STIMULUS PACKAGE AND WORLD ECONOMY

Addressing all the gloom and doomers who are negative about Obama's attempt to solve a problem created by the Republican administration of the past 8 years, I wish to note that apparently the current Republicans, who got us into this, seem to think they are the only bright ones who will get us out of it by demanding more of the same that got us there in the first place.

To the Germans, I applaud that they have independently come up with a similar plan of their own.

"The plan was approved by the upper house of parliament, which represents Germany's 16 state governments. It includes infrastructure investments, tax relief, reductions in health care contributions and money for families with children." a BBC article writes.

In October 2008, the IMF gave an explanation about the cause. Since world currency is based on the American dollar, it goes on to say: "The IMF said the global financial crisis, which started with the collapse in US sub-prime mortgages in August 2007, had worsened in the past six months - and had entered a "tumultuous new phase" in September."

Reported on by Sylvia Poggioli, the February meeting of the G7 (US, Germany, France, England, Italy, Canada and Japan) stressed the need for unity rather than protectionism. "These are global challenges and it is imperative that we work together to address them," Geithner told reporters afterward. "Effective global response will require sustained action by governments working with the international financial institutions."

BBC reported: "Finance ministers at a G7 meeting in Italy said raising barriers to free trade would make the downturn worse.

Hours earlier, the US Congress approved an $787bn economic recovery plan that includes a 'Buy American' clause."

It should sadden me that the Republicans continue their lock-step politics with seemingly little regard for the economic status of the majority of Americans. Since so many Americans are losing jobs and expected to take pay cuts, perhaps the Legislators should have their last pay raise (voted in by themselves) eliminated. That ought to bring a bit more direct money into the economy. Since many people are without medical benefits and care, the Legislators ought to carry their own burden of payment for medical insurance as many Americans do (at least those that aren't too poor to pay for any at all!).

If my logic were as simplistic as that of the majority of Republicans, I might say that opposing the Stimulus package and offering no better solution was a dumb thing, ergo since they were only Republicans who voted against it, only Republicans are dumb. However, that is not an intelligent way to think since it is obstructionist while offering no better options, therefore, I must not allow myself to think that way since I am intelligent.

NON-BELIEVERS/DENIALISM

In my naivety, for many years I thought non-believers were those who did not believe in God (more specifically, originally, in a Christian God). However, as I look around today's world, the non-believers cover a multitude of events and subjects to hold up civilization's advances, enlightenment, and opportunity to allow history to prevent the future from making the same mistakes.

Sometimes it is more difficult to figure out where the greatest dangers lie. Is it more dangerous to believe everything you hear from Rush Limbaugh? Non-believers did not accept a book several years ago that listed what he said (on the left page) and the truth and references to prove that truth (on the right page). Politicians in places of power, like Michelle Bachman, are a threat to our Democracy. She denies the efficacy of the Constitution.

What do we do with people who deny evolution, though science is pretty clear it is no longer a theory but a reality of Nature? On the other side are the believers of Roswell aliens having landed.

The deniers of the Holocaust are plentiful; and, believers that 9/11 was perpetrated and carried out by our own government exist.

There are deniers of Bosnian genocide. Denialism is a current plague in our country and elsewhere. Time is wasted in pointless debates where pseudo-'facts' are bandied and only serve to obfuscate any serious discussion points.

Equal to those denials above is destructiveness to morale everywhere in these trying times by negative people, the gloom and doomers, the people whose eyesight does not take them to the end of the tunnel, no matter what facts they are given. At the moment, most of these seem to be Republicans and we can only hope the next election will drop a few of these lock-step voters who seem to have no mind of their own or are totally dependent on the 'in numbers there is strength' so that they dare not go against their leaders.

NEW (???) RESEARCH FROM THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

An article written by a 95 year old Jesuit priest, says that men and women both sin, but in different ways. The priest certainly is not a devotee of modern science, evolution, or knowledge about good mental health. He writes that woman's sin is 'pride' and man's is his lust (never once allowing himself to think that both genders may have evolved that way in a more civilized manner than that of Biblical times).

The Catholic survey writes that man's urge for food is only surpassed by his urge for sex. I have never understood how anyone believing in the Bible which urges man to procreate and not waste his seed could have supported celibacy, which might seem counter to those notions. But since I know little about the process the Catholic church used to arrive at celibacy as a virtue surprises me less than Sarah Palin believing that abstinence is good birth control....which it might have been, if practiced, were it not for it being counter to procreational instincts.

The article goes on to say: "Catholics are supposed to confess their sins to a priest at least once a year. The priest absolves them in God's name." If God is omnipotent and omniscient, why does he have to have a middleman? It has always seemed to me that Confession serves the purpose of titillating the priest to experience sexual transgressions vicariously though, apparently, since the church also became a haven for pedophiles, it has always peaked my curiosity as to whom those priests responded, within themselves, to heterosexual transgressions. I'll probably never know.

"Traditionally, the seven deadly sins were considered: pride, envy, gluttony, lust, anger, greed and sloth. The revised list included seven modern sins it said were becoming prevalent during an era of "unstoppable globalisation". These included: genetic modification, experiments on the person, environmental pollution, taking or selling illegal drugs, social injustice, causing poverty and financial greed."

They either didn't have those activities in Biblical times or they didn't consider them sins. Apparently the priests didn't understand that genetic modification happens in evolution without the hand (or shall I say science) of man being involved.

The article ends by quoting Pope Benedict: "Pope Benedict, who reportedly confesses his sins (it doesn't say to whom) once a week, last year issued his own voice of disquiet on the subject. "We are losing the notion of sin," he said. "If people do not confess regularly, they risk slowing their spiritual rhythm." "

The Merriam-Webster definition of pride, dating back to the 12th C, is: 1: the quality or state of being proud: as a: inordinate self-esteem : conceit b: a reasonable or justifiable self-respect c: delight or elation arising from some act, possession, or relationship

While psychologists look for ways to raise self-esteem, the church would have us lose it...become one of the flock. Is it any wonder that people instead of joining the flock, are flocking away from the church in droves. Yesterday I wrote my blog on traditions being lost. I believe organized religion is evolving to becoming just another lost tradition for many in the world.

ANOTHER TRADITION BITES THE DUST

In India, a father has passed down his profession of snake charmer to his sons for many generations. Their livelihood is as street performers. However, in the interest of protecting wild animals, this is now declared to be illegal.

There has been no mention that the government might have set up programs to train for another profession, though I have no definitive facts on that issue.

While the loss of a market for their product or their profession may feel as their loss of existence, others move on with creativity. The Internet has opened many doors to many people for new vocations and avocations (New Age professions).

DENIAL IS IN THE EYES OF THE BEHOLDER

It is amazing that Obama's approval ratings remain at a significant peak of 60% while the Republicans a crowing about their unity (voting to maintain their blob of a group, to prove that they are indeed unable to think independently and kidding themselves that is was some sort of a coup. However, the American people do not seem to look on it in the same way. DC Journalists Love GOP Obstructionists, But Americans Don't written in an article by Jane Hamsher in Firedog lake on 2/15/09. Ben Smith has an interesting article on how pollsters are finding that there is a pretty big gap between what DC journalists think Americans think, and what Americans actually think. Why did this not surprise me?

Throughout the presidential campaign the media treated what they reported as though they were being asked for their opinion rather than their reporting. Pushed by their station owners to keep their ratings up, they became entertainers just like Rush Limbaugh (there are still many who believe he is a real newsman, poor deluded people).

The article says: "But according to Daily Kos polling, the change in public opinion from a poll taken from Feb. 2-5 to the latest one taken from Feb. 9-12 indicates that Pelosi, Reid and the Democratic Party have actually gone up in public approval -- all had a net change of +2 points, while the Congressional Dems scored a +3. Conversely, Republicans went down -- the Republican Party had a net change of -2, while McConnell, Boehner and Congressional Republicans all had a loss of -3."

And if you go back to the beginning of the year and track how the public is viewing the political situation in Washington DC, the changes are even more dramatic:



The moral of the story: How sad that the American Public can no longer trust the media to be neutral in partisanship.

THE 'IS THERE A GOD' FIGHT GOES ON...AND ON...AND ON.

Once again I find myself in the situation of finding an article that says everything I would say, only says it better. The article tackles the prickly subject of Atheism in a society that is fairly ignorant of people who do not find blind faith in things they can't prove, a choice they can make. There are many myths about Atheism currently in our present society and, shockingly, it has been proven that the sign on most Political positions is clear: "Atheists Need Not Apply".

Greta Christina has written an article about 10 Myths and Truths About Atheists.

A 2005 survey showed that the USA had the least number of Atheists of the Top 20 countries.

In January 2009, Yahoo carried a story about buses throughout the world showing signs on their sides to persuade people that God does not exist. The majority of Atheists do not subscribe to man being the highest power in the universe, simply that Man has invented a variety of Gods with no proof that any of them are legitimate and cannot be taken on Faith.

BIN LADEN HAS WON AS HE PROMISED IN 2004

The World Bank has warned that the global economic crisis is driving millions into poverty in developing countries and urged the Group of Seven countries to address the issue at talks this week. The UN's Millennium Development Goals, had set specific targets by 2015 to overcome poverty.

"The World Bank said new research found that up to 53 million more people have been trapped in poverty amid the spreading economic crisis exacerbated by a financial system meltdown in September." Isn't it amazing how the Republicans can defend the Bush Administrations when they see what has happened to the rest of the world which thought the US knew best, financially. While I have quoted from this speech before, it seems no one else in the world seems to remember it, bin Laden's economic threat (promise) made to break the US economy, believing instead was due to our great new National Security. The reason we have been reasonably safe from Al Qaida directly in the US is that he no longer needs to kill innocents with bombs to make his point. He must, reading the same financial news as the rest of the world, be feeling a total success while watching Bush's ignorance and swagger on TV News.

For a transcript of the entire speech you can see it here. "Peace be upon he who follows the guidance: People of America this talk of mine is for you and concerns the ideal way to prevent another Manhattan, and deals with the war and its causes and results.....we fight because we are free men who don't sleep under oppression. We want to restore freedom to our nation, just as you lay waste to our nation. So shall we lay waste to yours.....But I am amazed at you. Even though we are in the fourth year after the events of September 11th, Bush is still engaged in distortion, deception and hiding from you the real causes. And thus, the reasons are still there for a repeat of what occurred......And as I looked at those demolished towers in Lebanon, it entered my mind that we should punish the oppressor in kind and that we should destroy towers in America in order that they taste some of what we tasted and so that they be deterred from killing our women and children......So he took dictatorship and suppression of freedoms to his son and they named it the Patriot Act, under the pretense of fighting terrorism. In addition, Bush sanctioned the installing of sons as state governors, and didn't forget to import expertise in election fraud from the region's presidents to Florida to be made use of in moments of difficulty.

All that we have mentioned has made it easy for us to provoke and bait this administration. All that we have to do is to send two Mujahideen to the furthest point East to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qaida, in order to make the generals race there to cause America to suffer human, economic, and political losses without their achieving for it anything of note other than some benefits for their private companies......This is in addition to our having experience in using guerrilla warfare and the war of attrition to fight tyrannical superpowers, as we, alongside the Mujahideen, bled Russia for ten years, until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat.....So we are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy. Allah willing, and nothing is too great for Allah. That being said, those who say that al-Qaida has won against the administration in the White House or that the administration has lost in this war have not been precise, because when one scrutinizes the results, one cannot say that al-Qaida is the sole factor in achieving those spectacular gains. Rather, the policy of the White House that demands the opening of war fronts to keep busy their various corporations – whether they be working in the field of arms or oil or reconstruction – has helped al-Qaida to achieve these enormous results. And so it has appeared to some analysts and diplomats that the White House and us are playing as one team towards the economic goals of the United States, even if the intentions differ."

Further driving his point home, he says: "Meaning that every dollar of al-Qaida defeated a million dollars by the permission of Allah, besides the loss of a huge number of jobs.

As for the size of the economic deficit, it has reached record astronomical numbers estimated to total more than a trillion dollars.

And even more dangerous and bitter for America is that the Mujahideen recently forced Bush to resort to emergency funds to continue the fight in Afghanistan and Iraq, which is evidence of the success of the bleed-until-bankruptcy plan – with Allah's permission."

There are still Americans with double digit intelligence who, like the lame and the halt, believed in Bush's lies right to destruction just like the Jonestown massacre in 1978 followers, believed they would die and wake up better off. This should make clear that religion is not always the way to go, nor the religious zealot the person to follow.

We have let the sheep, rather than the shepherds lead this country far too long. The American people finally voted in a shepherd as their current president but the sheep, who liked leading and got pompous about their position do not understand that business is not longer 'as usual'. It will be fought in many ways...the media will fight, not for principle, but to keep their jobs and entertainment ratings. The Republicans will continue to fight bipartisanship and vote 'no' to any new idea regardless of its merit. Moneymakers will fight to continue to make money with no consideration to the cost to the poor people. And the most wonderful thing Barack Obama will have brought to the Office of the Presidency, beside his brilliance, caring for all people, morality, ethics and integrity, is respect and hope.