Social Media And The Ugly American

I've been posting less frequently on my blog.  My Facebook page is 99% the game I play.  I do not have a Twitter account.

All three are due, somewhat, to time restraints.  Like right now.  I should be out in the yard and will be as soon as I finish.   However, there is a lot more to it.

As for the blog, I'm getting tired of railing about politics.  Even using it as a way to vent is getting  old because that's all I'm doing.  Venting. I'm contributing absolutely nothing to the national dialog which is comprised of people who already have their own opinions and will continue to do so no matter what I may think.

Twitter and Facebook are another story entirely.  Of the nearly 200 hundred friends on my Facebook page, most are fellow game players.  The next largest chunk come from our local blogging community.  They are acquaintances, not friends.  I find I have little in common with most of them and rarely check their pages.  The remainder are my real friends.  People I actually know and care for.  It seems a shame the numbers aren't reversed, but I've no one to blame for that but myself.

Twitter?  Other than not having a device other that a prepaid phone and my computer, I'm not really able to participate.  I wouldn't if I could.  Just look at the Weiner affair.  Did he or didn't he send tasteless photos of himself?  It's hard to believe he could be stupid enough to do so, but then he is a politician.

If he didn't, and was hacked as he says, what kind of people have we become?  How could anyone do that to another?  This isn't a bunch of kids harassing their favorite nerd, which is bad enough and often has a tragic end in and of itself.  This is adults destroying a man's life, his reputation, his career.  If it could happen to him, it could happen to any of us.  By people we don't even know.  Wow.  It makes my skin crawl at the very thought of it.

I'm less than a week away from entering a new decade.  I don't have many left, if any.  I think back on conversations with my Mother during her later years as she'd shake her head in wonderment regarding the state of the world and the people in it.  I'm doing exactly the same thing, only my thoughts aren't wonderment as much as disgust.

When you hear people say they like animals better than they do people, believe them.  There's good reason for it.

I rarely return to a post to add something but today I feel compelled.  Congressman Anthony Weiner, D-NY has admitted to everything reported thus far in the Twitter scandal.  This has nothing to do with party and everything to do with character.  There are too many like Mr. Weiner serving in Congress.  What is it that attracts voters to such men.  If it's a reflection of ourselves, that we can 'identify' with them, we need to take a good hard look at who we are and what the world sees.

Redistribution Of Wealth Won't Work

Have you noticed every time the monthly stats come out showing the economy continuing to slide the government always says it's "unexpected"?  Is it getting tiresome?  Do you wonder,  really wonder, if they know what they're doing?  Don't blame it on Bush.  We're three and a half years into this administration and none of their ideas have worked.

What's worrisome is, according to Gallup, that the nation seems to be split nearly down the middle as to whether or not we should tax the rich .  Remember that's those who make over $250,000.  This day and age it is not an exorbitant salary - for those lucky enough to be working.  Place an undue tax burden on them and they'll quit spending.  Just like the rest of us.  That is the Democrat's plan. Tax, tax, tax.

The solicitor general even went so far as to suggest if you're balking at the mandate to buy insurance in the Obama care scheme, which is a tax, make less money!  What kind of advice is that from a government official?  It's reprehensible and totally alien to the American way of self reliance.

As time passes I'm getting more and more worried about another four years of Obama.  He doesn't listen except to his own drummer.  His people are snide and condescending.  And nothing they've put forward, be it cash for clunkers which decimated the used car market, to the bank bailout that has made the banks so gun shy they won't lend money to help clear up the housing market mess, has worked.

There is one plan out there.  It is Paul Ryan's.  Yes, it will change medicare but in truth that isn't bad.  It doesn't eliminate it, it merely becomes a voucher system.  It will not affect those currently in the system or those who will be before legislation is enacted.  At least take a look at it. Don't listen to the Democrat scare tactics.  Medicare as it is now or would be under Obama is no great shakes itself.  Just try to find a doctor who will take you and if you do what kind of time they give you.  Trust me.  It's less than adequate to say the least.

How is redistributing wealth going to help any of this?  Before the next election rolls around we need to do our homework on proposed solutions and, as I harp on often, find out the 'how'.  Ryan has done that.

The Republican field is still shaping up.  Beware the "personalities".  We have one in office now and are witnessing what inexperience can do.  We need an experienced steady hand on the tiller. A person knowledgeable about both our own problems and those we face throughout the world. Knowledgeable!  Get that?

Or am I once again witnessing the generational shift where it's so much easier to let the government do it in it's own way without challenge?

 Hub and I have worked hard for everything we have.  We've had no government hand outs.  Success was achieved through knowledge, read education, ability, perseverance and hard work.  To have that taken from us because someone else doesn't want to put forth the effort makes me angry.  And sad.  It's not the America in which I grew up nor expected in which to live.

The pendulum can swing back.  I'm seeing few signs that it will.

Palin's Roll Of The Dice

Is it just me or is Sarah Palin's shtick getting old?  If it's just me so be it.

I don't care that her tour bus bears the American flag.  I don't think looking into the constitutionality of it, as one MSNBC reporter seems to be doing, is worth the effort. It seems to me to be an exercise in ho hum.  Another monumental ego needing attention.

Palin is a tease.  Is she or isn't she going to run? Maybe, as has been suggested, this is her version of a campaign.  Getting down and dirty with real people like the bikers ride into D.C.  "Coincidentally" arriving in New Hampshire the same day Mitt Romney announces his presidential bid and immediately attacking him over Massachusetts care.

As cheerleader-in-chief of all things anti-Obama  and anti-conservatism she has no peer.  As a serious presidential pretender?  Well, I'm still waiting for substance and candor.  Her new found wealth has allowed her to hire better speech writers.  She hits all the right buttons, but why won't she defend what she says in question and answer sessions?  Or is there really no there there?

I just wish she would make her intentions clear.  If she's just going to cheer lead, fine.  Go ahead.  If she's going to run, then get with the program.  I'm getting really tired of her.  Her voice is beginning to grate on my nerves.  Her mannerisms and sound bites are predictable and becoming irritating with their continuing vagueness and sameness.

I don't see her making any headway with the independents who aren't into her family values bit.  She can't win without a good portion of them.  As a flamboyant personality/celebrity has she reached her peak?  She has with me.

As serious Presidential material she isn't even on the chart.  Showmanship doesn't equate substance, intellect or ability.  Maybe the announced candidates aren't the most flashy of groups but most of them have something to offer.

Somehow blaming all our ills on those who don't agree with all the Conservatives are demanding and the "lame stream" media isn't a foundation for being able to govern.  And that is the thrust.  What I want to know is what she'd do in the middle east and other trouble spots.  China.  North Korea.  Has anyone heard one single word on any of it?

It's time.  Time to say something.  Or nothing.

The Joy Of Gardening And Other Generational Differences

I finally got around to reading an article Hub had printed out for me awhile ago.  It has the foreboding title of Standard and Poor's Downgrade and the Death of American Exceptionalism.

The contents reminded me of just what we've been doing for the last several days that has kept me away from the computer.  Working.  Hard.  For the pure pleasure of enjoying the end result.

Every spring we have a ritual.  We buy a myriad of bare root trees to plant on our acreage.  Our effort to reforest this dismal prairie.  We're tree people and shouldn't be here, but we are.  So we dig the holes, buy the trees, plant them and nurture them like children until they set down their roots.  It's exhausting, especially for folks our age with our variety of aches and pains.  Yet it's a good tired, one from a job well done and the pride that comes from watching our efforts flourish.

It ties in directly to the point of the article.  The generational difference between those of my own who grew up being taught to work for what we want, to earn it and then to enjoy the fruit of our efforts.  That work ethic let to American exceptionalism.

Now we are leaning to an entitlement mentality.  We want the government to do more and more for us.  Obviously the case with the resistance to change in medicare and social security.  Education.  With it comes the end of individualism, innovation and yes, our exceptionalism.  President Obama has made it clear time and again this is his vision for our country. But what happens when the money runs out? Our money. That's how it's paid for.  Our taxes and an ever increasing debt ceiling until no one will lend to us because the dollar no longer has any value.   Nor will the country.

We could have hired a landscaping firm come in and plant our trees.  They would even choose them I'm sure.  They'd be just as pleasing to the eye or would they?  We'd have a sense of detachment because it wasn't our effort, no matter how pleasing they may appear.  Yes, the landscapers would do their job and move on.  To get them back if a tree got sick would be nearly impossible.  We'd either have to educate ourselves on the care and maintenance or lose it.  After all, weren't we entitled to a job properly done even though we had no input as to how that should be?  No idea that recourse would be time consuming, probably less than satisfactory ~ and expensive?

It seems to be little different than giving up our individuality and independence to the government.  Like airline security where we allow ourselves to he herded like sheep and manhandled beyond all decency in the name of safety.  Like health care where decisions will be broad based  without considering individual needs.

Maybe we should all plant trees and gardens and learn all over again what exceptionalism feels like.  That puff of satisfaction that comes from a drooping plant that resuscitates. By our own skill, caring and possibly innovation.

My hands are dirty even though washed a thousand times.  It will take days to get all the dirt out from under my nails.  My back has felt better for sure.  But we got it done.  With a lot of laughter and good humor even as shovels  hit rock sending reverberations running through our spines.

I feel good.  I feel proud that we old folks still have it in us.  We'll have left our mark on our little bit of the prairie.  Our mark.  Not someone or something elses.  That's the only entitlement I want.  As a reward for our own exceptionalism.








  

Is Obama's Race Really To Blame?

Is racism going to rule the next presidential election?  I wonder, when House Assistant Democratic Leader, James Clyburn, who is black, still claims most of Obama's problems are because he' black.

I'm willing to accept that Mr. Clyburn is 70 years old and racism is part of his mind set.  What he grew up with.  What he's had to contend with.  But I dare say it is not the cause of Obama's problems.

I can say this with some basis because I am white and I voted for him.  I thought he was young and bright and like so many of us, failed to realize that he had too little experience in the world of politics.  His beliefs, which he kept pretty well under wraps, have been too liberal for my of our taste.


No, Mr. Clyburn.  Even with the birthers who for some reason desperately want to prove he was born in Kenya, are more concerned he's a closet Muslim than the fact he's half black.  It's not race.

As for the birth certificate issue?   McCain was asked to prove he was born in American territory and it was concluded that he was.

The chosen example of his face imposed on a chimpanzees body?  Actually, they did the same thing to Bush.

No, his problems are of his own making.  His dreadful lack of knowledge of protocol with foreign dignitaries and his apparent refusal to learn is the least of them. His past associations.  His missteps in foreign policy.  His "I won" attitude.  His unwillingness to work with the Republicans to force his own vision.

Yes, he won.  But he wasn't elected to change the country into his vision of it,  but  to better the peoples vision.

None has to do with racism.  I can only hope the advisers to the President in his upcoming campaign, don't think they can use race as their trump card.  It will set back all the progress, as imperfect as it may be, we've made, for generations.  A setback we as a country can ill afford and can so easily avoid by looking at the truth of the matter.  It is the man, his manner, his policies, or lack of them, that drive his poll numbers.  Not his race.