt, said his wife got it for him but he didn’t think it would go with his color . . . didn’t really know what he meant . . . but hey . . .”
Obama exits with security in tow. You and your conspirator leave the party and hail a cab; job done.
In the mean time Chris is on vacation for a week in the Bahamas and naturally he cannot be reached. This is doubly advantageous. He cannot verify and therefore accentuates the mystery by also being out of touch.
Chris Matthews comes back from the Bahamas, quite tanned and in good health. He is scheduled to interview Nancy on hardball the next day, who for some reason was very eager for an interview about healthcare. She looks at him a little too carefully throughout the interview and asks him about his color? He thinks she means his tan, “looking better,” he quips and Nancy retreats to the green room for pampering in ‘makeup’. “Can you make me look forty,” she teases the gay artist. “Oh honey, you are so forty! Get out of here!” “Seriously” she lowers her voice, “FORTY.”
Rahm Emmanuel hands Nancy his Blackberry in the morning Cabinet meeting with the president with a raised eyebrow. “Nancy”, he says “you know this is most irregular, It’s some doctor down in the Bahamas. (You), said something about Chris Matthews getting his dream, and him your number.” Naturally, Nancy takes the call.
The doctor (you) is affectionately known as Michael’s angel, and you speak reverently about him. You explain that your future success and those of similar genius of kindly being allowed a clause in health which pertains to ‘rejuvinative procedures for the racially challenged’.
The following weak headlines just before a vote reaches the senate floor, says: Cosmetic Surgery “An American Right.”
The bill fails . . .
. . . By only one vote . . .
One fool less and 100 million to go.
Milton
Fools vote. This much should be obvious by now. I do not presume to surrender a list, but their numbers are legion and growing. What was intended as a sacred trust to the thoughtful initiate has steadily devolved into a poll for ‘best dressed’. Pants first; then shirt, the time-honored ritual has protected legs from briar, maintained our genitalia as mystery and protected from element what skin does not favor.
Without engaging in another civil war to prove our point, we should endeavor to convince the fool to put his clothes on, if for no other reason to elude the embarrassment of the initiate who must focus fully on his uncertain future.
So what has the fool done, you may ask?
Plenty:
He has discarded God and therefore left the Devil to play.
He has enshrined opinion over wisdom. Oprah is a mime, lip-synched to a sound track skillfully dubbed from popular culture. Nothing of accountability ever comes out and hereby, substance, is the resultant tragedy.
He has voted for an untested Icon, and yes, the lips move as well on this one too. This Icon, the adjutant indeed, works on the careless assumption that when things are bad, changing everything will make it better.
Perhaps in an effort to appear responsible, the fool has made great effort to wag the finger, not only at human error, but to all humanity. It seems our existence is an affront to mommy earth. We must pay. Less gasoline, less babies, less wealth, less privacy, less security, etc. are the prescriptive punishments for absolution to some primal yet foggy remnant of guilt.
Before I underscore doom with a longer list (and it is very long) let me stop here to propose a remedy. We must fashion a trend not with a billion dollar campaign, and not with a media circus. It has to start with a whisper at one of those big Washington insider cocktail parties. It goes something like this:
“Hey Nancy, I heard Chris Matthews is looking for a plastic surgeon who has pioneered a procedure for turning white people into blacks, I mean African American. Nancy perceives a set up, “Oh stop it!” “No, seriously, Michael Jackson gave him a grant when he was in med school with the proviso that he would work on this. Seems he succeeded also on developing a hormone cocktail that triggers the immune system to fight the physical effects of aging.”
A conspirator calls your name holding his cell phone over his head, “Hey Dave, it’s that Doctor again.” “Nancy would you excuse me for a moment,” and you disappear into the crowd, cell phone in one ear and finger in the other.
“Hey Harry, Chris just called my answering machine, said he wouldn’t be able to pencil me in for Hardball this week, said he has a ‘procedure’ that reschedule him at some clinic. You saw him last week, is he O.K.?” Harry stares gloomily back and says innocently, “I thought he was O.K.”
Your fellow conspirator spills some Merlot on your sleeve, “Damn, I’m sorry mate . . . ‘fraid I’ve met my limit . . . get you a club soda there?” You feign some appropriate disgust, “It’s a cotton microweave. I’ll just dab it with some soap and water in the bathroom.”
Obama is posing at teleprompter angles in front of the bathroom mirror with one of his secret service agents. “Oh, Mr. President!” You appear surprised and pleased like an orgasm before church, “Just a little wine on the sleeve.” Chris Matthews gave me this shirt, said his wife got it for him but he didn’t think it would go with his color . . . didn’t really know what he meant . . . but hey . . .”
Obama exits with security in tow. You and your conspirator leave the party and hail a cab; job done.
In the mean time Chris is on vacation for a week in the Bahamas and naturally he cannot be reached. This is doubly advantageous. He cannot verify and therefore accentuates the mystery by also being out of touch.
Chris Matthews comes back from the Bahamas, quite tanned and in good health. He is scheduled to interview Nancy on hardball the next day, who for some reason was very eager for an interview about healthcare. She looks at him a little too carefully throughout the interview and asks him about his color? He thinks she means his tan, “looking better,” he quips and Nancy retreats to the green room for pampering in ‘makeup’. “Can you make me look forty,” she teases the gay artist. “Oh honey, you are so forty! Get out of here!” “Seriously” she lowers her voice, “FORTY.”
Rahm Emmanuel hands Nancy his Blackberry in the morning Cabinet meeting with the president with a raised eyebrow. “Nancy”, he says “you know this is most irregular, It’s some doctor down in the Bahamas. (You), said something about Chris Matthews getting his dream, and him your number.” Naturally, Nancy takes the call.
The doctor (you) is affectionately known as Michael’s angel, and you speak reverently about him. You explain that your future success and those of similar genius of kindly being allowed a clause in health which pertains to ‘rejuvinative procedures for the racially challenged’.
The following weak headlines just before a vote reaches the senate floor, says: Cosmetic Surgery “An American Right.”
The bill fails . . .
. . . By only one vote . . .
One fool less and 100 million to go.
Milton
Saturday, October 10, 2009
The Christian's Way
The man that I am has nothing commensurate with the Divine grace afforded him. I have, in clear memory, narrowly been saved from death on at least four occasions. Those who also know me more intimately, know that I have been visited twice by a heavenly emissary, which to deny in my experience, would defy all sanity.
Let me say at once as the Plaintiff to life’s vicissitudes, and as the Defendant before God Almighty, that I have lost on both counts, and enjoy my life purely by grace.
My first angelic visit during my youth crushed any fantasies I might have had concerning the personhood of these beings. I was, in fact, afraid for my life and in full knowledge that my mind was as transparent as it was faulted. Needless to say, I survived, and without further diversion into that story, I am completely convinced of the massive powers from Heaven, and within the limits of my personal influence on you the reader, be also assured of what mighty forces of God may be marshaled.
On a broader note, I wish to address Christendom not just rhetorically but sincerely and to its heart. “Why are you so scattered in intent, so divided by credos and so feeble in your causes?” And to the Devil, “why do you attack such a feeble foe with such virulence?”
To these twain queries I declare flatly and without apology, the power of God will prevail and the name of Christ will conquer.
Not being afforded the opportunity of a pulpit, nor exceptionally inclined to deserve one, to the few who actually read my blogs, I say emphatically, that the second coming of Christ is a soon to be reality.
I want you to dispel the leanings of sentiment which have penetrated Christian culture, in particular, the popular idea that the second coming is purely a symbolic idea of the fluffy goodness which by Providence is coming our way. No, this natter-headed nonsense is a dangerous diversion. It stands in startling contrast to the writings of the prophets Daniel, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and John the Revelator, and not to let the matter rest too lightly, are in stark contrast with the explicitly recorded personal utterances of Jesus.
Understand, that the forces to which our government has succumbed are little else than what the company of mutually compelled sociopaths commonly renders: In contest it holds no good thing for the benefit of the many, but rather accumulates for itself only more power and tyranny. Human life is cumulatively being drawn down in value by popular culture, sinister environmental policies, threat of war, and rationing of resources. All these things are in concert with the portents voluminously written of in the Bible.
It will require a miracle to save mankind. It will require the second coming of Christ, (Moshiach). The affairs of man will so totally exceed the debauch of any previous age, that only a reboot of civilization will revive the possibility of our survival. And, necessarily our lives must center ‘round our loyalty to God and a resolute commitment to follow His Laws.
Not to discourage mind you, but rather to encourage your allegiance to God, I implore my friends and foe alike, to commit yourselves humbly before God and seek his power to repent. All faith depends on familiarity with Him, and with Him we are not powerless. In fact God is content with our weakness to perform in us great things. I tremble for my family, my nation and my world, but I still tremble at my own humanity in the face my personal failures. I need God in my life more than ever and yet I elude my own needs be denying Him in my life. God is Almighty. Let us stand up for him when opportunity comes, at it will, and let us recognize our purpose in life to lead mankind to Him who led us in the wilderness, who lead us in the gospels and will lead us also to heaven.
An Epistle was not my intention. I rather relish the idea of a purer, happier world. Only the path to it frightens me. Fear lessens with Love, as any child knows from getting a vaccination. Ours is the same as the child’s, in fact, for to our Father in Heaven we are all His Children.
Milton
Let me say at once as the Plaintiff to life’s vicissitudes, and as the Defendant before God Almighty, that I have lost on both counts, and enjoy my life purely by grace.
My first angelic visit during my youth crushed any fantasies I might have had concerning the personhood of these beings. I was, in fact, afraid for my life and in full knowledge that my mind was as transparent as it was faulted. Needless to say, I survived, and without further diversion into that story, I am completely convinced of the massive powers from Heaven, and within the limits of my personal influence on you the reader, be also assured of what mighty forces of God may be marshaled.
On a broader note, I wish to address Christendom not just rhetorically but sincerely and to its heart. “Why are you so scattered in intent, so divided by credos and so feeble in your causes?” And to the Devil, “why do you attack such a feeble foe with such virulence?”
To these twain queries I declare flatly and without apology, the power of God will prevail and the name of Christ will conquer.
Not being afforded the opportunity of a pulpit, nor exceptionally inclined to deserve one, to the few who actually read my blogs, I say emphatically, that the second coming of Christ is a soon to be reality.
I want you to dispel the leanings of sentiment which have penetrated Christian culture, in particular, the popular idea that the second coming is purely a symbolic idea of the fluffy goodness which by Providence is coming our way. No, this natter-headed nonsense is a dangerous diversion. It stands in startling contrast to the writings of the prophets Daniel, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and John the Revelator, and not to let the matter rest too lightly, are in stark contrast with the explicitly recorded personal utterances of Jesus.
Understand, that the forces to which our government has succumbed are little else than what the company of mutually compelled sociopaths commonly renders: In contest it holds no good thing for the benefit of the many, but rather accumulates for itself only more power and tyranny. Human life is cumulatively being drawn down in value by popular culture, sinister environmental policies, threat of war, and rationing of resources. All these things are in concert with the portents voluminously written of in the Bible.
It will require a miracle to save mankind. It will require the second coming of Christ, (Moshiach). The affairs of man will so totally exceed the debauch of any previous age, that only a reboot of civilization will revive the possibility of our survival. And, necessarily our lives must center ‘round our loyalty to God and a resolute commitment to follow His Laws.
Not to discourage mind you, but rather to encourage your allegiance to God, I implore my friends and foe alike, to commit yourselves humbly before God and seek his power to repent. All faith depends on familiarity with Him, and with Him we are not powerless. In fact God is content with our weakness to perform in us great things. I tremble for my family, my nation and my world, but I still tremble at my own humanity in the face my personal failures. I need God in my life more than ever and yet I elude my own needs be denying Him in my life. God is Almighty. Let us stand up for him when opportunity comes, at it will, and let us recognize our purpose in life to lead mankind to Him who led us in the wilderness, who lead us in the gospels and will lead us also to heaven.
An Epistle was not my intention. I rather relish the idea of a purer, happier world. Only the path to it frightens me. Fear lessens with Love, as any child knows from getting a vaccination. Ours is the same as the child’s, in fact, for to our Father in Heaven we are all His Children.
Milton
Friday, August 21, 2009
On Human Suffering and the Will of God
I do not wish to be perceived as glib or disconnected from the experience of suffering. I, like most, have had my share of it, perhaps even somewhat more, as a fool generally collects more of it.
I repent the fool gladly, as there are now new pains in my age which haunt me from my youthful foolishness. There are some whose sufferings have been so intense however, as to wilt any hope I should have of facing. I like all, wish for no pain in life.
But as is so often the case in life, suffering emerges against the backdrop of God’s will. Why does God allow suffering? Especially as a loved one or even an innocent child may have to endure its imposition, it is a natural question of the mind; why did this happen? Why, when God is all powerful ‘why’ wouldn’t he make it go away?
I believe there is a big part of this question answered in the last chapter of Revelation. Here, the answer is that suffering will end, and end permanently soon. This is comforting, but perhaps it does not fully eliminate the question as to ‘why’.
I too have heard the usual arguments, some with which I agree, and some with which I fervently disagree, on qualified grounds. I do not believe that we can, nor should we, assign the cliché pat answer to the suffering in our midst, that, “It is the will of God.” This imperious remark seems too willing to place God into a sphere of arbitrary elitism. Though we have no say as to God’s right to be imperial, arbitrary or elite, it is His manifest will however, to share His power of will with us. Albeit far smaller in scale, we call this ‘the power of choice’.
The will is an inscrutable thing. Prisoners are punished by having personal will minimized by a compelled order. Children will have tantrums when it is denied. Love will not blossom without its exercise and our ability to learn and develop character and personality are integral to its use. One need only introduce the hypothetical, of a world wherein all unpleasantness and discomfort would be reversed by a miracle of God, to see one result.
One obvious danger is that the endless perseveration of Divine intervention to prevent suffering, would create the illusion that cause and effect were ultimately charmed somehow. People would eventually be jumping off of cliffs for the mere thrill of falling. Virtually any impulse would encounter a positive end no matter what the intention.
Perhaps something of learning is necessary in this plane of physical existence, for which the determinism of cause and effect puts natural limits on bad behavior and bad ideas. Conversely, this also allows for the exhibition of good effects from deliberate acts which spring from virtue.
The human will must be allowed to exercise itself as a process of self discovery and as development unfolds, however we know also from the record, that God’s will is not excluded from the exercise of miraculous intervention, especially as it reveals his nature as a just and merciful participant in our lives.
Miracles therefore, come mainly as exceptions in our affairs. Every time a miracle unties one of our predicated sufferings, the set of cause and effect must not lose its predominance, for without it, free will may not be accorded relevant information from the same.
Physics seem to be affected as well, when intention is taken into account. For every paradox in nature, a new consequence emerges as reality. There is a classic experiment in quantum physics, which was originally designed to prove one way or the other, on the singular corpuscular nature of light versus its observed counterpart as a dynamic wave entity. In this experiment, single photons can be observed as a wave function if two paths are allowed as possibilities, but if one path is closed, its singular corpuscular nature is observed and not its wave nature. Simply put, the outcomes from this experiment illustrate how we can influence the results on even the most quantum level of temporal reality with our imposition of choice.
The will, of which choice is a manifestation of our personal intelligence, is integral to who we are, and in this essential regard tangled into the issue of our suffering, almost as if we have somehow chosen to endure it on some level. Our God-given nature, the nature to choose, to exercise our will, produces not only a chain of events from cause and effect but an implicit chain of potentialities which interact with others.
We know from history that it repeats itself when conditions are repeated. We can even foretell our own futures based on the trends we have learned from history. If personal experience were to be our only teacher in life we should all die with only retarded ambitions or perhaps worse, we should all simply die very young. We die young enough.
Moses’ farewell address to Israel, before his death, punctuates the entire purpose of his long recitation of the law “. . . they are not just idle words for you – they are your life . . .” (Deuteronomy 32:44) The meaning here, is not that God will kill you if you disobey, but that the law is the condensation of successful human behaviors. To disregard the laws of human behavior ‘would’ result in death. “The Sabbath (law principle) was made for man and not man for the Sabbath” (Jesus).
So, in essence, I believe there is ample evidence that the Bible is largely provided as a condensation of vital human experience, of which we should take note, so as not to retard our progress with only the limited experiments afforded by our short lives, with only our direct results from cause and effect. We have in the Bible a vast repository of true history, millennia of human behaviors which we may absorb to our benefit.
We live in a vastly complicated biochemical organism. Risks continually abound all around us. We cannot eliminate all risks to our existence. A cosmic ray may collide with a cellular nucleus and scramble our DNA. Cancer may be the end effect from this random cause. A good person may indeed suffer thereby. A malevolent sociopath wrapped in hatred may be conscripted by men of like creed thousands of miles away to commit mass murder in the name of his demented god. Towers have burned and fallen; thousands have died needlessly and most, no doubt, were innocent good people.
We live on this earth for a season. Jesus partook in the suffering of man in a deliberate exhibition of solidarity with us and this is also integral to our ultimate salvation. He lives and in this fact, we may live as well. He suffered with us. Why wouldn’t he also redeem us? Redemption from happiness is nonsense. Redemption from suffering has a vastly different weight of meaning.
But he left us a path of righteousness which we should follow if we are to be truly free from the evil effects of our own poor behavior. Our own minds will also exact a toll on our happiness if we do not conform to His principled life. Jesus was a happy Man/God. He spread happiness with his mere presence. He attracted children. People would follow Jesus for long distances without food or drink just to hear him speak. From the narrative in the gospels, He appears to have healed almost endlessly, a procession of invalids and lepers. And he forgave. The prescription for producing a state of happiness seems to have littered his every step in this life.
Our faith is the “substance of things not seen”, not the ‘substance of things never seen’. The Bible exists as a Divine attempt to arrest human attention from chaos and attract it to purpose. Faith is purpose exercised and we can believe in God's Divine purpose.
And the purpose is: Ultimate happiness and freedom from suffering. Eternity would be too cruel without it.
But while we are here you have my loving prayers.
Milton
I repent the fool gladly, as there are now new pains in my age which haunt me from my youthful foolishness. There are some whose sufferings have been so intense however, as to wilt any hope I should have of facing. I like all, wish for no pain in life.
But as is so often the case in life, suffering emerges against the backdrop of God’s will. Why does God allow suffering? Especially as a loved one or even an innocent child may have to endure its imposition, it is a natural question of the mind; why did this happen? Why, when God is all powerful ‘why’ wouldn’t he make it go away?
I believe there is a big part of this question answered in the last chapter of Revelation. Here, the answer is that suffering will end, and end permanently soon. This is comforting, but perhaps it does not fully eliminate the question as to ‘why’.
I too have heard the usual arguments, some with which I agree, and some with which I fervently disagree, on qualified grounds. I do not believe that we can, nor should we, assign the cliché pat answer to the suffering in our midst, that, “It is the will of God.” This imperious remark seems too willing to place God into a sphere of arbitrary elitism. Though we have no say as to God’s right to be imperial, arbitrary or elite, it is His manifest will however, to share His power of will with us. Albeit far smaller in scale, we call this ‘the power of choice’.
The will is an inscrutable thing. Prisoners are punished by having personal will minimized by a compelled order. Children will have tantrums when it is denied. Love will not blossom without its exercise and our ability to learn and develop character and personality are integral to its use. One need only introduce the hypothetical, of a world wherein all unpleasantness and discomfort would be reversed by a miracle of God, to see one result.
One obvious danger is that the endless perseveration of Divine intervention to prevent suffering, would create the illusion that cause and effect were ultimately charmed somehow. People would eventually be jumping off of cliffs for the mere thrill of falling. Virtually any impulse would encounter a positive end no matter what the intention.
Perhaps something of learning is necessary in this plane of physical existence, for which the determinism of cause and effect puts natural limits on bad behavior and bad ideas. Conversely, this also allows for the exhibition of good effects from deliberate acts which spring from virtue.
The human will must be allowed to exercise itself as a process of self discovery and as development unfolds, however we know also from the record, that God’s will is not excluded from the exercise of miraculous intervention, especially as it reveals his nature as a just and merciful participant in our lives.
Miracles therefore, come mainly as exceptions in our affairs. Every time a miracle unties one of our predicated sufferings, the set of cause and effect must not lose its predominance, for without it, free will may not be accorded relevant information from the same.
Physics seem to be affected as well, when intention is taken into account. For every paradox in nature, a new consequence emerges as reality. There is a classic experiment in quantum physics, which was originally designed to prove one way or the other, on the singular corpuscular nature of light versus its observed counterpart as a dynamic wave entity. In this experiment, single photons can be observed as a wave function if two paths are allowed as possibilities, but if one path is closed, its singular corpuscular nature is observed and not its wave nature. Simply put, the outcomes from this experiment illustrate how we can influence the results on even the most quantum level of temporal reality with our imposition of choice.
The will, of which choice is a manifestation of our personal intelligence, is integral to who we are, and in this essential regard tangled into the issue of our suffering, almost as if we have somehow chosen to endure it on some level. Our God-given nature, the nature to choose, to exercise our will, produces not only a chain of events from cause and effect but an implicit chain of potentialities which interact with others.
We know from history that it repeats itself when conditions are repeated. We can even foretell our own futures based on the trends we have learned from history. If personal experience were to be our only teacher in life we should all die with only retarded ambitions or perhaps worse, we should all simply die very young. We die young enough.
Moses’ farewell address to Israel, before his death, punctuates the entire purpose of his long recitation of the law “. . . they are not just idle words for you – they are your life . . .” (Deuteronomy 32:44) The meaning here, is not that God will kill you if you disobey, but that the law is the condensation of successful human behaviors. To disregard the laws of human behavior ‘would’ result in death. “The Sabbath (law principle) was made for man and not man for the Sabbath” (Jesus).
So, in essence, I believe there is ample evidence that the Bible is largely provided as a condensation of vital human experience, of which we should take note, so as not to retard our progress with only the limited experiments afforded by our short lives, with only our direct results from cause and effect. We have in the Bible a vast repository of true history, millennia of human behaviors which we may absorb to our benefit.
We live in a vastly complicated biochemical organism. Risks continually abound all around us. We cannot eliminate all risks to our existence. A cosmic ray may collide with a cellular nucleus and scramble our DNA. Cancer may be the end effect from this random cause. A good person may indeed suffer thereby. A malevolent sociopath wrapped in hatred may be conscripted by men of like creed thousands of miles away to commit mass murder in the name of his demented god. Towers have burned and fallen; thousands have died needlessly and most, no doubt, were innocent good people.
We live on this earth for a season. Jesus partook in the suffering of man in a deliberate exhibition of solidarity with us and this is also integral to our ultimate salvation. He lives and in this fact, we may live as well. He suffered with us. Why wouldn’t he also redeem us? Redemption from happiness is nonsense. Redemption from suffering has a vastly different weight of meaning.
But he left us a path of righteousness which we should follow if we are to be truly free from the evil effects of our own poor behavior. Our own minds will also exact a toll on our happiness if we do not conform to His principled life. Jesus was a happy Man/God. He spread happiness with his mere presence. He attracted children. People would follow Jesus for long distances without food or drink just to hear him speak. From the narrative in the gospels, He appears to have healed almost endlessly, a procession of invalids and lepers. And he forgave. The prescription for producing a state of happiness seems to have littered his every step in this life.
Our faith is the “substance of things not seen”, not the ‘substance of things never seen’. The Bible exists as a Divine attempt to arrest human attention from chaos and attract it to purpose. Faith is purpose exercised and we can believe in God's Divine purpose.
And the purpose is: Ultimate happiness and freedom from suffering. Eternity would be too cruel without it.
But while we are here you have my loving prayers.
Milton
Not Wanting To Bet
I seem bent to say a few things scurrying about my mind after a bout with the CNN pundits I recently saw at the airport.
Everything in liberal land seems validated by an opinion. In fact with out a famous opinion to bandy about there seems to be no fact worthy of contemplation with these elite. The news anchor seemed quite satisfied with the expert they paid to tell them how the new staggering national debt would be paid off when the recession goes away. After all, we’ve had just about enough of the damn thing and recovery pressures are soon surfacing that will reconcile with everything the president has done; (this went on and on like a professor describing the relationship between voltage and current).
Perceptions these days enjoy such a protracted lifetime fluttering through the media, settling on this mind and that, that they actually begin to seem real. These bubbles of fancy just never seem to pop. We are deep in a recession from over-leveraged debt, and the magical asymptote flattens so nicely if you start all over again with a new piece of graph paper.
Maybe we really can borrow so much money as to frighten the recession away. The trick is of course, to convince everyone that, “Yes We Can,” actually means, “Yes We Are.”
Then, just do it.
Borrow more than anyone else ever has in the history of the human race and proclaim loudly (very loudly it seems), that it is working. We will fix the recession with massive health care spending because our bad health care system, (which of course has caused bankruptcies to those ruined by too much of it), is too expensive. "Magical" government intervention will make all the bad stuff in medicine, all the inequities between the “haves” and “have not’s” go away. All we have to do is pass this damned bill now!
But we did now already, several times.
As long as the press can convince people that Obama has magic, the magic will go on. What would magic be without perception? Misdirection? Deception? Illusion? Is this what Americans have been reduced to believing in?
Yes.
“Yes We Can.”
There is an unwillingness, even a palpable fear with these liberal church folk when you start talking about the second coming of reality.
Some kind of reckoning with cause and effect can only be trouble for the liberals out there.
The ball has dropped. In fact several of them have dropped.
They are:
1) Terrorists with nukes;
2) A worldwide economic depression and;
3) A massive loss of liberty to name only a few.
The balls are falling from such a height, however, that there is a sort of weird fascination with the idea that the few years it will take for these leaden balls to fall and create utterly craterous doom seems to be so long as to seem meaningless.
We have learned to re-think our existence into the short span of a sound bite. It seems we can’t hear anything falling but we can hear lots of soothing Obama. So soothe away.
“Yes We Can,” seems to have leapt to, “Yes We Are.”
But are we really?
1) Are we really going to charm Iran out of being a nuclear bully?
2) Are we really creating millions of jobs?
3) Are we really going to save mommy earth with cap and trade?
Really?
Cause and effect is our chain of time and for 5 billion years, tomorrow’s links have come to this earth without a hitch or delay.
I don’t like the odds, sound bites not withstanding.
Milton
Everything in liberal land seems validated by an opinion. In fact with out a famous opinion to bandy about there seems to be no fact worthy of contemplation with these elite. The news anchor seemed quite satisfied with the expert they paid to tell them how the new staggering national debt would be paid off when the recession goes away. After all, we’ve had just about enough of the damn thing and recovery pressures are soon surfacing that will reconcile with everything the president has done; (this went on and on like a professor describing the relationship between voltage and current).
Perceptions these days enjoy such a protracted lifetime fluttering through the media, settling on this mind and that, that they actually begin to seem real. These bubbles of fancy just never seem to pop. We are deep in a recession from over-leveraged debt, and the magical asymptote flattens so nicely if you start all over again with a new piece of graph paper.
Maybe we really can borrow so much money as to frighten the recession away. The trick is of course, to convince everyone that, “Yes We Can,” actually means, “Yes We Are.”
Then, just do it.
Borrow more than anyone else ever has in the history of the human race and proclaim loudly (very loudly it seems), that it is working. We will fix the recession with massive health care spending because our bad health care system, (which of course has caused bankruptcies to those ruined by too much of it), is too expensive. "Magical" government intervention will make all the bad stuff in medicine, all the inequities between the “haves” and “have not’s” go away. All we have to do is pass this damned bill now!
But we did now already, several times.
As long as the press can convince people that Obama has magic, the magic will go on. What would magic be without perception? Misdirection? Deception? Illusion? Is this what Americans have been reduced to believing in?
Yes.
“Yes We Can.”
There is an unwillingness, even a palpable fear with these liberal church folk when you start talking about the second coming of reality.
Some kind of reckoning with cause and effect can only be trouble for the liberals out there.
The ball has dropped. In fact several of them have dropped.
They are:
1) Terrorists with nukes;
2) A worldwide economic depression and;
3) A massive loss of liberty to name only a few.
The balls are falling from such a height, however, that there is a sort of weird fascination with the idea that the few years it will take for these leaden balls to fall and create utterly craterous doom seems to be so long as to seem meaningless.
We have learned to re-think our existence into the short span of a sound bite. It seems we can’t hear anything falling but we can hear lots of soothing Obama. So soothe away.
“Yes We Can,” seems to have leapt to, “Yes We Are.”
But are we really?
1) Are we really going to charm Iran out of being a nuclear bully?
2) Are we really creating millions of jobs?
3) Are we really going to save mommy earth with cap and trade?
Really?
Cause and effect is our chain of time and for 5 billion years, tomorrow’s links have come to this earth without a hitch or delay.
I don’t like the odds, sound bites not withstanding.
Milton
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Manipulated and Maneuvered U.S.A.
Americans these days seem to be forgetting their chartered ideals on so many fronts and on such a massive scale, discarding long held truths into the dustbin of ‘opinion’. We have embarked with breakneck speed after demonstrably minor things such as the Michelle Obama’s tennis shoes, swine flu and with a conjugate sluggishness we barely turn our muddled heads to matters such as the Taliban’s rapid cannibalization of a nuclear state. I am inclined to agree with Mark Twain who once said, “I’ll forget the Lords middle name sometime, right in the midst of a storm, when I need all the help I can get”.
The consumer mind set seems only willing to regard time as a collection of popular events. And in a weird way, this is almost true, for being linear, time can be flooded with voyeuristic abandon and we soon become unable to see the sequence of anything else.
All that is required in my mind, to confirm with what magnificence we have been manipulated into delusion, is to remember and thereby juxtapose this world, with the one a mere 10 years ago.
Here in a brief review:
Conservative talk show host Michael Savage is banned from England (but not Jeremiah Wright).
The stock market has been surging upwards on the news that economic indicators such as April’s unemployment rates are “not as bad as predicted”. Basically, if your ship is sinking slower than you thought, perhaps there is time for another hand of poker.
Our financial system is becoming nationalized, as are auto-manufacturing giants, Chrysler and GM. Oh goody, the same people who right the tax codes are now going to make automobiles.
Let’s Invest money here!
Returning heroes from Afghanistan and Iraq are now under Napolitano’s careful scrutiny as potential “security risks”.
In counterpoint to this fact, we freed several Guantanamo prisoners with one now discovered to be in charge of Taliban military operations in Pakistan. Why let a good killer waste away in prison? Let them go, let them free . . . free I tell you! Praise Obama! . . . I mean Allah.
The urge to vomit, if not yet strong enough, will yet persevere. . .
One needs only to read on.
Air Force One, once the proud angel of protection for our nations highest officer, recently terrified thousands of New Yorkers by its low level passes for a “photo opportunity”. The white house, nevertheless, refuses to share these $300,000.00 photos with the nation who paid so dearly for them.
Obama was seen bowing to a Muslim Arabian Sheik. At least two hundred million of us actually saw this.
Nope. . . Now get this straight people! Obama was too tall . . . he did not a bow.
. . . It’s official, so there!
A witch hunt is underway to impeach the former president and arrest or disbar his personal counsel for allowing water boarding on terrorists, a rigor which the marine corps has also used to toughen its elite.
Bank of America and Citicorp mentioned casually that they need another 45 billion dollars this morning and both these banks stock rose at least 35 cents a share this morning.
We can’t sell enough Treasury bonds to cover our national debt anymore. China has pulled out but Berneke says we will pull out of the recession later this year . . . and “later this year” we will need to sell even more Treasury bonds. I don’t get the math.
Rahm Emanuel, always posing seriously with his index finger guarding his lips and Obama’s official fall guy, announced that the United States was not going to negotiate nuclear limits with Iran unless Israel gave up more of its territory to the Palestinians.
This is like telling your daughter you won’t chase away her rapist until she removes all her clothes.
100 days and only 265 to go! 630? 6,030? (there is a bill before both houses to repeal the 22cd amendment (term limits for the president)) Oh the “HOPE”! Oh the “Change”!
What a brave and insightful president we have! Such diplomacy and deliberated idiocy . . . and instant deniability too . . . because if it doesn’t fly with public opinion (what is our ‘public’ opinion anyway). . . he can chastise Rahm once again for his “misstatement”.
Iraq, timorously close to Iran and completely unprepared to defend itself militarily, announced that the U.S. military must leave next month. Perhaps there is reason to believe Iraq has already quietly acceded as vassal to Iran. Hurray democracy!
A winning beauty queen was denied the crown because she declares belief in the exclusive nature of heterosexual marriage. On the . . . sacred . . . all knowing eye no less! On TV! What hate speak! Oh the outrage!
Obama’s promise to track down “every dime” of the stimulus money(he read this very slowly and dramatically on his teleprompter). The stimulus passed through both congress and senate houses without being read, now Obama says the ‘tracking’ will be “delayed” until 2010 . . . very conveniently I might add, after the congressional elections and he knowing full well, that at least 350 billion dollars of this money is . . .
unaccounted . . . for!
Well, I’m sure we’ll just find it laying around somewhere in a lost and found . . . maybe in a purse . . . nope, too small . . . maybe in a 1,000 foot freighter off of the Somali shore perhaps? Who knows? I’ll help them find it. Is there a finders fee?
Obama refuses to give a speech next to the symbols of Christ at Georgetown University and orders them covered with black painted plywood. If Pilot could say “I find no fault with this man” who the hell are you?
I did say hell didn’t I !?
Well then, would the Pope please throw some holy water on this guy so we can see if he bursts into flames! Just a drop or two would be fine I’m sure.
Arlen Spectre defects to the Democratic party and Jeb Bush tells the Republican Party to move left . . .
Look you knuckle head! You traitorous, Bush, you!
And I’m screaming this loud enough for you to hear all the way from Utah to Florida :
THERE IS NO MORE “LEFT!” IT’S GONE! . . . DONE! . . . THIS FREEWAY OVERPASS RAN OUT OF FUNDING! IT MUST BE GONE . . . BECAUSE . . . I CANT VOMIT ANYMORE!
I am a conservative . . . now . . . under the ‘new speak rules’, of the ever Obama worshipping media, the word has been changed to . . .
“extremist”.
Let’s have a moment of silence, for the sinking of yet another perfectly fine English word, c-o-n-s-e-r-v-a-t-i-v-e, while we watch it slip into the mold ridden pudding which is . . . the PC American lexicon . . . joining all the other lost words like gay, black and terrorism . . .
I said, “pudding” didn’t I? . . . I’m really sorry Mr. Cosby, since it seemed a bit excessive to use another less palliative substance as my metaphor, ‘pudding’ has fallen prey to my rhetoric. Here, light another candle!
It is a quiet day somewhere on a desert isle. Somewhere I am sure natives are gathering thatch for their huts, children are catching pollywogs in a jar and new grass is emerging vibrant and green from the spring thaw.
But I don’t see those things.
Today, all that seems to be available to my eyes is the endless manipulations of the media, things like the afore mentioned silly . . which is our new actuality, our new abyss of madness.
Speaking of manipulation . . .
On a more personal note, I have been looking for some of these good home real estate buys the banks have been listing from the 20 million or so now vacant.
I need to move soon, as employment for me here is uncertain in the near future.
In my first visit to a shaggy weed strewn 3 acre stucco mission style house in southern California, I find a new picture, unlike the one in the ad. Rain water has eroded a once well terraced yard. Everything not sage is dead and dry. The patio pergola has been partially torn apart by migrant squatters (see, I didn’t say illegal Mexicans) and used for what looks like a cook fire. Discarded chicken bones and empty cans of beans are strewn everywhere. Adding to the debris is a mountain of used refrigerators, broken toilets, grass clippings, construction leftovers and a catalog of other items obviously intended to mark this once proud home as a new dump for all comers. It would take more money to repair this house than to build a new one.
So, from the realtor comes this history, shared by millions of other houses of similar fate:
The owners had to leave on a short sale and nobody buys it. The price sinks. Two years later the house is still empty but the bank does not want to sell at the listed price, but rather, samples the traffic in a battle of wills against the buyers market, refusing to sell at the list price. The banks do this much easier now than they could in times past, because federal ‘bail out’ money has infused bank balance sheets with fresh cash . . . from tax payers, and home buyers like you and me.
The banks (investors) need the listings to stay low, so that they can report their losses to the biggest insurance company in town, which is the federal government. The federal government isn’t done yet handing out money and the banks know it. All they have to do is call up the congressman they bought and he tells them everything. So just like a crack whore with 17 kids, you qualify, you sign up . . .
And you get the welfare.
Time to go buy some more Crack!
Mean while, these houses values crumble away from neglect.
Interesting way to “stimulate” our economy right?
I’m just done now . . . and . . . feeling rather depressed.
Thoughts of illegal substances cross my mind . . . but no . . .
I’ll take that desert island.
Milton
The consumer mind set seems only willing to regard time as a collection of popular events. And in a weird way, this is almost true, for being linear, time can be flooded with voyeuristic abandon and we soon become unable to see the sequence of anything else.
All that is required in my mind, to confirm with what magnificence we have been manipulated into delusion, is to remember and thereby juxtapose this world, with the one a mere 10 years ago.
Here in a brief review:
Conservative talk show host Michael Savage is banned from England (but not Jeremiah Wright).
The stock market has been surging upwards on the news that economic indicators such as April’s unemployment rates are “not as bad as predicted”. Basically, if your ship is sinking slower than you thought, perhaps there is time for another hand of poker.
Our financial system is becoming nationalized, as are auto-manufacturing giants, Chrysler and GM. Oh goody, the same people who right the tax codes are now going to make automobiles.
Let’s Invest money here!
Returning heroes from Afghanistan and Iraq are now under Napolitano’s careful scrutiny as potential “security risks”.
In counterpoint to this fact, we freed several Guantanamo prisoners with one now discovered to be in charge of Taliban military operations in Pakistan. Why let a good killer waste away in prison? Let them go, let them free . . . free I tell you! Praise Obama! . . . I mean Allah.
The urge to vomit, if not yet strong enough, will yet persevere. . .
One needs only to read on.
Air Force One, once the proud angel of protection for our nations highest officer, recently terrified thousands of New Yorkers by its low level passes for a “photo opportunity”. The white house, nevertheless, refuses to share these $300,000.00 photos with the nation who paid so dearly for them.
Obama was seen bowing to a Muslim Arabian Sheik. At least two hundred million of us actually saw this.
Nope. . . Now get this straight people! Obama was too tall . . . he did not a bow.
. . . It’s official, so there!
A witch hunt is underway to impeach the former president and arrest or disbar his personal counsel for allowing water boarding on terrorists, a rigor which the marine corps has also used to toughen its elite.
Bank of America and Citicorp mentioned casually that they need another 45 billion dollars this morning and both these banks stock rose at least 35 cents a share this morning.
We can’t sell enough Treasury bonds to cover our national debt anymore. China has pulled out but Berneke says we will pull out of the recession later this year . . . and “later this year” we will need to sell even more Treasury bonds. I don’t get the math.
Rahm Emanuel, always posing seriously with his index finger guarding his lips and Obama’s official fall guy, announced that the United States was not going to negotiate nuclear limits with Iran unless Israel gave up more of its territory to the Palestinians.
This is like telling your daughter you won’t chase away her rapist until she removes all her clothes.
100 days and only 265 to go! 630? 6,030? (there is a bill before both houses to repeal the 22cd amendment (term limits for the president)) Oh the “HOPE”! Oh the “Change”!
What a brave and insightful president we have! Such diplomacy and deliberated idiocy . . . and instant deniability too . . . because if it doesn’t fly with public opinion (what is our ‘public’ opinion anyway). . . he can chastise Rahm once again for his “misstatement”.
Iraq, timorously close to Iran and completely unprepared to defend itself militarily, announced that the U.S. military must leave next month. Perhaps there is reason to believe Iraq has already quietly acceded as vassal to Iran. Hurray democracy!
A winning beauty queen was denied the crown because she declares belief in the exclusive nature of heterosexual marriage. On the . . . sacred . . . all knowing eye no less! On TV! What hate speak! Oh the outrage!
Obama’s promise to track down “every dime” of the stimulus money(he read this very slowly and dramatically on his teleprompter). The stimulus passed through both congress and senate houses without being read, now Obama says the ‘tracking’ will be “delayed” until 2010 . . . very conveniently I might add, after the congressional elections and he knowing full well, that at least 350 billion dollars of this money is . . .
unaccounted . . . for!
Well, I’m sure we’ll just find it laying around somewhere in a lost and found . . . maybe in a purse . . . nope, too small . . . maybe in a 1,000 foot freighter off of the Somali shore perhaps? Who knows? I’ll help them find it. Is there a finders fee?
Obama refuses to give a speech next to the symbols of Christ at Georgetown University and orders them covered with black painted plywood. If Pilot could say “I find no fault with this man” who the hell are you?
I did say hell didn’t I !?
Well then, would the Pope please throw some holy water on this guy so we can see if he bursts into flames! Just a drop or two would be fine I’m sure.
Arlen Spectre defects to the Democratic party and Jeb Bush tells the Republican Party to move left . . .
Look you knuckle head! You traitorous, Bush, you!
And I’m screaming this loud enough for you to hear all the way from Utah to Florida :
THERE IS NO MORE “LEFT!” IT’S GONE! . . . DONE! . . . THIS FREEWAY OVERPASS RAN OUT OF FUNDING! IT MUST BE GONE . . . BECAUSE . . . I CANT VOMIT ANYMORE!
I am a conservative . . . now . . . under the ‘new speak rules’, of the ever Obama worshipping media, the word has been changed to . . .
“extremist”.
Let’s have a moment of silence, for the sinking of yet another perfectly fine English word, c-o-n-s-e-r-v-a-t-i-v-e, while we watch it slip into the mold ridden pudding which is . . . the PC American lexicon . . . joining all the other lost words like gay, black and terrorism . . .
I said, “pudding” didn’t I? . . . I’m really sorry Mr. Cosby, since it seemed a bit excessive to use another less palliative substance as my metaphor, ‘pudding’ has fallen prey to my rhetoric. Here, light another candle!
It is a quiet day somewhere on a desert isle. Somewhere I am sure natives are gathering thatch for their huts, children are catching pollywogs in a jar and new grass is emerging vibrant and green from the spring thaw.
But I don’t see those things.
Today, all that seems to be available to my eyes is the endless manipulations of the media, things like the afore mentioned silly . . which is our new actuality, our new abyss of madness.
Speaking of manipulation . . .
On a more personal note, I have been looking for some of these good home real estate buys the banks have been listing from the 20 million or so now vacant.
I need to move soon, as employment for me here is uncertain in the near future.
In my first visit to a shaggy weed strewn 3 acre stucco mission style house in southern California, I find a new picture, unlike the one in the ad. Rain water has eroded a once well terraced yard. Everything not sage is dead and dry. The patio pergola has been partially torn apart by migrant squatters (see, I didn’t say illegal Mexicans) and used for what looks like a cook fire. Discarded chicken bones and empty cans of beans are strewn everywhere. Adding to the debris is a mountain of used refrigerators, broken toilets, grass clippings, construction leftovers and a catalog of other items obviously intended to mark this once proud home as a new dump for all comers. It would take more money to repair this house than to build a new one.
So, from the realtor comes this history, shared by millions of other houses of similar fate:
The owners had to leave on a short sale and nobody buys it. The price sinks. Two years later the house is still empty but the bank does not want to sell at the listed price, but rather, samples the traffic in a battle of wills against the buyers market, refusing to sell at the list price. The banks do this much easier now than they could in times past, because federal ‘bail out’ money has infused bank balance sheets with fresh cash . . . from tax payers, and home buyers like you and me.
The banks (investors) need the listings to stay low, so that they can report their losses to the biggest insurance company in town, which is the federal government. The federal government isn’t done yet handing out money and the banks know it. All they have to do is call up the congressman they bought and he tells them everything. So just like a crack whore with 17 kids, you qualify, you sign up . . .
And you get the welfare.
Time to go buy some more Crack!
Mean while, these houses values crumble away from neglect.
Interesting way to “stimulate” our economy right?
I’m just done now . . . and . . . feeling rather depressed.
Thoughts of illegal substances cross my mind . . . but no . . .
I’ll take that desert island.
Milton
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