IT IS HIGH TIME THE POPULACE STARTED ACTION FOR WHAT THEY WANT

Since Obama was elected, people have been looking to him to fix the problems and listening to the Republicans tear him down though they are the ones who are preventing him at every turn because they want him to fail.  I'm sorry that it took Egyptians to mobilize protesters who saw the strength in non-violent masses.

Tomorrow the National Teapartiers plan to come from Virginia to come to protest the protesters, it would seem.  It is unlikely they will be there to be supportive.  It is heart warming to see the support that is being given them by many groups.

MSNBC's Ed Schultz has been on site and been wonderful in interviewing people.  While other networks avoided coverage, he has  been there for several evenings.  He has been asking people why they are there.  Even students are there top support their teachers.  They are municipal workers.  Governor Walker is clearly not trying to balance the budget, it is to 'bust' unions.  The fan has finally been hit with the lies the Republicans have swallowed from the corporate money and the upper class in our two-class system.  We have no more middle class and it is a disgrace to our America.

Watch this carefully.  This is not just a Wisconsin issue, it is a United States issue and other states will follow.  Watch closely.

BEWARE: THE 'TUMMY BUG' IS LOOKING FOR A HOME

Aliens have attacked my digestive system.  What used to be an ordinary appetite,  wishing for good tasting stuff going down has changed and everything wants to reverse direction.  So far that urge is defeated by offering my tummy nothing that can travel.

To spare any of you, to whom this bug may find an attachment, I'm told it doesn't last 'too long',   Meanwhile, waiting for 'not too long' to pass, anything outside my body has become of little interest.  I feel chilled to the bone and think of the Eskimo aged who get left to die on an ice float.  That is not yet a desirable alternative to my discomfort, and since there are no ice floats nearby, I guess I'll tough it out.  As Schwarzenegger said, "I'll be ba-a-ack!"

PROOF THAT OLD AGE ISN'T FOR SISSIES

BBC ran an article this week saying: " US actor Mickey Rooney has been granted a temporary restraining order that requires his stepson to stay at least 100 yards away from him and his home."
"Rooney is "effectively a prisoner in his home", the order - approved by a Los Angeles judge on Monday - states.  Mr Aber is the son of Rooney's eighth wife, Jan Chamberlin, whom he married in 1978.  According to court documents, he has allegedly deprived Rooney of medication and food and has confiscated his passport and other identification cards."  Click here for the complete article.

Those of us who remember Rooney as a child actor can hardly believe he is 90 years old.  Even if he has run through to eight wives, he does not deserve this kind of behavior from anyone, nor does any senior in their own home from their children, step-children guardians, or anyone else yetr it happens too often without the law hearing about it in order to intervene. 

People who are alone, often immobile, are preyed on by strangers who befriend them and pretend to be helping them.  They are not penniless people, necessarily, and one instance with which I am intimately familiar, the woman was quite well to do but shut a sister (who lived a state away) out, had succeeded in having the woman write a new will, and walking off with hundreds of thousand of dollars of silver, jewelry, rugs, antiques, and other valuables..  Of particular concern are those who are lonely and talk to anybody available.  They tell them their delusions of wealth and security when it is, in fact,  lacking  and leave themselves open to be preyed upon.

JOHN BOEHNER OFF TO A VERY BAD START

The Republicans did everything they could to rid the House of Nancy Pelosi and failed to do so.  Speaker Pelosi will go down in history as one of the most efficient and effective Speakers we have ever had.  This is hardly what is being said about Speaker Boehner. Three bills have failed to pass; bills the Republicans had put up.  He seems not to check his facts and misstates.  The worst one recently being to announce that there have been 250,000 government jobs added under Obama.  The truth is, moving to keep up with the growth in our population and add appropriately as has always been done, there have only been 58,000 jobs; quite within usual, past .practice.

Ruth Marcus summarizes Boehner's recent remarks.  David Gregory asked him, on Meet the Press on 2/13/11, why he doesn't correct the many Republicans who still think that Obama is not a citizen nor a Christian...both false assumptions or beliefs.  His response was to say he is not responsible to correct how people think.  I find this difficult to understand, having heard his shouting at political audiences like a Gospel preacher discussing the fury of God.  To read this article in full from the Washington Post, click here.

When his own party is feeling let down with his leadership, one wonders when the fan will be hit.  One of the things he does, with gusto, is criticize Obama.  However, he offers little of himself other than biased, politicized opinions which he misrepresents as the will of 'the American people'.  I often wonder what he would do if he was really confronted with what the American people think, in fact.  Perhaps he is under the delusion that the Republicans and Tea Partiers represent the majority of the the 'American people'.

SIGNS OF CHANGE: GLOBAL AND OTHERWISE

When our world of humor picks up a theme, we know it is uppermost in the minds of most of us.  It is my belief that the reason we are having such divisive tactics in our government is because many people and, especially  conservatives are loathe to accept change.

While it is clear that conservatives do not accept constructive change as Democrats wish it, it is surprising they accept lies so quickly.  A Fox Cable News whistle blower recently said that Fox News is really not a news station but 'thrives on fabrications and falsehoods.'  Do people choose to believe the lies because their their own prejudices and biases get supported?  There is little else one can believe about them when they are so against Obama and insist he is African-American.  They show their belief in the one drop of blood rule to be defined as black.  I, as a Caucasian, believe he is as much a Caucasian and Black.  (My math has always told me that 50% will always be half and equal to the other 50%.)  The rest of us are happy to see this man of mixed race making such a great change in our government and accept a man without reference to the color of his skin.  For more on Fox by this insider's report, click here.

One of the greatest changes we face is the difficulty autocrats and dictators will have in keep[ing their populations ignorant.  Now that the Internet is keeping the world informed, it will be almost impossible to keep the masses down as dictators have been able to do for a very long time.  Yet another change not spoken about as often is that more and more people are abandoning 'faith' in favor of reason. The number of self-defined atheists is rising rapidly throughout the world.

NARCISSISTIC INJURY WHEN NARCISSISM IS NOT A DIAGNOSABLE PROBLEM

 narcissism also narcism n. Excessive love or admiration of oneself.  Usually it refers to a psychological diagnosis of personality disorder.  I wish to discuss it in very practical terms in everyone's life in which it is not a disorder.  We speak of someone suffers after being rejected  as having received a 'narcissistic' injury.  In that context we are referring to that part of each of us that is invested in maintaining our self-esteem.and positive view of ourselves.

Given an awareness that all of us have a narcissism threshold, not unlike a pain threshold, if one wants to get a point across to someone, the sense of personal attack (or narcissistic assault, if you will) must not breach the threshold.  Once breached, a person goes into defense mode and stops listening...too engrossed in preparing a defense against the attack.  Managers and bosses often are the worst offenders.  Given their sense of power in their position, they often attack, surprised that the recipient becomes nonplussed:

tr.v. non·plussed also non·plused, non·plus·sing also non·plus·ing, non·plus·ses also non·plus·es To put at a loss as to what to think, say, or do; bewilder.

n. A state of perplexity, confusion, or bewilderment.

Note the many adjectives in this definition :  nonplussedadjective taken aback, stunned, confused, embarrassed, puzzled, astonished, stumped, dismayed, baffled, bewildered, astounded, confounded, perplexed, disconcerted, mystified, fazed, dumbfounded, discomfited, flummoxed, discountenanced

 

If you were the recipient of feedback from a powerful figure in your life, would you be taking something that causes a reaction to fit any of those words calmly?  Unlikely.  Any of those reactions would indicate a narcissistic injury in the most humble person.

 

The moral:  If you want someone to hear and accept what you are saying,  find a tactful, non-threatening set of words to convey what you want to have heard and understood.  Otherwise, you might as well talk to yourself.

 

                           Happy Valentine's Day

WE LIVE WITH A DOUBLE STANDARD

There has always been  a double standard because there has never been and can't ever be a total equality between genders when people think concretely.  Men and women have totally different chemistry which makes their body structure and chemistry different.  Mscle mass in women is usually lessand the many differences in their makeup and genetic structure also make brains function differently.  One should never be thought of as being superior but simply different.  However, we have observed the rigid thinking which exists within a large part of our society.

Much of the inequality perceived can be explained by the different expectations people have been brainwashed to to maintain.  I remember a doctor from Greece at a meeting at Hellenic College regarding training priests.  Women wanted to know why they couldn't be priests as some other religions are now allowing women as ministers.  The doctor told me women could never stand long enough to give a sermon because their bladders were too small!  I was horrified by this physician's hold to the double standard of inferiority of women.

Woman's equal rights as a matter of law has been sought for more than thirty years but the overwhelming majority of male  legislators  have voted it down every time it came to a vote.  If one believes that our forefathers meant to use the word 'men' as all mankind, there is already equality.  But we know that our constitution did not include races as having equality so, presumably, this allowed some to believe that women were as inferior as slaves.

One might wonder why with the Phyllis Schlaflys of our country, any women ever became CEOs, hold jobs outside the home, or graduate from colleges with medical, legal, engineering and all other degrees.  As always, women have been forced to carry more than their share of the load, dragging some of the few remaining Neanderthal-thinking males..

Hopefully, even if laws aren't changed, mothers raising their sons eventually will make chauvinistic men extinct.  We can at least maintain hope. There is always a new tomorrow and prospects for enlightenment.