Time For Health Care, Mr. Obama

Dear President Obama,

You have now sent the nation into place where is has never before been directed, financially speaking.  Your recovery strategy has spent billions, with results yet to be realized for the people.  You have kissed the cheeks of the Muslin Nations,bowed to various kings, and have spoken strongly to  North Korea for their dangerous games.  You have begun the apologies for, and withdrawal from, Iraq.  Overall, to paraphrase Saturday Night Live, you haven’t achieved anything yet.

But now it is time.  Time to turn away from the banks, from Wall Street, from the evil men and regimes that are scattered in the world around us.  Let your good people now focus on these things.  Time to focus on the health of the nation; the literal health.  With so many people still losing their jobs we find ourselves, as a nation, at higher and higher risk for illness, injury and death… because fewer of us have health insurance.

Time to make good on your health care promises.  Time to stop bending to your party’s favors that need to be repaid.

We need health care.  Not just reform.  Not just a moderate makeover that is forced through a gauntlet of powerful, influential, rich, corporations who contribute strongly to re-election campaigns.  Our doctors, our drug companies, our health clubs, our diet supplement companies… one sixth of our economy… is motivated, is DEPENDENT, on people being sick.  Staying sick.  Not dying, but continuing to consume drugs, require care, purchase health products.

Our current system is now overwhelmed… but is a huge money maker.  In fact, I would suspect that many many hospitals, doctors, and drug corporations are pretty happy with that fact.  To put it into manufacturing terms, the factory is at full production.

How do you stop this cycle?  I don’t have a clue.  Or maybe I do.  Perhaps what is vilified as a “single payer” model is the only way out.  I think that a low cost “insurance” option that incents the customers and the health care administrators to have people live healthily.  Perhaps it is also time to start advertising, as with cigarettes and alcohol, just how hazardous some of our foods and restaurants have become.  The movie “Food Inc.” illustrated very nicely some of the problems on that front.

Mr Obama, we know your powers of rhetoric are excellent.  You are sitting in the loudest bully pulpit of the world.  Why are you not speaking more strongly?

© AlasdairCelt 2009

Survival in the Obama Era

In today’s world at the tail end of the first decade in the 21st century, we have an interesting new set of problems, new threats, and new tools to help us deal with surviving disasters, major or minor.  Gone are the days when survival just meant being able to hunker down in an underground shelter with some food and water to wait for the fallout to pass, and radiation levels to drop.  The threat of an all-out nuclear holocaust is much less now than it has been in 50 years, but other threats have much greater odds.

Hard-core survivalists have, since the fall of the Soviet Union, found themselves with less  reason for storage of guns and materials.  It seemed that the whole survivalist culture might be going completely out of style.  Of course, 911 helped bolster this mentality, but for the most part the terrorist targets tended to be in major cities: places that survivalists generally avoid based on common sense.

The Obama Era has ushered in a new phase, however.  A super majority of Democrats in the house, and a citified Democrat in the office of the President, have lead to a general fear that, well, as a minimum there will be much greater federal gun control, and in a worst case will be a new socialist style government that will take our rights away even faster than the previous administration.

So now the survivalists have a new mission: so survive this administration.  Ammunition prices have skyrocketed as remaining stocks are purchased at rates not seen in years, and many guns are being sold out… especially the ones that have been labeled “assault rifles” by Democrats in the past, for fear of bans coming down fast and hard.  Freeze-dried food is now at post-911 prices, and the hard-core survivalists are once again planning for their bunkers: not for any Soviet threat, but to hide from a new Big Brother.

Is this a reasonable response?  No, I don’t think so.  I believe that our needs for survival preparation is still there, but I don’t believe that stockpiling freeze-dried food, hiding excess guns, or burying thousands of rounds of ammo is the best preparation for the possible critical events that could occur in the near future.  Not to say investing in guns and ammo would be a bad thing: sometimes guns can go way up in value, however, I think that we should spend our money and time in ways that maximize our survival, and long term success, in the case of things that  have higher odds of occurring:

GET INVOLVED.  Perhaps the cheapest and most effective survival technique is to be vocal and active in government.  The citizens who say nothing, who don’t write their congressmen, who don’t actively support their candidates… or even worse, who don’t vote… deserve what they get: governments with different values than their own.  You have to spend your time, and maybe even a few dollars in donations, to support the candidates that are willing to serve freedom over government protectionism. At the least, get a membership in the NRA if you want to keep your guns!  Because so few people actually get involved in government, your involvement is magnified 100fold.

PREPARE FOR THE REAL-WORLD THREATS – Sure there is a chance of widespread nuclear involvement, however the odds are small.  There are much larger chances for widespread, long term, power outages or a global pandemic… because we know these things have happened already, and still have a pretty good chance of happening again.  We know we can’t count on our government to save us: think back to Katrina… and our governor suggesting we stock “duct tape and plastic sheets” as a preparation for widespread biological attack.

SPEND WISELY – Perhaps if you are wealthy enough, you can build yourself a deluxe bunker in virgin Canadian forest AND stock it with 10 years of food.  Most of us, however, are not independently wealthy, and still have to put our pants on one leg at a time.  Our decisions to prepare for disastrous events just are not as important as say… our decision to pay our mortgage.  You pretty much have a 100% guarantee that if the mortgage doesn’t get paid, a disaster will occur, at least on a personal scale. .. and you’ll have to start looking for a new bunker.  You have to spend your distaster preparation dollars in ways that give them the best bang for the buck… and address the needs of our higher potential disasters.

More on this topic, perhaps coming out as a booklet with some great checklists… Get smart, get involved!

© AlasdairCelt 2009

God(s)

What is the nature of God?  Is there only one way of looking at the concept of God?  Which religion is “right”?  Which religion is wrong?

Does any of this conjecture really mean anything?  More than the barking of a dog?

Because, as hard as it is to imagine, if any one religion is correct, then the vast majority of the world is doomed to … well Hell.  Unless, of course, the religion that is “right” allows for lots and lots of other religions.  Which certainly would not be the case for most of them.

Of general religions, I am not an expert.  I only know of a few intimately, though I have read widely.  Having grown up as most in the United States, I was exposed to primarily one religion, and was taught to distrust, pity, and sometimes fear, all the others.  More people than not, I would suspect, grew up in a similar manner.  Even the atheists I have know seem to have been raised in the same manner, more or less, with “No Religion” as their religion.  Only through an open mind, much reading and a conscious decision to overcome a sense of cognitive dissonance do some people learn a broader sense of religions.  I have found most people don’t bother.  It is much easier to believe in “one” way.  Much much easier to fit into the society that immediately surrounds you.

Then, suddenly in the world sense of things, we have instant global communication.  The stricter old-school religions find themselves faced with well… facts that are uncomfortable, worldviews that are fiercely incompatible, and worst of all, exposure to thousands and thousands of other religions that compete with their belief systems.  The fiercer of these religions can either A) isolate their followers, or B) explain away the differences, or perhaps C) announce all-out warfare.  A good war always seems to drum up some additional support.  Just ask a few U.S. presidents.

So now here we stand.  The Far-Right whackos of one religion blowing themselves up to defeat the hated infidels, while the Far Right of one or two other religions secretly happy to have a war to fight.

Back to the question: What is the nature of God?  The sad part of this whole discussion, is perhaps the fact that the religions with the closest view of what God is tend to hate each other the most.

So I say this: Let the nature of God be bountiful, diverse, and without limits.  Let the nature of God(s) match what we understand as truth, but also what can be good for people, for families and for societies… even as we become a global society.

© AlasdairCelt 2009

Ah green man

Ah green man, ah green man,

Peering from the wood

Dark eyes stare into mine

Beneath the sylvan hood

With wooden nuts and wilted stem

God, or monster, or simply fool

With silly crown of leaves enrapt

Our reflection from a darkened pool

The tilted shuffling walks

The aimless rambling rants

But reflect a distant spark

Mirrored within the cants

For beneath that shadowed mask

The greenwoods deep doth hide

Within that robe so lightly worn

Great powers strain to ride

Harken me, you Greenmen boys

Who don the leathern mask

The darker gods may yet call

And you won’t like what they ask

© Alasdaircelt 2009

Magic

Magic

What is magic?  Arthur C. Clarke in his Third Law of Prediction said “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”.  This a greater truth, in my mind, perhaps than anything else Mr. Clarke has said.  It creates for me the definition of magic: “Magic is any technology sufficiently advanced so as to not be understood”.

There have been distinguished scientists, not too long ago, who claimed that all that was worth learning has already been learned.  Most people know now that this concept is bunk, for myself, the longer I live, the more I realize how little we really know about the world.  Do you think I’m wrong?  Especially, most especially, we know so little about the human mind and the human body: the heart of what is traditionally know as magic.  Amazingly we ignore the most powerful positive effects on the human body: the human mind.  Not only we ignore this effect, our medical establishment consistently denies it, and works to filter it out of every clinical trial.  We affectionately call it “The Placebo Effect”; yet this effect is the most powerful, and arguably the oldest medicine know to mankind.

Magic.  The magic of the druids, medicine men, and shamans is perhaps centered, (along with herbal lore), the placebo effect.  By helping the mind heal the body, these ancient traditions utilized…magic…in a way that our modern medical establishment ignores.  This magic is still barely understood.  Indeed, our general understanding of the human mind and psyche seems very primitive.  I once knew a brain surgeon who bemoaned the fact that most of his patients died or lost much of their “self”.  As he put it, he was only called in when the odds were already long: when the tumor was already large, or the damage extensive.  His primitive scalpel was as libel to carve out vital elements of humanity as it was to solve the problem.

Magic.  Perhaps the most interesting and powerful magic is the magic of positive leadership, sometimes called “group dynamics” or perhaps “mob psychology”.  The magic that launches ships to far lands, the magic that lead to our reaching the moon.  For good, and just as often for evil, this magic has perhaps changed the face of mankind.  This magic was well understood in the past, among the Greeks and Romans.  We modern humans have made some vast improvements in the methods… but we have NOT much improved the basic elements: the magic of leadership.

Magic.  We have among us a powerful magician.  A man who was able to grab the interest of the people, who was able to leap ahead in a field filled with serious entrenched partisans and even depose the anointed Democratic Heir.  The question is, does he know that he has magic?  Does he recognize his leadership magic; his own powerful and only vaguely understood abilities to convince the people?  So far, I would say “NOT”.  He acts as though his role of the president is functional and political.  Perhaps he believes his rise in leadership was completely based on his own, and his team’s, unique skills.  With only a thin smokescreen of bi-partisanship, he advocates for the Democratic Party, supporting their plans through his budgets.  Even worse, he uses his magic to tell us how BAD things have gotten in order to convince us all to spend so much of or nation’s future money.  He seems to be using his magic to get his way in congress, but a side effect is a further depression of the economy.

Magic 101: A Negative Message Is The Easiest Message, and The Most Powerful, But It Often Reflects Back Onto You: Sometimes 100 Fold.  Stop with the negative messages, Mr. Obama.  Step up to the plate, and start with the positive messages.  The financial markets are in tatters, and running scared from “Democrat Wealth Destruction” policies that seem to be in the works.  Spend a few days, spend some of your precious magical energy, ON Wall Street, really LISTENING to the issues.  Wall Street holds the life blood of big and small businesses alike, as well as a huge percentage of Americans who have any kind of retirement fund.   You should be able to afford the time: there is no single thing more important to America right now than our economy.  Remember, YOUR TIME and YOUR ATTENTION is where your magic goes…

© AlasdairCelt 2009

Freedom

Freedom

“Freedom is a much touted and little used luxury”

We believe our freedoms, as Americans, are precious.  In fact, it is perhaps the single defining American ideal.  Freedom, especially freedom of religion, is what many immigrants came here in search of.  Freedom was defined by “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” by our founding fathers who referred to the “rights of the people” as self-evident.

Yet in recent years we have repeatedly let seeming “well meaning” legislatures and power-hunger government entities erode our freedoms.  Why, are we so quick to give our freedoms away?

You don’t believe me?  Let me offer some examples:

Search & Arrest: Fear is probably the greatest power of tyrants in all of history.  Through fear can the minority control vast regions.  Through fear, even in our democracy, a government could gain powers well beyond those that the founding fathers found acceptable.  The founding fathers felt strongly that our individual rights to NOT have our “persons, houses, papers, and effects” searched without probably cause “supported by Oath or affirmation”.  They knew that through fear tactics, tyrannical government could exert controls that would suppress democracy.  They had personal experience with this.  Technology has changed since the 18th Century, but people have, for the most part, not changed.  By giving the government the ability to peer into our houses, our persons, our communications, electronically or through other high-tech methods, we have given away one of our most fundamental rights.  A president that espouses these actions, from domestic wiretaps to email scanning to high tech scanning of people’s houses, is directly attacking one of our basic individual rights under out constitution; and is setting up a government with powers rife with potential abuse.

Freedom of Speech: Perhaps one of our least trammeled rights, the right to freedom of speech, is in jeopardy again.  Democrats, in an effort to suppress the vocal opposition to their policies in talk radio, plan on doing something called the “Fairness Doctrine”, which would take away the rights of a radio host to express his opinion… without having some government defined “alternative opinion” being given equal airtime.  First of all, if the government is involved in determining what speech is fair, how can that be anything but censorship?  As well, how many issues have just two possible viewpoints?  This thinly veiled effort to suppress the conservative voice will backfire on the Democrats if the conservatives get back into power.  It’s a huge attack against another of our basic rights.  With the myriad of new communications technologies, perhaps it is time to ramp down the FCC’s control over the airwaves.  For myself, I have always wondered about the standards that allow horrible depravity and murders, yet vilify the image of a woman’s breast.  Are these really the values that America wishes to support?

Rights in Criminal Cases: “No person… shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law”.  How is that we can do this simply by labeling them a “terrorist”.  I was horrified by a “homeland security” television show recently.  In case after case, what was simply a crime in the past, became a “terrorist act” or something that “supported terrorism”.  Our government, using the specter of 9/11, has made it OK to take away rights simply by labeling a crime differently.  As well, please notice that our wise founding fathers did NOT make the caveat “No person who is a US citizen”.  No, they made these laws to bind the actions of our government against all “persons”, no matter their race, religion or national origins.  How can we accept the actions of Guantanamo Bay, of overseas CIA interrogation facilities, and worst of all, the incarceration and isolation of our own citizens without having any due process of law?  This is not a new approach.  Ever since we started our “war on drugs”, we have considered it OK to deprive people of their constitutional rights when we seize cars and houses simply because the crime involved drugs “nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation”.  Simply by vilifying a particular crime, we have found it acceptable to give away our rights…and reduce our freedoms as a nation.

Freedom of Religion: We should have freedom to practice religions and be treated the same under law by federal, state and local government no matter what religion is practiced.  Yet our states consistently suppress religions through their marriage laws.  Only officials from “established churches” approved by the state are allowed to perform marriages in many states.  How is this not the enforcement of a state-defined “acceptable religions”?  Perhaps our states should get completely out of the “marriage” business.  Leave the religious marriage in the hands of religions, and let the state manage the contractual agreement.

The Right To Bear Arms:  Well, I won’t go much into this one.  Suffice to say that this is a freedom that we have now, in most places, but is under constant pressure by well-meaning individuals… and under a Democrat government, may well be lost forever.  It doesn’t take a genius to see that gun control, where implemented, has had little effect on real crime rates.  Take away a population’s legal guns, however, and you have a population that is a lot more easily controlled: by governments and criminals.

As I went through these examples, you can see that the destruction of our freedom is being orchestrated by both Liberals and Conservatives, Democrats and Republicans.  Each of these didactic institutions cares less about American Freedoms than they care about their own ideals and party power.  Each of them would willingly destroy freedoms in order to stay in power… for our own good, they tell us.  The blood of patriots was shed for our freedoms, over and over.  How can we support politicians who vote our freedoms away, piece-by-piece, year-by-year, for a tiny bit more perceived security?  How can we support parties that weigh their own partisan needs greater than basic rights that our founding fathers died for?

© AlasdairCelt 2009

The Obama Nation, Chapter Two: Strike One: Mr. Obama, Strike One: Democratic House

Well, the Obama nation is beginning to fade.  So far his colors are still vibrant, but a savvy eye can begin to see the hints of a color shift.  Mr. Obama has made his first major blunder in the public eye.  Some of his cabinet selections ran fast and loose with their own finances; just as all partisan players, Democrat and Republican, tend to run fast and loose with the truth in politics.

Perhaps this was not entirely a mistake by Mr. Obama.  Perhaps he knew some of his partisan selections were going to crash and burn under public scrutiny.  Perhaps he was simply clearing the way of required political “favors owed” so that he could be free to select the candidates who might support him directly, rather than partisan stalwarts.  We can only hope.

As well, the Democratic House has made their first major blunder by passing something they called an “economic stimulus” that does not seem to have any innovative ideas, and perhaps very little real stimulation.  The bill, instead, seems to prop up the same failing institutions that got us into this mess… as well as a lot of cash for the Democrat’s favorite programs.  Most people have not read this bill; perhaps even the very people speaking to you about it on the evening news.  I have.  You should too.  Check it out at:

http://appropriations.house.gov/pdf/PressSummary01-15-09.pdf

It contains stuff like “saving public sector (government) jobs”, plus plenty of favorites that may have an effect in the long term (more money for education, arts, infrastructure, & technology) but only a few line items that seem to have any possibility of some short term and medium term (IE the next 5-10 years) effect.  How can they call this a “Stimulus Package”?  Call it instead, “The Democratic Wet Dream Bill” that allows them to mortgage our economic future under the guise of our current emergency.

Now don’t get me wrong.  I’m all for infrastructure, technology support, and education.  But I think that we should do these things when we can afford them, in the open, and NOT try to fool the American public into thinking that this pile of pork and very long-term investments is something that it is definitely NOT.

So WHAT, might you ask, WILL stimulate the economy?  If the government spends a bunch of money on the arts, for instance, won’t that help?  The answer, of course, is “most likely not”.  Each tax dollar you take away from a citizen or a business keeps those entities from potentially spending those dollars on some thing else.  So, every dollar sucked out of your and my pocket keeps us from buying the widget we have had our eyes on, that would support our local retailer, that would support some manufacturing company somewhere, that would support their suppliers, and so on.

Not only does the government take this dollar from us to keep us from spending it the way WE want, they skim off the top up to some 40% to 60% for their big bureaucratic expenses.  What the artist sees at the back end of this process is only a portion of your dollar.  About the only clear winners in this game are the handful of artists and helpers who are lucky (and politically correct enough) to be “stimulated”.

Government actions that can stimulate an economy must go far beyond simply spending taxpayer dollars.

So WHAT, might you ask again, WILL stimulate the economy?  Well, I don’t claim to be an economist.  I say that proudly, because economists seem to be a pack of drunken lemurs that have more internal strife and general disagreement than…  well than the Democratic Party.  My view of the economy is simple: we are like a giant traffic jam…  say, a giant traffic jam on the beltway that surrounds Washington DC.  Filled with cars and trucks of all sizes, the cops are trying to get people moving.  We haven’t completely stopped; we are all creeping along.  As more cars and trucks break down or run of gas, the road slows down even more.  Sure, you could eventually open up a short-term space on one end of the beltway by building a big new section of roadway; sure you could make a special lane for “artists cars and government workers”, but the rest of us will still be plodding along as our radiators burst or our gas tanks run dry.

To stimulate this traffic jam of an economy, you have go to do several things at once.

1)    First, and foremost, you have to remove as many roadblocks as you can.  Get rid of the construction sites during rush hour; focus on using the roadway you have when you need it most.  Red tape and as much tax as possible should be removed.  Businesses & investors, the big and small trucks, are the lifeblood of the economy because they make the jobs that everyone lives on… so you have to give them room.  Perhaps you need to make a special lane for them.  Perhaps you need to create a fast-lane national fund to stimulate small and medium sized businesses, and make the process to get the loan a quick one.  A low-interest loan fund for small business would create millions of vital new jobs within weeks.  Bailing out the automotive industry simply saves thousands doomed jobs for a little time.
2)    Tow Away The Creeping Hulks.  Certainly don’t throw money at just the massive, rusty, badly maintained tandem trucks of the automotive industry and banks on Wall Street!  You need to create stimulus across the board.  Letting these huge broken down behemoths trundle along the road instead getting them off the road (and then just letting them get towed) is a mistake.  Someone else, some savvy entrepreneur in a fleet of small trucks, will take their space if given half a chance, and the economy will run better for it.
3)    Get the cops out there to direct traffic, speak confidently, and enforce the laws!  Pull over the speeders, those expensive sports-car businesses that willfully played games which threatened the economic safety of us all, and keep them off the road.  Create a positive mood.  Let people know where they can get into detours and alternate routes.  Get linked up with other roadways, other national governments, to encourage more global trade.  The more we lock down the borders of our roadways, the more gridlock is created.  We live in a global economy now, like it or not.

Will these steps really work?  I don’t know for sure, but I sure have spent enough time in traffic jams.  And I think that my approach has as much merit as any of the drunken lemur economists.

A final note to President Obama

Dear Mr. President,
You are still in a position to create the positive mood, which will help encourage the traffic of the economy.  You, more than anyone else in the entire nation, have the positive will of the majority of the nation behind you NOW, FOR A LIMITED TIME.

So, PLEASE, Mr. Obama, stop playing partisan politics.  Please start working with the smart players of both parties.  Work with the Senate to strip the 2009 stimulus bill of everything except that which will truly stimulate, and add in more real stimulation.

Because now even more we need you, your vision, and your powers of inspirational leadership.  Because we are now still, for a limited time, your Obama Nation.

© AlasdairCelt 2009

Realtors are Agents Of Doom

Realtors are Agents Of Doom.

Come with me down this path, and you will see clearly that some occupations seem to draw people into a deep and dark void. Until recently, I have believed that real-estate agents were a relatively benign, possibly occasionally incompetent, ordinary occupation. I’ve even used a realtor for some of my purchases. But recent events are finally starting to clarify their role in the world. I am now developing the hypothesis that the occupation of “realtor” is really a front for a diabolical agency bent on worldwide destruction.

Segregation & Racial Strife
In my first experience with a realtor, I was politely (but firmly) steered away from “certain neighborhoods”. Seeing as I was young & stupid, I thought that she was doing me a favor. Sure, the houses looked great, and were available for a low rent. Sure, I could have been part of an effort to revitalize a community, but it might have been uncomfortable for me to live with all those… people of another culture. She never actually said that, and I wasn’t smart enough to figure it out. I ended up finding an apartment on my own eventually anyway. But my story is not the only I’ve heard. Realtors seem to be directly responsible for steering people into segregated neighborhoods, and may be single-handedly responsible for crushing urban revitalization programs wherever they fail. They certainly can be counted on to enforce the status quo, and by whispering those two secret words “property values” they seem to be able to get away with acts anyone else would find amoral. I must face the fact that these agents could be hoping to widen the cracks of racial and social prejudice… for if divided, we are much easier felled.

Marital Strife and the Destruction of the Family
Via carefully crafted charts, a realtor can carefully plan the doom of a young couple. “Look” they say while smiling crocodile smiles “with your combined incomes you will be able for afford THIS house”. Of course, the realtor knows full well one of the couples may lose his or her job for a time, and that if children come on board, things will get very tight, and especially difficult if one of the pair stays home. These agents can count on couples buying anywhere near the top of those charts are guaranteed extreme financial stress in their marriage at SOME point mighty soon… breaking down the family structure, weakening our culture at its very foundations.

Caveat Emptor
Some would say that realtors are guilty of leading people down the path of personal destruction by encouraging buyers to purchase houses filled with hidden flaws, with neighboring properties scheduled to become dumps, built on land that was once orchards (and therefore likely to be covered with Lead-arsenic poison). I, however, feel that these manifestations of darkness are merely delightful cruel tidbits for the agents. Every buyer should know “caveat emptor”.

Destroying Neighborhoods
Covenants are a common way that Realtors and their developer minions work together to create housing that is guaranteed to hobble a community. These covenants create constant strife; keep people from growing their own food, and stop families from making their yards more comfortable and livable. Effectively, these covenants have take a holy concept and turned it into a contract that makes home owners prisoners within their developments, and reduces the chance that any development can become a thriving community. All justified, all made right, by the Realtor whispering in the ear of homeowners “property values”.

Global Warming
I’ve recently come to the conclusions that realtors are directly responsible for global warming. Yes, I’ve said it. How might this be possible? Well, their plan was a good one. First, they convinced all those people who lived in pleasant, close-knit, communities near the cities that their houses were too small, that (gasp) ethnic types were closing in, and oh, well, golly gee wouldn’t be great to live in the country? A nice drive out to the rolling hills and pristine farms usually sealed the deal. The poor deluded soul would sell his wonderful little house for less than it was worth to go live in an overpriced behemoth; a “McMansion”, out in the country. His once healthy lifestyle of walking and close-knit community is now exchanged for driving everywhere, community via Internet and heating a badly designed over-sized house. His carbon footprint increasing by tenfold. Not just for his own personal commute that wastes 1000’s of gallons of gas every year now; not just for his massive house that now requires $1000 worth of propane every time you fill its tank, but for all the additional costs to get everything else to his house way out in the country: food, school buses, lumber, shrubs, asphalt. And the joke of it is, the greatest joke of all is on this poor schlubb after a few years. Because before long, he will find that everything he ran from in the city (traffic, crime, etc) soon will follow the crowds out to the suburbs, and everything that he thought he was getting (rolling hills, farms, views, open streams, ponds) were all being destroyed by housing developments.

Crash of the Financial Sector
Some might argue that the real-estate bubble was an accident of greedy investors and homebuyers. This may well be partially true. Property values kept going up and up. Anyone with half a brain new that a downturn was inevitable, however, realtors kept pushing. If anyone would know the crash was coming, it would be the real-estate agents. Lobbying organizations combined with gobs of cash rolling around in an over inflated pricing market lead to the realtor’s greatest engine of destruction: the sub-prime mortgage. This tool was blithely supported but Democrat and Republican alike. Now realtors were able to put people into houses SO far above their means that both their families destruction, and eventually the global destruction of the banking and mortgage systems as we know it were guaranteed… leading to our current global recession. This has been their greatest triumph to date.

Today, realtors are starting to thin out. Some people say that is because there are fewer buyers out there, and the realtors are finding other work. For myself, I can guess differently: The troop levels are being ramped down because this phase of their mission is primarily complete. All I can say is look to the skies for the next phase of their diabolical plan, look to the skies!

Our Obama Nation

Our Obama Nation

OK, I admit it. Unlike the huge majority of the nation, unlike most of my friends, and despite the polarizing, contentious political propaganda and mass media, I was delighted during this election to be satisfied with both candidates. This election was a no-lose situation, as far as I was concerned. Sure, each candidate had attributes in certain arenas that made them better than the other, yet each provided potential for some key changes I felt are greatly needed in our nation.

Senator McCain offered an important change, in my mind, a change away from the Republican and Democratic drones that have plagued the White House for… well, for the most part since there was a presidency. As much as he was made fun of by SNL for it, Senator McCain has been a thorn in the Republican side for at least the last 20 years. His choice of Sarah Palin did nothing but support what I thought was his planned revolutionary approach: to shake things up in the Republican Party from the inside (despite Palin’s much-maligned conservatism). In the end, though, I think that he has learned that it’s mighty hard to shake things up when you are trapped in such an entrenched power structure. I found it amazing he did as well as he did, given the tepid support from Republican Conservative partisans as well as the limited financial support from the old guard Republican machine. The important lesson of the McCain triumph in the primaries should not be forgotten; perhaps the Republicans will begin to understand how far astray the Conservative movement has taken them from the rest of the nation.

Senator Obama offers, to my mind, something much more profound than simply “Change”. I didn’t entirely believe him when he talked about change. Despite his great speech-making prowess, he simply is too much of an entrenched Democrat, and thoroughly part of the democratic machine. His choices for cabinet tend to support my hypothesis. No, my strong support of Senator Obama has more to do with something else: positive energy. The energy that he brings to the political arena is incredible, and he, for a while anyway, can achieve incredible things through the crazy levels of support he can ask for among the America people. Sure, he’s African American, handsome, young, well spoken, a man who came up from the trenches and is now stepping into the highest office in the land, but the most telling and incredible aspect of Senator Obama is that most people actually were voting FOR him, rather than simple against the other guy. (Except for, perhaps, the bitter “Hillary” partisans).

So now we enter into the era of our Obama Nation. I’m not sure how long it will last; it won’t be for a fixed 4 or 8 years. Senator Obama’s profound influence will depend instead on how well he follows through with his promises, or perhaps more importantly, how strongly he can keep vigorous his vision from the Bully Pulpit. The Obama Nation may well run out in a matter of months, with years of second-guessing and pointing fingers; yet hopefully the Obama Nation will last for decades. Perhaps a renewed sense of civic purpose will come over the Gen-Xers and younger generations. Perhaps volunteerism will become rampant and common. Perhaps we will have some common-sense changes to our third-world health conditions despite our first-world health infrastructure. Perhaps a sense of despair will begin to be replaced by a sense of being able to effect change.

Senator Obama, I wish to close this blog with a personal message to you in these precious moments before you become president; when anything is still possible. Please, sir, set your sights as high as possible. Stay honest, and out from under that desk in the oval office. Don’t let the details get in your way; find some good people to take care of those. We need you, your vision, and your powers of inspirational leadership. Because we now are, for a limited time, your Obama Nation.

© AlasdairCelt 2009

Minor Epiphany

If everything is filled with some energy, then each simple bit of food you put into your body, each simple act, each breath you take could have an effect on you; your health, your thoughts, your life.  Everything around you can be filled with energy, with positive or negative effect.

When you have a bit of a hamburger from Wendy’s, what energies are soaked into that burger, like the juices into the bun?  Let’s suppose, for instance, the worst case scenario:  The cow, crushed among other cows in a factory feed lot, lead a simple, stupid life eating processed Genetically Modified corn without ever knowing the excitement of running across the plain, or even the simple pleasures of cow sex.  A man who has killed so many cows that he is bored with the process, killed your cow quickly and brutally with a pneumatic hammer.  The cow’s warm body was thrown into a disassembly process that was performed by bored, unhappy people, quickly sliced and packed and thrown into a grinding operation, mixing the remains of hundreds of sad cows and assorted other parts.  A packer who hates his job packs it.   It is trucked by an angry trucker among hundreds of other cars and trucks, each living in a sort of hate and fear of the road.  It is cooked by a bored assembly line of cooks who, like a machine, try not to think too much, but work automatically.  Finally it is served to you by a chubby, resentful teenager who has fantasies of spitting into every burger that leaves her window, but is too fearful to actually do it (most of the time).

By the time you eat that burger, it may well be a powerful ‘pill’ of boredom, resentment and hate.  It may include not just the energy of all the lonely and unhappy hands that touched it, but also the energy of the corporations behind those hands…. Corporations who have left thoughts of good food long ago, and now focus on profits, profits, profits.  Corporations who would gladly cut corners, gladly use cheaper components, gladly add chemicals, if they thought that they could get away with it, and it would increase sales, or decrease costs, or make them more prestigious.

So you take that ‘pill’ of meat & bun (and don’t get me going on genetically modified wheat), cheese food, wilted lettuce & factory tomato, smeared over with the chemical goo that is formulated scientifically to make it all taste so good… and bite into it.  And you may be consuming, taking within you, all the combined negative energies of thousands of people.  Wow, that tasted good.  I’m not even talking about the lack of nutritional value.

If you think about it that way, if you think about where everything comes from, who touches it, how it is created from both a physical and psychic standpoint, then the whole world takes on a new layer of meaning.  Where did your house come from?  Handmade by a craftsman pouring his energy of love for his craft into each board?  Or was it slapped together by a bored, angry crew of underpaid workers with minimal effort, cutting corners with materials, shirking every step?

Did people who love their work pour themselves into making your car?  Your furniture?  Your mattress?  Your clothes?  Your jewelry?  What sort of magic, what sort of energies are you surrounding yourself with?

I’m not saying that you can’t eventually wear away the energies that imbue an object or a place with focused effort, with intention, with prayer, or with something like Feng Shui.  I’m just suggesting that you think about that ‘pill’ of energy you may be swallowing with each thing that surrounds you.

But now we get down to the crux of my minor epiphany: YOU have the decision, the right, the “magical power” to decide that you will imbue the world around you with good energies, with positive things, or with negative energies.  Each action you take, each breath that leaves your body, every glance, everything you touch, everything you think about can be filled with the positive energy of your soul, or NO energy, or negative energy.  When you cook your own food, or the food of friends, or food of loved ones, do you fill that food with love and the laughter of your soul?  Do you pour your heart, and your mind, and your spirit into each simple omelet?  Do you take each egg and thank the chicken, thank the spirits of the earth that cared for that farmyard, and the farmer who plucked the egg from the nest?  Then crack the egg, mixing it with it’s brothers & sisters who made the sacrifice to become part of your spirit, letting positive energies of the universe pour down your spatula into the scramble that is before you?  Stir in onions that contain the deep power of the earth drawn up, and the power of the air and sun drawn down, peppers that are soaked in the energies of you or our spouse who planted, tended them, and plucked them when they were ripe… Do you do that?  IF you did, think of the wonderful energy that would fill each meal.

After you discipline your children, which every child needs on occasion, do you go to them and say that you love them, and tell them that you are so lucky to have the worlds greatest children, and kiss them gently while pouring your love into them through a simple touch, and the energy of your eyes?

Do you wake up, and despite needing coffee, reach over and touch your spouse, flooding him or her with all the energies of your love even if you aren’t so lucky as to get frisky in the morning?

Do you do these things?

I call a life like this ‘Intentional Living”.  The condition of seeing, and creating the positive effects you have on everything with your energy.  You choose, you intend to live positively with every action and thought.  You choose to fill your life with the positive rather than the negative.  Now this way of living is not all goodie-two-shoes.   Not everyone can be A Dahlai Llama or a Mother Theresa.  With practice, though, each day becomes better and better.

It’s hard to find food, meat, bread, vegetables, that come from places with positive spirits, but perhaps its worth the search.  In our world of cheap goods that come from slave labor in China, it is hard to find the objects we use every day that are filled with love and old fashioned craftsmanship.  Do you choose entertainment that fills you with inspiration, or do you watch the network news every evening?  When we all need cars to travel to work, how do we choose a vehicle that has a better spirit?  How do we find work with people that allow the positive energies to flow?  How do we surround ourselves with friends like that?  Or even relatives?  Well, I didn’t say it would be easy, nor even perfect.  Sometimes you just have to deal with a negative mother-in-law…  but hopefully not often (and maybe you can arm yourself before you are subjected to that blast of negativity, as well as plan a recovery period).

Yet, even if you manage to become positive yourself, your work is just begun.   Because it requires that you take action when things threaten you, your neighbors, or the earth with negative energies.  It means that you will have to go to the meetings where local politics are discussed, politics that effect the earth, your neighborhood, or your property.  These meetings may be filled with all sorts of negative energies, hurting you, if you and your friends can’t do something about it.  Intentional Living also means that you need to defend yourself and your family against the bullies of the world, the negative people who prey on others for their own physical or emotional gain.  Because all the good intentions in the world are meaningless without the good actions that follow.

Intentional Living means that you fill the world around you with your positive energy intelligently, deeply, and thoughtfully.  It does not mean that you give all of your money away to the poor, but it may mean that you help a friend out through some hard times, pouring your love into each action without expecting repayment.  It does not mean that you bring that bum home who may eventually rape and steal from you, a grown man packed with enough negative energy to blanket a stadium.  But it may mean that you support local self-help programs, ones that can have a positive energetic effect on your community.

So you see there may be a way to a wholesome, meaningful and powerful life, but it’s not easy.  In my view, Intentional Living starts out pretty small but can reach across the world.  There are no real boundaries to the effects of your positive energies.  But the beginnings are very small, very simple, very loving.  Perhaps you can start with an omelet.

© AlasdairCelt 2008