A Tale of Two Americas

Today, I attended a funeral for a family member who served three presidents during his life as a physician. It's hard not to get a lump in the throat looking at the rows after rows after rows of tombstones honoring those who gave the fullest member of devotion.  It's hard not to feel a surge of gratittude to the selected servants who marched silently in unison to hoist the coffin from the hearse to the caisson.  The whole cememony draws one to silence, they walk in unison and in silence.  Even the horse drawn carriage is driven at such a speed to heighten the silence.  

It doesn't matter the weather, the rows speak to the heavens of their sacrifice and service.  The men shooting a 21 gun salute reveal a somber understanding that what we value, we must defend.   

A few miles away, people stormed the capital and they remain as of now, contesting the election of President Elect Biden.  People broke windows and left messages for congressmen for doing what they're elected to do, to represent the states and give a roll call of the electoral college votes cast.   

The President and the President Elect went on the news, I listened to both. President elect called for people to stand down, to calm down. He opted to not take questions and I thought that wise.  He did call on the President to also ask people to leave and calm down.  Minutes later, the President reechoed his claim that the election was stolen, though he ultimately asked people to leave.  

It wasn't pretty, it wasn't noble. It wasn't Presidential, but it was what was. 

Mercifully, people did begin dispersing. We must hope for something better than what we've seen up to now.   

Praying for peace is the first step, working for it is the second.   

The reality is, we need to be a country that can abide, and the behavior of those outside and inside occupying the captial does not indicate this reality. People who abide do not break windows of the government buildings, or threaten elected officials if the election does not go their way.   

I thought of the marching military honoring the dead.  I thought of the dead who thought this country was worth living and dying for...we need to somehow find a way to make our country closer to something worthy of such sacrifice for everyone from this day forward.    

What Matters More

 The election remains both an uncertainty and a necessity.  It is exhausting not knowing and yet feeling profoundly unhappy that the results, whatever they are, won't fix the fundamental problem.   Half the nation thinks the other half hates it...and the other half is sure that the half that isn't them is hateable. Everything about this is wearying because it does seem (if social media is to be believed) as if we are being reduced as a country to an Us and Them --which is not what allows our country to thrive. 

I know no one reads blogs anymore, but since it's my corner of the internet universe I'm going to say something.   People don't vote for all the reasons we ascribe. They are not all of their vote, nor are they only their vote.  There are the 365 days of the year of living, of doing, of treating others as human beings that should be considered when deciding if someone ought to be cut out of one's life.  Perhaps it is simpler to use a one strike and you're gone, but reality is that each of us, all of us, are more complex than the binary system of voting reveals.  

There are pro-life democrats and people who vote democrat despite the party platform because they believe government's role in providing a safety net to the poor and the sick is part of being pro-life and a part that should be strengthened.   There are republicans who advocate for the immigrant, who want us to not be poor stewards of the government or slavishly devoted to corporations and CEO's over middle class people.  They just aren't on the top of anyone's ticket.  They're our neighbors and friends and family.  They believe in things like civic responsiblity, justice for all, providing support to infrastructure and promoting growth that doesn't edge people out of neighborhoods where they've set down roots. They believe in cultivating the arts and education, in science and libraries and technology and beauty.  People who want a good government, want the government to bring about good for and to people.   

The people who vote, want the world to be a safe and thriving place of freedom and opportunity, they don't agree about the how of it.  For our democracy to last, we will have to reach across the aisle in all things, and find where we can do the most good.  We will have to work with and for each other.  We also don't get to decide the government is always the solution or always the problem.     Either one is a simplifcation of the complex reality of an insitution that has served however faultily over the years.  The system works as well as the people who serve in it, so if we want it better, we'd better be better ourselves.   

How?  The voting is the beginning, not the end of our civic responsibility.  Join some part of what makes your community run, be a voice that speaks, be the hands that do the work, be the eyes that see the problems or the ears that hear the needs of the community.   Maybe explore if God is calling you to run for public office or help discuss within the parties the purpose of the parties themselves. It's not that it doesn't matter who wins, it's that what matters more is what we do going forward, irrespective of who gets to 270.   

What Kind of Candy Test?

It's Halloween, and before we all collectively raid our children's stashes for those coveted Almond Joys, Twix bars and Snickers, it's time to play everyone's favorite hypothetical, "What kind of candy are you?" test.

We'll get the big guns out of the way. 

Donald Trump:  "If I were a candy bar, I'd be huge, wildly popular, the most amazing candy you've ever seen." 

The researchers here at Chocolate For Your Brain know candy, and you sir, are a Payday.  Why?  Because no one wants one, no one's happy to see it in their candy stash, it's a bit nutty with a goey indeciperable center, but for some reason, it persists and pretends to be a confection everybody loves.  Even the slogan, "Everybody loves a payday." feels like a forced mantra, something the people who manufacture paydays would like everyone to believe, but again, no one has ever sighted anyone eating an actual payday.   Further, no one has ever admitted to having consumed one.

Hillary Clinton:  100 Grand.  Why?  Because she's crispy on the inside, and everyone knows it.  Also, she'd like to think she's got big clout, but 100 Grand doesn't go as far as it used to, and never became the darling the creators dreamed it might be with their slogan, "Who wouldn't like a 100 Grand?"  Like Payday, the hundred thousand dollar bar candy banks on people agreeing before they taste it, and like Hillary, the 100 Grand bar has repacked itself on multiple occasions in an attempt to garner greater popularity.   It's never worked but really, 100 Grand, One Hundred Thousand Dollar Bar, what difference does it make?

Bernie Sanders:  A Goodbar.  Most people like them when they get them, but they never actively seek them out.  They're also hard to find in the markets.  The candy's rather simple and straight forward, and yet never quite what we're looking for.

Democratic Party:  Bit-o-honey.  They insist they're not wrong.  They insist you'll love them if you just try them.  They have no interest in hearing any other point of view.   Even when you're down to the last of your Halloween stockpile, you won't touch them.

Republican Party: Jolly Ranchers.  They're hard.  They think everyone loves them.  They're always last picked and most of the time they suck, and some of the time, they bite.

Note what's missing?  Sure.  We're missing a Kitkat, a Snicker's, a Hershey's bar and a Reese Peanut Butter Cup!

Why are we missing these better candydates?   Because there isn't anything good on the menu. 

For that to happen, the candidates and political parties would have to give us a break, satisfy, put a smile on our face and work well with the other side, so two great tastes would work well together.

If I sound sour patched on the whole political process, you're right, but remember, I kid. 

Connecting the Dots with Mark Shea

Hello! It's Monday so you get to hear me and Mark Shea interview a candidate for President.  We're talking with Mike Maturen of the American Solidarity Party. The discussion includes revisiting what it means to be pro-life (not merely anti-abortion), and Catholic social teaching, the defense of religious liberty and the question of how one engages in responsible economic policy.  

While the gentleman and the party are working to get placed on the ballot, the discussion of what is the morally correct vote, does come into play.  How do we discern what is the way to do the most good?  Our current system does not ask that question, it asks, are you on Team Iron Man or Team Captain America?  

It was pretty cool to say to my teens, get rides home from practice today, I'm interviewing a candidate for President.  It was also cool to hear that the guy cooks dinner for his kids most nights.  

Here's the link to the show, consider joining us next Monday at five o'clock.  You can text, tweet or facebook questions or you can call in, if you have a question.   As always, it will be fun.

Connecting the Dots with Mark Shea!

We're Always Both And

By now nearly everyone knows, Hillary Clinton said that some of us are "irredeemable."  I would submit, the candidate for President is correct and yet not.  For she thinks only some of us are irredeemable.

Sitting in mass today, I heard the story of the Prodigal son, of the two sons who both misunderstood the Father's love, and yet both were the beneficiaries.  That is the true reality we face, both as a people and to a person.  I couldn't help but notice all the families struggling with children at the mass. I know this battle, it is a universal one.  This day, my kids kept trading off who would sit next to me, eventually resulting in two sharing a chair, one sharing my lap, and one glommed onto my left shoulder rendering me unable to move. They did in turn each need to go to the bathroom, which gave me a few moments to try and really attend, but I kept seeing the families.

I saw parents trying to hold those they loved more than life itself and pay attention, some having to take their kids back to the cry room, others attempting to tough it out.   They were trying to love with great fervor, squirmy little people who didn't want to obey, didn't want to follow, didn't want to be quiet, didn't want to do anything their parents wanted.  Yet, the parents held them, kissed them, prayed with them and for them, and spent all of their energy on what seemed like a meaningless endeavor to the outside world, trying to help them behave at mass.   They didn't stop loving their misbehaving children, not doing what they wanted, not doing the Father's will.  Some might describe the acting out of these kids all over the mass, as deplorable.   It did not stop the parents love, their children's disobedience.

What we need and don't have and haven't had in some time, is a leader or a person running for leadership, who loves those not voting for the "proper party." Additionally, ideology driven media, celebrities, politicians, social media, and all other means of communication, tend to stir the sense of us, them, and promote hating the other as irrational, unreasonable, uneducated, stupid, crazy, evil, corrupt, awful, sinful, and instantly tainting of anyone who doesn't fit whatever the group think deems appropriate.  I don't hear anyone disagreeing that someone in this country is irredeemable, only disagreeing about who's on the list.

The reality is, we're all on the list.  We are both irredeemable by our limitations and sins, and innately worthy of honor, being made in God's image and thus daughters and sons, heirs to God's kingdom.   We love with great fervor, but often, we throw that fervor into everything else except our neighbors.  So yes, Hillary is right when she says anyone is deplorable.  I am, as is everyone who votes for Trump, Hillary, or anyone else or no one else, anywhere in this world, any time in this world.  We are all broken.  We are all prodigal children who sometime are the older sibling getting mad because there's a party and it wasn't thrown for us to show everyone else how good we are or more accurately, how bad everyone else is by comparison.

We are all, irredeemable or would be, save for that great unfathomable fact, God loves us.  What we have to remember, both as citizens and as individuals, is that great truth, that mysterious truth of God's love for us, is true for all of us, for each of us, at all times. There is no one who is irredeemable save that soul which refuses redemption.  God's mercy is not a safety net, but the hand of the father, reaching out to each of his children, offering grace, divine help, redemption.

We are all both and.  What's great, what's wonderful, is God has invited all of us to the party, where He will show the world how much He loves us.  All we have to do, is be willing to come in to the feast.  

P.S. I saw the parents of the squirmy kids.  They bought their children donuts.

There Isn't a Home

In the arena of America politics, there isn't a home where as a Catholic, I can feel comfortable.  I know good earnest noble intelligent caring people across the political spectrum. I know some who say, here is your home, because you oppose this...insert issue A. They are correct, I oppose issue A. It is insufficient reason. I know others who say come over here, it is obvious you don't belong over there. We have issue B and C.  It doesn't matter. If my faith is the determinative factor on voting and not ideology, then neither party deserves my support.  I cannot reject half of my values to affirm one, or ignore that one for the same reason.  I can't.  Not if I want to hold true to any of my faith.  Not one pinch of incense for either false god.

Neither candidate should hold power. Neither is a good decision, only a negative decision. Whether for Trump or Hillary, I can't give my assent without being tarred by the muck each candidate has chosen to embrace.  I cannot support either candidate if giving such support results in having to pretend corrupt isn't corrupt, evil isn't evil, incompetent isn't incompetent, and ignorant isn't ignorant. To support either is to somehow contort one's values and shoehorn them into the slipper for either R or D.  For me, neither shoe fits.

These candidates are real people with serious character flaws. I concede, one of these two damaged souls will win but not with my help. Today, I reject both parties and their proposed candidates.  I have never not voted, but I don't think in good faith I can assent to either ever. To me, they are both Barabbas. They are both something other than good, and the position of President is something that ought not to be given to one of these two least kind, least selfless, least ethical, least honest or generous candidates to enter the public arena in a long time.

To those who say, "No! You'll waste your vote."  No.  I am holding my vote.  It is not something someone is guaranteed because of their party.  It is something that must be earned.  No one has done anything to earn my trust, let alone my vote.

Why do I say there is no good choice?  It is not because I despair of good in this world or in people. I know I am not the only one who knows many on both sides of the political spectrum.   I know I am not the only one to be able to name names of people with R's and D's affiliated to their voting record that are to a person, decent, kind, thoughtful, diligent, people of good character.  I imagine most are trying to make the best of a situation they did not choose and do not want.

When I look at the fruits of pledging fealty to either side, both candidates demand too many compromises.   Anyone who doesn't fit one's political template is thus exiled to the political equivalent of Hell, for having thought otherwise.  Modern politics seems to thrive on this sort of instant US THEM, US GOOD, THEM EVIL sort of nonsense. This sort of rigid dismissal of all who think otherwise must be rejected.

Whatever that is, it's not American or Catholic, or even sensible. It's not healthy for anyone to presume to reading other people's hearts when we cannot even see each other's faces.     We are all more than politics, or we're supposed to be, and to be Catholic, we even have to see those we consider our enemies, as made in the likeness of God, and worthy of dignity, worthy of love.  It's too easy to give into snark, to vitriol, to declaring the other side willfully ignorant or deliberately evil.   It allows us to dismiss whole swaths of others and feel smug in doing so.

We are a diverse nation, with multiple reasons for our decisions, both pragmatic and ideological, social and personal, ethic based and steeped in history. By our very ordinary acts of everyday civility, and the peaceful transition of power from administration to administration, all of us prove, our great capacity for tolerance, our great capacity for diversity of thought, our ability to coexist despite what the political parties believe.

So while I don't have any faith or trust in the candidates, I do still hold great hope in the promise and reality of the everyday R's and D's.  I'm thinking they would probably prefer to skip both conventions, go to a local watering hole and complain about the candidate they got stuck with for this go around.

We'll survive whoever wins, because we are bigger than any one candidate.  Politics would have us always believe this is the critical juncture, (regardless of the year) where utopia or doomsday is around the corner.   I reject the damning despair and false hope presented.  The universe will go on, as it should, and it will the results of all of our efforts in the every day that determine whether we become a better nation or not.

We Have No King But Caesar

The people have spoken and we will have as President this fall, someone who thinks Planned Parenthood does some very good things...or we will have Hillary Clinton.  
We will have someone who has no humility.
We will have someone who has no scruples about lying, about destroying others, and about lying about destroying others.
We will have someone who thinks the law is for other people.

We will have a leader who is willing to mock other people, and to tell all followers, it's okay to hate the other side.   They're legitimate to hate.  

We will have a leader who thinks because people on the other side hate, they are somehow legitimate and noble.  

We will be ruled by either a party indifferent to anything anyone says, or the other presuming about its own moral value based on comparison.   If the Houyhnhnms or the Yahoos win, humanity loses.  
America loses.

No one running for office this year who will be on the November ballot has done anything ti show they care about anything or anyone other than themselves.  

If the theme of the 2008 election was hope, the theme of 2016 is

Abandon all of that, ye who enter here.  

Not to spend too much more time gazing into the Palantir, for such way lies only despair, but my one worry and warning is based on the one thing I've seen from the fruits of both candidates about the coming election.  No matter who wins, we will have someone in the White House who above all other things, desires power.  

Valentine Campaigns

Hillary Clinton:  Bring me the hearts of everyone who did not vote for me.

Bernie Sanders:  Free Hearts for Everyone!

Marco Rubio: Everyone loves the tin man.  Right?

Donald Trump: A heart of pyrite but you don't know the difference.

Jeb Bush: You've tried all the other Bushes...third time's a charm.

Chris Christie: The only one whose heart flutters when he takes the stage, is his.

Ted Cruz: I don't believe they celebrate Valentine's day in Canada. 

Carly Fiorina: Be Mine. Please!  Come on....

Dennis Kasich: There ain't no way they're ever gonna love you....

Ben Carson: Clear!

Honest Political Slogans

The year 2016 is already looking like a clunker season for political candidates, with no fresh new faces, only those who have run before, and now think by process of elimination, it must be their time. Because none of these candidates have won in the past on their own gravitas or election savvy, I feel it my patriotic duty as a citizen to offer the following election slogans to participants from both parties to use as a means of creating a viral and virtual connection with the disaffected voting public.  It's the least I can do.

10) The Recycled Campaign...reduce, reuse, recycle....Me!

9) Second Chances: I'm running again....because last time, you made a mistake.

8) The Princess Bride Appeal: Please consider me as an alternative to suicide.

7) Cable Argument: I'm the Candidate You Settle For, Because no one else is worth watching more.

6) Pre-Owned Car Model; Only Used by One Election, Mileage in the mid 50-60's. Make an offer.

5) Same Difference: Will Your Life Improve Under the Other Candidate's Rule? Depends....How Much did You Donate?

4) Casablanca Rule: You'd probably despise me if you gave me any thought, because you object to the type of business I do. But through ways of my own, I help. Don't mind a parasite, just object to the cut rate one.

3) Red Rover Red Rover, There's No One Else to Come Over....So...you have to pick me!

2) The Moral argument....In some cases, I'm the lesser of two evils.

1) Hey! I'm Bought and Paid For By Corporations You Like!

Feel inspired...I do. Please remember me when you take hold of power, I'm thinking an appointment to be ambassador to Malta might be appropriate compensation.

(This concludes this week's exercise in cynicism.  We now return to normal humor parameters).  

Cassandra Question for All of Us

Cassandra tells the truth and no one believes her.  By the time they know it to be truth, it doesn't matter.  I'm wondering, are we Troy?

Brendan Eich was forced to quit.

His crime?

Donating $1,000 to support a marriage amendment in California -- eight years ago.

 The firing of the Mozilla CEO for daring to have a non popular opinion is telling, and chilling.  How long before anyone who wishes to hold office must give a loyalty oath to prove they aren't out of touch with whatever the powers think important?  We now live in a world  where retroactive vindictiveness is harnessed to create a Social Media Hulk Smash Flash mob that uses prior actions and opinions to destroy the designated target in the present.  Lovely!  What could go wrong?

All of this is done to create a new society, one which tolerates, but not you...and not you....and not you.  Mobs that win through mob actions or at least silence opposition, don't dissipate, they rage on, they look for new victims, emboldened by the successes.  Others will see, Mozilla caved, and new attempts to purge corporations and other organizations of anyone who once or currently holds a position of power who espoused wrong thinking or contributed to the wrong political party will emerge.  Why?  Because it theoretically worked in this circumstance.  

But this sort of behavior on a societal level, it doesn't bring good, it doesn't create understanding and it certainly doesn't evangelize tolerance.  It promotes the equivalent of thumbs up thumbs down.  All we're doing now, is determining who the next meal is for the lions. 

The problem with this social media driven resignation/socially demanded firing is it wasn't based on anything but disagreement with a position.  Judgment and verdict in one swoop, for expressing an opinion once upon a time that people disagree with now. 

No reason, no mercy, no discussion, no grey areas, no belief that anyone can ever think differently, was involved.  Just the rage that the present selected opinion wasn't always the opinion, and fear on the part of those surrounding the man, of what would happen if they did not capitulate.  

But the message sent by sending him packing, was no one should have ever thought differently.

And that sort of non thinking disguised as ideological righteousness is dangerous.  If you agree with the prevailing wind, you have nothing to worry about...unless you used to disagree with the prevailing wind, or until that day when you might.  Diversity of opinion is no longer tolerated.  

The standard reaction to this sort of a post by those who approve of the virtual dismissal of this person is to say, pshaw, that's just hyperbole, we're still a reasonable people.

We aren't ...insert unreasonable action here.  It's just HE shouldn't be thinking this way because he's in a position of power.

No one believes Cassandra, but our freedom of speech, our freedom of expression, our freedom of religion is being eroded in favor of everyone being "tolerant" by in no way differing.  

The purpose of our country is to allow people to think as they will, believe as they will, even if we disagree.  People are supposed to be legally able to create businesses and do the work and not have to pass a political, ideological litmus test to do so.   Politicizing everything in order to mold it to our own satisfaction is a lousy crazy way to live. I have friends with whom I disagree on multiple things, even important things, but they are still my friends because we see each other as human beings first, and that what is valuable in the other, is beyond where we differ.

People are still free to do so, but incidents like this erode the moral diversity of our society.   The cases against those who wish to operate their business under certain moral parameters like Hobby Lobby or the baker in Colorado, or the photographer in Arizona, are examples.  Our country no longer allows for live and let live. No, not agreeing, past or present, is designated as some sort of irreparable psychological harm, that must be censured. It's speak, speak perfectly, donate perfectly, align yourself politically correctly,  or die.  (business wise). 

The public nature of the consequence of a perceived act by those who perceived it to be hateful and declared it as such, should chill anyone who has ever entered or ever might enter into the public square.  Personal Political expression has just become a permanent threat to livelihood, no matter your acts. Your past is present, all sins equally fatal if judged guilty.  Every business is affected by what happened to Mozilla.  All it takes is one real or imagined grievance, and a committed individual to whip up a storm.   We have been to a person, doused with moral kerosene.  All that is needed, is for life to provide the match.

True tolerance, does not involve demanding the head of the other in capitulation.  True tolerance reveals the error of the other side through something other than sacking, vilifying or destroying livelihoods and mocking people for daring to disagree.  Look at Martin Luther King Jr., or Ghandi, or Pope John Paul the II, all three of these people faced evils they knew to be evil, and they managed to bring about a change in the hearts of peoples, whole peoples, not by firing people or declaring the other side evil, but by simply standing out against what they knew to be wrong.  

If the goal is to change hearts, threatening people's livelihood if they voted or donated a certain way may create a climate of complicit silence, but it isn't tolerance.  It's tyranny, it's mob rule, it's simply switching who is the bully and who is the bullied. 

If one wants a world where bullying is acceptable, carry on, and understand, one day, each of us will be on the losing side of whosoever has the greatest force and momentum. 

If you are really against bullying, if you really want tolerance, if you really want a world where COEXIST means something, you can't demand everyone act, think, speak, vote and work all the same way.  It's like demanding that all restaurants be five star, but serve McDonald's.  You have to allow for more than right and left, Republican and Democrat, secular and religious, you have to allow for diversity of thinking and the manifestation of that thinking in real life, as applied in work, play, association, business policies, family life, everything, all things. past and present.  

There is a great spectrum of diversity of being in this world.  We are all beautiful souls, and we are called to love all souls, to hope we will have the distinct pleasure of knowing each other, all each others for all of eternity.  That isn't tolerance, that's love, that's fellowship, that's a deeper community than can be generated via hunting down anyone and eventually everyone who fails to meet the ever moving standards of acceptability within the culture.   The prevailing thinking that all is relative means that limited parameters of tolerance are forever moving, excluding more and more always in favor of the new, which must necessarily dismiss the old.  

Do I feel sorry for a CEO?  No, it's not a case of pity for the rich man, it's a question of what type of society will we be.  Will we now have a free society, which does not declare whatever is not popular is immoral and illegal, or will we be slaves to fashion and politics and the forces that demand ideological fealty retroactively for all of time as proof of the purity of their own positions and vindication?  Will our society tolerate anyone being out of touch with whatever is not yet decided?  Can any of us endure such a scrutiny?  I would say, if the eyes of the world are turned on us, there is not one of us that would not be withered by the experience.  Such a world will not end well.

So here's my Cassandra question: How will we love if we will only tolerate perfection? Will we be able to bear the realness of being if we keep deciding that we can bear less and less of what it means to be real?

I know where I'd rather live.  I'm just not sure how we hold onto it.  

 

Soap Box Time

Soap Box #1.  I didn't watch the Grammy awards, and from all reports, I only missed that they decided to drop the veil of pretending to care what we plebeians think.  Today's entertainers continue the relentless quest for how to find the underside of the bottom of the barrel of bad taste.  Miley outdid Brittany who outdid Janet, and now Katy Perry seeks to carve out her niche with all who like watching a cocktail of fire, pole dancing and Satanic references. But I'm more stunned anyone has any energy to express outrage.
 

How is it that the Grammy awards surprised anyone? 

I'll give the girl credit, the bar has been raised...or lowered, depending upon how you want to work that metaphor.

As the whole of the entertainment industry commits itself to triple dog daring each other how to lick and twerk enough to cause stomach upset, we grow less capable of having our sensibilities rocked. So in the interest of self preservation (I don't want to bleach my brain or eyeballs), let's just tell them, the culture is dead, they win. We'll declare ourselves outraged and shocked and

The bell rang. We're going back inside now.

Soap Box#2  After all, our culture is currently at war with anything that smacks of holding onto sanity.  Ideology has become the new American Idolatry.  There is acceptable thinking, and everyone else.  Everyone else, shut up and let the smart people govern and entertain. 

For example: the Governor of New York declared those who hold pro-life views aren't welcome in his state.  Before someone says, "You're taking it out of context...he meant." I've read what he said. I've read what he said we should think about what he said.  I've read the "context."

 Here's my response.  If someone like say, Sarah Palin said, "Those who are pro-choice should form their own state or get out." The calls for her head that haven't yet been made, would still be non stop streaming on the television.  The internet would melt from the scores of posts, tweets and blogs about the intolerant right wing.  No later back pedaling, I only meant extremist when I said that would satisfy.

So no. I'm not buying his latest non apology or the ditto he received from the new mayor of New York. They meant it.  They think it.  They believe it.  Pro-lifers, we shouldn't be part of the public square.  Besides, there aren't that many of you so just go with the flow.

Annual flash mob of Ninjas

We're gumming up the utopia that would be by daring to not agree.  

Which brings me to Soap Box Issue #3

Modern thinkers love to remember Saint Francis as the sort of patron saint of bunnies, and he loved the earth so, there's that.  But all that other stuff?  Forgettaboutit!

Any time Catholics integrate faith into the whole of life, we're just being simplistic. Probably people said that to SAINT FRANCIS too.

 

"Think you're taking this give everything away and follow me a bit too far Francis."

Following the arguments of those who think Catholics ought to just get over themselves and their religion and stop imposing their values on others by not wanting to pay for birth control or abortion, the general gist of it is this:

For those of you who still believe in God, trust us.  We know God understands if we need to make allowances for modern living even if you don't. They then assert there isn't anything in the bible that says "No abortion" or no "birth control."  followed by some attempt to claim there isn't any God but if there was...He/She/It/ would think like they do.

Remember I said judge not.  That's the only thing you have to do.  I didn't mean any of that other stuff.  YOLO!

 

One can almost hear Kathleen Sebelius pondering, "Would someone rid us of these troublesome nuns?"  Saint Thomas Beckett, pray for us.

Being Catholic means turning the other cheek. So I'm feeling a bit cheeky today, mirthful and merciful.  Turning the other cheek isn't rolling over. It's fighting back with grace, humor, joy, wit, knowledge and truth.

Our society is trying to discern do we serve the government or does the government serve us? 

If it is the former, then any who think otherwise must be brought to heel, if it is the later, than there is room for those for whom religion, faith, vocations, aren't to be kept in a box for Sunday or simply used at the soup kitchen. I could argue that people who believe in what Jesus said at the sermon on the Mount about feeding the hungry, serving the poor, caring for the sick, visiting the lonely to the point of living it are the reason for being at mass on Sunday and why you serve at a soup kitchen, they are why there is a soup kitchen.  But I'll point out instead, you won't have a society of civilized kind people if the only reason for not breaking the law is the threat of punishment, you will have martial law even if it is only done via economic lashes of the whip.  

Free people think freely, speak freely, worship freely, act freely.  They hold vigorous debate, they argue, and they stipulate that the other side may disagree without being utterly devoid of sense, sensibilities and legitimate grievances.  Memo to Laura Levites and all those who think wishing evil, violence and death upon political opponents is clever thoughtful commentary.  Stop it.  And if you can't stop yourself, I'll just say (cause I'm Southern), "Bless your heart." and then because I'm Catholic, I'll have to (and it won't easy), pray to mean it in a non ironic or sarcastic way.

Bottom line:

 

The State of the Union is precarious, because a nation divided against itself cannot stand, and as long as the political climate insists upon pitting right against left, religious against anyone else, man versus woman, and DNC vs. GOP and lays everything as a you're for us or against us and if you're against us, you're ignorant or evil or both, we cannot have a thriving nation, or a thriving people.  Being told you're either surrounded by ignorance and evil or that you are ignorant and/or evil, drains the public spirit, the will to go out and really address the serious pressing problems our country faces in real time. Such a lens always forces the viewer to eliminate half of the solution by dismissing any and all disagreement as made in bad faith. We can only work at our best if we are a Union, not a squabbling nation in need of counseling and in danger of divorce. 

 

We need to be able to have discussions about serious topics of dispute that don't translate to sound bites or become used as a sledge hammer against the other side. A reasonable government would not demand people violate their religions to satisfy a political goal. We need to recapture the beauty and genius of our government and our nation, which included limitations on power and procedures which insured culpability for action and inaction in the three branches of government, a firm belief in the fair application of rule of law, not the selected prosecution and enforcement of some or of mitigated justice based on economics, color or creed.  We need to recapture the promise this nation held, that people could make it, because we remained people free to try and free to succeed. 

 

 

Nothing That Concerns You Has Happened

Nothing that concerns you has taken place.   Be calm.  Be of good cheer, no bad evil or wrong thinking is going on in your government, we're benign happy people who only spend money responsibly on good things.  The only people who ever are wrong or bad, are those other guys who aren't in power, but are stinky heads anyway, to be spit on, possibly jailed, and always ignored.  If any of them raise any concerns, it's not because they're right or we're wrong, it's because they're greedy for power we have.  You can't trust them.  But you can trust us. We've the better intentions even if we do exactly what was done before but don't tell you. 

Yesterday, I read about the hunger strike at Gitmo, where possibly as many as 166 inmates have been on hunger strikes owing to the abuses and conditions they endure in their never ending confinement.

It seems only a few years ago,  I remember when the political left was a champion for their rights, for human rights, for the Constitution and the rule of law.  I remember when the idea of the U.S.A being engaged in torture or permanent imprisonment without possibility of trial or parole or even charges, brought thoughtful and consistent outrage at the administration for its slow responses and casual indifference to violations of agreed upon standards for treatments even of "hostile enemy combatants."  I remember back when Bush was president, feeling horrified at the existence of the camp, and thinking, anyone brought there, if they weren't broken when they went in, would hate  the US if they ever got out.  I remember thinking, this couldn't be our government, being coy with the rule of law, pretending to somehow parse the constitution to allow something like torture and indefinite imprisonment to exist.  I remember feeling ashamed.  I also remember musing that in creating such a place, a door was opened for future mischief.

That future mischief happening has now been going on for a while.

Now that it is 5 years into the existing administration's run of the land,  can we possibly consider the moral legitimacy of arguing against this policy without being told such criticism undermines the existing president, is politically or racially motivated, or has no weight since Bush did it first and worse? 

Wrong is wrong. Violating rights and holding prisoners in permanent limbo isn't a policy any person with an R or a D beside their name should endorse, it is UnAmerican,  it is inhuman.  People who watch Fox News and those who comment on Das Kos ought to be on the same page about this, that we can't be a nation of laws if we ignore those laws when they are inconvenient.  Human beings matter.  They matter whether they are Muslim or have Alzheimer's or Down Syndrome or have been raped, or are the teenagers who committed the crime or are unborn.  We are a nation that claims to be better, to cherish life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness as part of our core.  We are ignoring that core for some people, because it is easier than the alternative that freedom demands.  We are going to have to live unsafely and be okay with the reality that life and liberty, involve risk.

So how do we let these people go?  We swallow hard. We recognize that we have probably created by our unwillingness to follow our own laws, regardless of political affiliation, a whole new generation that can declare us hypocrites and justify by their own pain, any rage they throw our way.  We will have to work seven times seventy times to earn the trust we have burned over the years. Some of those injured or who view the injuries, will never trust us.  We will have to live with that too.

We live in an age that is honestly burnt out on outrage.  We should be. We have seen how little fruit it produces.  Our congress passes laws without reading them and spends money without thinking.  It holds committees that make recommendations that are promptly filed away never to be used.  As a people, as a government, we waste, we idle, we blame, we rule, we smother, we take, we spin. But we never stop a program. We never cut back. We never stop what is politically convenient.  We never release power once acquired.  

For our society to begin to get better, Americans have to not spend energy being outraged, and instead spend our talents speaking and learning and pushing back against the political sloth that paints all approval or dismissal of policy as purely based on politics and thus not worthy of note if it goes against your guy's side.    We need to insist to the President and to the house and the senate, that this place be closed. We need to insist that these people be returned to their homes.  We need to have trials with charges to illustrate to the world and ourselves, we aren't petty tyrants with large credit cards.  We need to respect the rule of law for all people at all times, if we would be a society that values the rule of law.

Everyone gets that those laws, following them, in all scenarios, it's hard. It's why we've failed in some cases, but we have the power to stop failing. Being a nation of laws is what makes us a nation worth having, worth keeping.  Call your representatives and senators, write your papers an email.

My fellow blogger The Ironic Catholic has some excellent links and her piece also talks about the need for all of us as Americans, as people of good will, as humans, to speak out and ask that this place be closed.  Those who have been cleared, must be set free immediately.  There is no excuse, save fear of what we have done, and we need to be a braver people who when they see something is wrong, stop the wrong itself.

So I stand with my fellow blogger in asking questions, and the others who have joined...

I Know She's Not on the Ballot

But given the state of things, what this nation really needs now is mom and apple pie. 

Moms deal with fighting siblings who view minor infractions on their property as a reason to declare World War III, so a mom could certainly deal with the squabbles in congress.

When one party locks the other out of a bill writing session what do you think Mom would do?  She'd bang on that door and demand they open it up and share or they'd be doing dishes and the laundry...in fact, because they did that, they get to do the dishes and laundry together.

When someone issues a fake apology, Mom would be there to make him redo it, mean it and make restitution. Then she'd watch over him like a hawk to make sure whatever it is, it didn't happen again.

When Congress votes itself a pay raise, Mom would be there to cross it out and say Knock it off, it's not like you're suffering and tell them to get back to work.

Mom would not let them leave the house in a mess, she'd make the Senate pick up their toys too. 

Do you think Mom would let the press tell fibs about either side on anything? Me neither.

About Childhood obesity.  She'd tell everyone to turn off the computer and tv and get outside and get some fresh air until dinner.

About the deficit. She'd cut coupons. She'd go to each department and tell them to prioritize. She'd then tell everyone who helped make this mess to chip in a bit.  She'd also give everyone who helped spend us into this mess a serious lecture about accepting responsibility and make them chip in more.

On dealing with other countries/foreign policy.  Don't give money to bullies. Don't play with bullies. Don't put up with bullies.   And bullies? You're not welcome, you can't play with us. Shape up and we'll talk. Pretty simple. 

On the unemployment problem, Mom always has jobs.  Every mom I know can think of ten jobs that need doing right now.  Imagine an army of moms. We'd have the rate down to zero if moms were in charge. 

And lastly, it's been a hard few years.  It's cold outside. We need a little warming, a little joy and sweetness and happiness.  That's what the pie is for, she'd even make it a'la mode.

So Vote Mom in 2012 --She's not on the ticket, but she should be.

Who Will Stop it? (Sherry Rants again).

The other day a friend of mine was getting really down about politics.  I understood. 

Neither side seems serious about reducing the debt, the deficit or even curbing the slightest of abuses of Congress, jobs are still MIA, the housing crisis has all of the nation trapped in mortgage amber and the super increase in demand for government safety nets and use of them coupled with the increase in taxes across the board on all those who are not yet continues to make day to day living much more of a chore than it ought to be.  We used to breathe easier. 

Then, there are the unspoken problems like the systemic ethical, moral and constitutional flaws in the currently existing health care law, the erosion of liberties a 'la Patriot Act Part Deux, the Drone Wars, the massive increase in authority and oversight of the IRS, and the lack of safety of American people abroad if the government decides to look the other way or spread a convenient untruth when some diplomat has the poor taste to be assassinated during an election year. Fast and Furious has been neatly swept under a rug never to be mentioned again.  I also forgot to mention the Kill List.  Before anyone says "Hey! You're piling on Obama!" let me point out, Romney isn't mentioning these things either so either he wants to keep them going or he's gutless on this point and so they'll still exist.  Either way, I'm irritated.  It means these things that shouldn't be in a nation that values rule of law, the Constitution and due process, will be allowed to continue. (SSSHHHHHHHH, Not supposed to think that or criticize, just vote and be done with it).

That the polls that aren't rah rahing for one side indicate a mostly 50-50 call indicates the reason for the near passionless political life of those on either side who normally put up signs, get out the vote and debate their neighbors.  

But I told my friend, "As Catholics, we have to stay informed. As Catholics, we are compelled to be involved.  As Catholics, we have to act." In other words, we can't just rail (wrath undirected is the equivalent of being a troll in com boxes, it's stupid, unbecoming and doesn't persuade hearts, change minds or affect policy --it only leaves everyone else with a sour taste in their mouth when your name pops up).  We can't despair.  (That's quitting with a whimper. It also means whoever wins doesn't need to pay you any mind).  And Further, we can't give up. The fight to stop these abuses or have them investigated, repealed or addressed is not ended by a vote or an election.  The decision in November is merely an indicator of how steep the climb to win will be (excruciating or merely grueling).  The energy of before the election is nothing compared to what will be needed after, regardless. 

Holding our officials accountable has become something not done unless the political class sees a profit in it.  Over the past few years a pattern has emerged:

     If it:
     hurts others on your side in the election, you get sacked,
     doesn't seem to matter because it's not an election year for your side, yawn and move on, nothing to see here,
     hurts your opponents even if it's nothing, there will be one indignant person who gets on camera to give a speech amounting to "Never in my whole life have I been more scandalized and this person should not simply be forced to resign but stand outside on the mall in the rain wearing a sign "I STINK and DESERVE TO BE SPIT UPON BY GOD AND MAN) before being tarred, feathered, audited and thrown in jail indefinitely."  Then they'll be quietly dismissed with their golden parachute and become part of the speaking head circuit.

If I sound jaded, cynical and agitated, it's all true. Mostly because I fail at those three things, not wanting to being wrathful, not wanting to despair and not wanting to quit and say "I'll take my toys and go home." 

We have to fix the home we have.  We have to call every senator and every representative and demand they pass a budget, demand they pass budgets every day, don't let the Congress go home for recess until they fulfill their congressional constitutionally defined duties.  Zero out every salary of every elected official and every pension of every elected official until they do their actual job.  Pay all of what is lost to the debt. They can live as those who are jobless if they aren't going to do their job. Every agency that doesn't file its taxes, every employee that does not file taxes, fired.  Fired. Fired. Fired.  Every one of them.  Every single one.

 We ought to call the press and tell them that they need to cover the red and the blue with equal zeal and curiosity rather than pure disdain and absolute adulation based on political affiliation.  You want to know why your circulation is dying? Because you only sing to yourselves and congratulate yourselves on how beautiful you sound.  Edit and vet yourselves.  Be brave enough to speak the truth and document it with facts from reliable sources. Vet your sources better than high school students are currently demanded to do. I know there are exceptions, but they are not the rule.

We ought to cry out at our President and those who aspire to the office, "GROW UP! Do the job! Stop offering what you don't have and demonizing those who disagree. You've burned your last straw man. We are real. Our problems are real and we have real disagreements about how to solve them and we're not stupid. Stop hyperventilating at each other and demanding we do the same."  If you want the job, you better have a plan and it better be more than it will just take time or wait and see.  Despite our constant distractedness, we can follow along.  We are a nation of common sense and honor, we deserve better.  Our leaders ought to be able to get along with others better than we expect our children to in school.  They also ought to be held accountable for failures that aren't merely gaps in communication or the inability to tell a story or build the narrative.  We all know the difference between failing to present a compelling case for a good plan and failing to present a good case period. 

Failing that, failing us by failing in their duties in favor of a party or in favor of donors or in favor of amassing power, we as the citizens of this country should tell all of you who hold positions we pay for, positions we've entrusted you with, positions designated to be honors for leadership, we fire you today. We shall not be part of this experiment anymore.  It is failing because you have failed.  You have failed us. You have been wretched poor stewards of our past, our present and our posterity. You have failed the future of this country by your votes in the present.  Your grades are not incomplete anymore. They are "F's." 

I still am hopeful that our nation can right itself, that we can grow the economy, bring down the debt and the deficit, improve our existing services and rid a lot of the waste and repeal those laws that threaten the fabric of our nation's core values.   I am hopeful because our country is bigger than either party or any president.  But it will become harder as laws and practices that erode our liberties codify and become accepted as simply part of life.  (See abortion if you need a perfect example).

At some point, if we do not stop, if we do not demand that our government limit itself, the government shall be all and we shall cease to be a free people.  We cannot be free if our every action is now monitored and sanctioned or disapproved. We cannot be free if we must always be "careful" about our thoughts and words.  We shall become serfs of the elected. If the government can dictate the limits of our faith, what stops the government from deciding our limits need to be still greater?  At what point does the government become a secular caliphate?  We the huddled masses yearning to be free will know that our security depends on surrendering not only that freedom, but that yearning.  This is not an R or a D problem. It isn't a case of who started it. It's a case of WHO WILL STOP IT?  Because if no one does, we as a nation will cease to be the great promise to the world we once were and our children will grow up not understanding what they've lost.

Reasons for Being on The View as vs. Anywhere Else

10) Eye Candy is as Eye Candy does.

9) Letterman didn't give the bump I expected.

8) They won't ask the hard questions Univision does.

7) Lecturing the UN...that's easy. Talking to UN leaders where they get to have a say and might disagree...

6) Biden and his wife were scheduled but that could have been awkward.

5) Lost a bet with Hillary.

4) Wanted advice from Guinan. (It always worked for Picard).

3) It's boring to listening to Jay Carney twist in the wind every day.

2) Chris Matthews is starting to creep me out.

1) That phone in the White House keeps ringing every night at 3 a.m. How's a person supposed to get a decent night's sleep?

Rock Paper Scissors Lizard Spock

Most election years, I watch both conventions.  I hear some good speeches, but I was also pay attention to what is not said. Part of the purpose of a convention is to introduce the party/person to the people. Both conventions are first and foremost, giant commercial parties for the faithful.  Here's how they usually go regardless of your party affiliation:

 Here's our candidate, rah rah rah.  Good to people, good to animals, good to rocks.  Good to air. Good for everybody. Good. Good. Good. Good. Goody goodness type good. Good good goodness with a puppy and apple pie. Good. Good. Good.  Oh and we're cool too.  Our side rocks.  It rocks. ROCKS!  Did you see that we ROCK? Rock on!  Rock! Yeah! 

That other side..Evil. Pure evil. Impure evil. Evil with impurity on the side. Impure evil with pure evil on the side. Evil. Evil. Evil. Evil. Evil evilness and villainy, villainy and evil evilness.  They are so evil, they run with scissors. We saw it.  We can't stop it, but you can. Stop their evil scissor running or wallow in freakish misery forever if they win, worrying about your eyes or skin being hurt by those evil people with scissors.

We have a solution. Our solution is so obvious and simple a caveman could do it, but those evil cavemen on the other side, they've been stymieing our leadership forever.   They fear our brilliance.  They fear you.  They'd fear you even more if you recognize our brilliance.  We're brilliant.  We're brilliant, we're brilliant and we're good for you (Like fruits and vegetables and other foods in sensible portions only moreso).  Join now and you can be brilliant too.  It's contagious, just like voting for the other side makes you an evil caveman.  You don't want to be an evil caveman so you should join us and be an independent thinker like all of us. Then you too will be brilliant and good. (Don't forget good).  Brilliant and good and like fruits and vegetables only moreso. And we have a plan.  We can't show you the plan because then the evil stupid cavemen would steal it and use it in an evil stupid way, but we have a plan.

Also, we'll give you things because, we're good and brilliant and brilliantly good. The other side won't give you things because again, they're stupid and evil and selfish.  Or, we'll solve all the problems the selfish evil stupid people created and punish the stupid evil selfish people because then they'll either learn they should be brilliant and good like us, or continue to be punished on top of being selfish and evil and stupid.  

And, after millions and maybe billions of dollars are spent telling us this on tv and radio and computer and in magazines and papers and countless hours are lost that could be used to actually address the issues of unemployment, taxes, health care, the huge expansion of government powers to include not only the Patriot act but unmanned drones over our own country, voters will still be left with a great puzzle.   Not who are these guys but why is it always the same two options, Godzilla or Mothra?  The problem is, no matter which monster wins, it's the people that have to clean up the mess.

And like those Godzilla movies, there's always another one, there's always another election, so there's always another battle of the titans to illustrate to the destroyed city that we are not players in this arena, we're at best innocent bystanders who get to scream at the sidelines as cars are smashed and buildings crushed.  Both parties have huge planks in their eyes, and the media goes around screaming about the voter's splinters and how those splinters are affecting their judgement and their vision.

I won't say that there isn't a dime's worth of difference between the two parties or that anyone's vote doesn't matter, only that I'd wish at some point, we could get beyond what feels like a bad movie or at best, a fight between high school nerds over which sci-fiction is the best; the type of Internet arguments about who is better, Old or New, Starwars or Star Trek, Kirk or Spock that go on forever and mean nothing!

I'd like for our country to get out of adolescence or at least middle school about politics.  Don't just tell me how wonderful you are.  Tell me what you are going to do and how and then why.  Show your work.  Let me see what your plan is. Trust that if it is a good plan, I'll back you.  If it is a bad plan, I'll tell you.   If there isn't a plan at all, I'll be annoyed at you.  If you lie about the plan, I will be more than annoyed.  I'll be angry.

And when the little people in the b-movies get angry and organized, even the big monsters lose.

Laughing at Icarus

If the President falls from the sky in this election, the media will have no one to blame but themselves for making him into a messiah, conveniently forgetting what humanity did historically to the only one who actually could make that claim and not be engaged in pure hubris. It didn't help that the President bought into the image and let the illuminated images, Greek columns, halos and Light worker comments stand without comment. He didn't check the nonsense at the door. He spoke it himself to the crowds.

 

Thus when he showed himself to be merely mortal, to enjoy the luxury of the job, made gaffes or bad decisions, the fall from grace one had to know would be more perilous. Granted, when you make your whole campaign of ideas center on the cult of personality and mercilessly castigate through willing sycophants anyone who disagrees as the embodiment of all evil past and present, it will take time for resistance to such a myth to be shattered but if it should, the fall will be hard. 

 

The speech with the chair was hailed in part because a whole people have been lectured for nearly 4 years to NEVER criticize or laugh at this President. Perhaps some laughed harder than the bit deserved. I thought it was clunky but did like when he would get to the punch lines. I did laugh. The news was not that an old Hollywood person stood on the GOP platform, but that American people laughed at their leader, on that floor and in their homes watching.

 

Up until 2008, this was nothing we didn't do on a regular basis. We laughed at our politicians because we could, even if we agreed with their politics. People laughed at Chevy Chase playing Ford, at Tina Fey as Palin, we laughed hard at all the skits by stars who pretended to be the Presidents. We laughed and it wasn't because they were cruel or lacked understanding of the political arguments being made, but because that was one of the powers of being an American. We can laugh at our government for its abuses, its failures, its overreach, its underservice, for all the ways in which it does not live up to the ideals upon which it was founded. We can laugh at our leaders and not go to jail for that bit of mirth.

 

Eastwood broke the 4th wall of Politics in our current age, daring to publicly satirize the sitting President. Merely doing that was an act of open rebellion against the daily propaganda, the political correctness Nazis, the overzealous rage of those who have declared this leader of the free world to be something beyond what he is, a politician who won elected office.  They have also declared dissent the equivalent of moral treason, at best the result of innocent ignorance, at worst, proof of hearts of pure darkness.

 

We cannot survive as a representative republic if we cannot tolerate even the gentlest of mocks without declaring the source of disagreement something by its nature evil. It means the side that wins takes itself too seriously and engages in an almost puritanical wrath of self justification in all policy and procedures. Being able to laugh at ourselves, at our government, at our leaders is a sign of our humility about our nature and our fallibility. We have ideals. We fail to live up to them...often. We fly higher than our wax wings will allow.

 

Most of us wake up and are friends with people regardless of how they vote. Most of us could see that there was much to criticize regardless of what political party holds the majority.  Most of us know the President and the political parties are neither the enemy nor the devil.  Most of us also presume or would hope, that those who disagree with our own politics, would give us the same benefit of the doubt. The absence of humor directed at one side of the argument made the discussion much harder. Humor/satire makes those pointed barbs that sharpen the debate. Comedy illustrates the absurdities that otherwise might go unnoticed if all we do is rah rah rah for our own side. It makes the truth about our condition, our government, our leaders, our reality, more tolerable to bear.

 

With the birth of blogs, YouTube, face book, twitter and cell phone cameras, we have become a nation with nearly instant access to every human moment possible in both ordinary and political life. What will allow us to survive this brave new world of being constantly reminded of each other’s humanity is twofold: the grace of humility (to recognize the humanity in those we see or read about on the internet or news) and the grace of forgiveness. It isn't enough that we see the reality that the people revealed to be stupid in thirty seconds of film from an I-phone, but that we forgive them their moments of sloth, crudity, anger, lust, wrath, shortsighteness, stupidity or what have you. In politics, there is a dearth of both humility and forgiveness, resulting in the take no prisoner’s rancor that frequently passes for policy debate in the public square. We have fake apologies, fake acknowledgements of wrong doing, but what we never see, is public fake forgiveness, or even rarer, public acceptance/forgiveness of actual wrongs.  If  a public figure caught doing something inappropriate is taken to task, as part of reformation of the individual’s character, the wrong is spun and whittled until it is a virtue or a survival mechanism or a sign of evolved awareness of nuanced realities. (See when President Clinton lied under oath and article after article discussed the necessity of lying for good mental health, or President Bush signed the first deal running up our deficit and bailing out the banks and article after article about debt being good). 

We don't have to forgive what isn't wrong. We don't have to reflect or change if we can instead pretend what we did required that others reflect and change their minds about what is wrong.  I am talking about being given the grace of forgiveness the same way we now exercise the public gift of scorn (through com boxes and snarks and barbs and sharings of moments of extreeme humaness).  We are otherwise in danger of becoming a nation of gossips, of emotional wolves who prowl the internet for our next pack like opportunity to pounce and rend.   We must recognize how there but for the grace of God, could be us. 

 

Next week, I fully expect the DNC to fire back with both barrels. I will hope that if I laugh at something, I will admit it was funny. Further, I hope that here is the beginning of the restoring of good faith in our nation, the kind that exists between neighbors, between friends, between most Americans; the presumption that humor is not meant in malice, political allegiance does not require a rubber stamp agreement with all policy, and obedience to one's political ideology or President is not a moral imperative or sign of intellectual strength or weakness. It simply is a free choice which each American has the right to make and unmake as the situation warrants. 

 

And hopefully, some day we can look back at the madness and silliness of politics in this age and laugh. 

 

Ents Being Hasty

Because I cannot square allowing for or promoting the perpetual acceptance of killing the unborn as a viable option, whether for grave or shallow reasons, (and with 50 million killed, some were grave, and some were shallow to be sure) I cannot vote for this president, ever. I must be at odds.  His party may offer kind good words, but they also offer it on the backs of millions of innocent lives.  Not thousands, not hundreds of thousands, millions.   

This does not mean I go rah rah GOP, GOP is the place for me, because the Republicans have time after time given lip service to being pro life, rather than affirmatively address it, just as surely as they pay lip service to a balanced budget, to living under the rules that Congress passes, and lower taxes. The only conviction I believe is that every single one of them wants to get reelected.  Now that, I do believe. 

 I don't know about you, but our government seems to every day find new things that it cannot live without and thus demand that we pay more and do without ourselves.   I do not approve of torture or drone strikes or never ending aggression towards those we can decide upon a whim to put on a watch list or declare part of the war on terror.   So I don't trust our government or the bureaucracies that weather every election.  I don't trust that the policies advanced and financed so thoroughly shall evaporate over night if a different president takes office. 

I worry that unless this mandate is dismantled utterly, the tentacles of Planned Parenthood will continue to exist to poison this land and whoever is leading it. 

This will all try to continue to stand under the guise of women's health, because apparently, we can't solve any problems or help anyone if we don't provide free birth control and unlimited abortion first and foremost and always.

It's not true. 

So every election is a bit of a problem for me,  Whose's side are you on? 

Side? I am on nobody's side, because Nobody is on my side.

Perhaps the President thought by signing into law a 2000 page monstrosity that included funding of abortion and by making it mandatory to provide contraception via insurance, making every Catholic culpable in the act of providing abortion and birth control and sterilization, it could erode our souls.

It very well could.

If we failed to respond, if we stayed asleep, everyone by their own actions unless they opted to go to jail by refusing to pay taxes, would become pro-choice.   Even if we prayed by the clinics and offered to adopt, even if we did fasting and rosaries, by remaining loyal citizens and doing right by Caesar, we would be culpable of enabling evil.  How could we be pro-life when we paid and voted into office those who promoted and funded the perpetuation of this evil forever.  Eventually, we'd despair and quit and whimper away. 

But there were some that resisted.  And even the sleepy trees united when they saw what destruction would come from this policy.  (It takes a lot to wake up an Ent...even more to move the President of a major Catholic University).

I may be shire folk, but I'm feeling rather Entish about all this. And seeing the 43 intuitions/organizations and Universities file a lawsuit to me is rather like the Ents going to War. 

So today I'm proud of the University of Notre Dame again.  I'm hoping Saint Mary's College finds her voice to speak too and Boston College and all the other places that came into being because they were Catholic, not because they were universities, but because they were Catholic.

As a hobbit in this battle, I'm stocking up on rocks. 

And Now Sherry Rants about Politics...

We have seen that our Representative Republic cannot manage itself. Our government spends money hand over fist we do not have, at roughly 3.97 billion per day or 45,949 dollars per second.  Basically enough to fund a college student for a year at a private school with board, give or take 5k. 

Just 4 seconds of your Government's time, 2 if it's a state school.

We should be screaming at them.

Neither the President nor the Senate nor the House have any actual intentions of dealing with this, as all of the piggies have their noses in the trough. The few that have attempted to restrain spending lack the political capital to get anything to happen. The Senate hasn't passed a budget in three years.  The President's budget is so not serious, not even any Democrats voted for it out of party loyalty. 

Anyone can google the existing programs of the Federal Government and find Waste. Waste. Waste and more waste.  Nothing happens to stem it.

I'm sorry.  It's just way way way too much to spend giving small coctail appetizers exercise. I like my shrimp Jumbo sized.

And all they know is sick shrimpies don't do as well?  I'm sure they know more but that's the selling point?

(In fairness, I watched three different videos of the scientists explaining their work and picked this one because it was 1) shortest and 2) the other two had more about the shrimp being an internet sensation.  I did look at their website and their perspective, but have a mill for a treadmill....and to study shrimp. And this is just the project that we know about. What we don't know about, is all the par-tays the GSA, Secret Service, Solyndra and others have been having on our dime. 

So things are not working. And Romney or Obama, Congress shall remain its spending don't look a problem in the eye kick it down the road CHARGE it in practice.   Except we can't go on indefinitely.  If we took away all the money of all the millionaires and billionaires in this country and even took the entire fortunes of the fortune 500, we'd still not be able to  finance all that we spend and certainly not what people want spent today and tomorrow and the tomorrow after that.  

MEMO to both parties: If it's bad when THEY do it, it's BAD when YOU DO IT.  See: Gitmo, Guantanamo, suspending habeas corpus, drone strikes, torture, restricting religious liberties, taxing on top of taxing, wasteful allocation of funds, crony capitalism and crony federalism, no bid contracts, factually devoid hit pieces on opposition, lewd, crude and socially unacceptable behavior of every flavor, spin, lies, revolving door lobbying, and for sale access. Corrupt is Corrupt. Stink is stink.  Evil is as evil does and a letter R or D is irrelevant.  

I know in part why we're not out there screaming. We've yelled. We've voted. We've done Occupy or Tea Party and had 15 seconds of coverage and now there is nothing.  No difference. The glaring absolute shrug of shoulders by those in power to any of the grievances about all of this tells us, we are no longer a free people.  We are the funders of those in power, who get to keep what those in power deem appropriate.  And we get to fund whatever they want, for as long as they want, regardless of our own objections, be they religious, fiscal or political.  Pay your taxes, shut up and go home. 

We have a hydra on our hands with as many heads as it has dollars.   First rule in fighting a hydra. 
We need to at least stop creating new heads. 

If we just were to keep spending at a fixed level until we begin to clear away some of this...2008 levels in all things, it would be a start.

If we also froze Congress pay so they can't give themselves pay raises anymore, that would be a symbolic recognition that the government ought to show the same restraint that the private sector must when times are tight.

And, if the government opted for shaving simply 2% of its entire budget --leave the actual cuts to the actual departments but they must submit a budget that is 2% less than last year's. No auxiliary. No extra. No getting around. Everything must be included. No accounting tricks. No funding tricks. Everything.  Then we might start to recognize that budgets are like diets. They require discipline and consistency and most importantly, time. As a country, we're not giving ourselves even a starting chance at this; it's like we start every morning with a bucket of fried chicken and a whole chocolate cake, wash it down with a six pack of beer and say, "Today, I'm going to lose 10 pounds!" It's not happening. 

But that's a lot of "Ifs."  Frankly, I think my odds are better if I wish for a pony. 

We need a constitutional amendment to demand that Congress live within the means provided by the tax payers and not institute taxes that are retroactive or proactive to fund today. We need it because the politicos of today lack the moral courage to do this with the power they've been given absent the force of law.  

It's been a long time since I did a political post, mostly because this year, I'm just discouraged. I do not see anyone the least bit interested in spending less. I do not see anyone the least bit interested in reducing my family's tax rate. I do see people spending money like mad and with nary a concern about results, effects or reality. I have no faith in the GOP --Romney? Really? The guy who can do great in the blue states...but won't win a one of them?   Thanks. If the Republicans lose the White House, I hope they learn to get rid of the tired argument, "It's His Time." Dole and McCain ring any bells people?

And Obama? Please. The man has in three years, spent more than any President in the history of our nation.... Combined.  He doesn't think there's a problem his government can't solve.  He doesn't see the problem. He's shown zero leadership in this area and all the pretty speeches in the world aren't going to make me believe that he's suddenly become a fiscal hawk.

Remember when the DNC used to howl about deficit spending under Reagan and how bad that was? Remember when the DNC wrung its hands about how crazy Bush was for spending so much? I do. I agreed with them. It's not often that happens.  Does anyone in Washington actually know how to get things done that don't involve creating more entitlements or spending more money?  We used to know. Not that long ago either I might add. 

Our government need not continue as it has, but it will take people of courage to do otherwise.  Here's hoping there are enough people left in the House and Senate who could make this the priority, this the purpose, so that government of the people, by the people, for the people, might not vanish from the Earth due to lack of funds.  Because the alternative...no matter what political stripe you root for, won't be pretty.

The Velveteen Nation

Ever since Pixar's "Cars" some of my kids have wanted to watch racing. They have a Daytona 500 race Wii game and specialize in spectacular crashes.  Finishing is for the singularly uninteresting in their minds.  Post game wrap up consists more of discussing the total decimation of their vehicles and how they exploded or limped into an explosion.  Perhaps they thought the game was realistic, because they were psyched for Sunday. 

What they discovered was the degree to which boredom can be contagious as they watched various race car drivers talk about the weather or what they twittered about the weather or whether they should even have twitter accounts as they waited for the opportunity to drive around in circles 500 times.  Within 15 minutes of all talk all the time, two of the boys had bailed for the Wii.  The third son was more dedicated but when the discussion became a discussion about the discussion they were having that the race car drivers felt they should not discuss on television, the final child decided extra studying for school was preferable. 

On Monday, by the time we remembered that today was the race, the big crash had already happened.  It was talked about ad infinitem, but the reality of the race was so eclipsed by the track conditions, the delay and the fire such that while we know the race ended, we neither saw nor cared. Nor have we even felt the need to google the result. My children have gone back to the virtual world versions of this same thing.  It's more fun.

Like the Oscars where more people discussed Angela Jolie's thigh than any actual film and the GOP Primaries which seem to never end or have actual winners,  systemic failures and spectacular crashes along the way have made the actual process seem plodding, dull and unoriginal.  The whole mood of the whole country seems to be summed up in "Let me know when you decide to do something." and "I'm sick of these excessive celebrations in the end zone before you've actually scored."

I'd like to think that everyone is just plain exhausted from years and years and years of political spin and the disingenuous attempt by the press to paint anyone as a god or a devil.  I'd like to think that everyone really wants to send a message to Washington and Hollywood to get outside their bubbled existence and know that hype is just that, hype. We won't believe the worst or the best printed about you.  Kindly extend the same courtesy to all of us.   But the reality is probably more complicated and simple than that.

The cyber and political world can make us forget the actual, where 99% of Americans of all political stripes and persuasions seem to be able to have normal discourse and kindness and progress and commerce and even friendships without the rules or consent of the government and politicos.  99% of Americans also manage to get through the day without knowing or caring what Hollywood thinks on any "important" matter.   What we don't understand is why the miles inside the beltway suffocate any capacity for civility or common sense.  We also do not comprehend why the beautiful people of the film and television industry, who have everything and are paid to step into other people's shoes, to create illusions, to imagine themselves as other than who they are and convey it convincingly, are so incapable of imagining any thoughts to have validity that do not echo their own.  The beltway and the Hollywood class seem stuck on their own track for the 500+ laps, unable to comprehend anything beyond their own designated path. 

The thing is, in the real world, there are a lot of other roads and open spaces and thoughts and ways of seeing things than those prescribed, scripted and approved by whomever the "They" is that prescribes, scripts and approves such things.   We're more interesting and real than the limited roles cast for us by those who have the power of the pen, the screen, position or title.  We actually want solutions and believe they're there for those with courage enough to propose them.  We also believe that we're smart enough to be told what's really going on, rather than pandered to and patted on the head or promised the sun, moon and stars.  We're real.  We know that all things have limits, even government spending, even government regulations.  Even more frightening for all of you, we were always real, you've just never noticed.