How Much Are We Really Willing to Take???

Not only are we living in a materialistic world, we are now living in a dangerous technologically driven world, a world where any and everything is now for sale to the highest bidder it would seem.

The U.S. House of Representatives guts standing internet privacy laws (protections afforded by FCC Regulations).  Why? Apparently this is some twisted effort to 'remove restrictions stifling innovation'.   This sure sounds like smoke & mirrors to me.   We already have an intelligence community that has repeatedly demonstrated a gross overstepping abuse in their surveillance operations, and now we're going to further open the field to anyone interested in playing?

I'm all for innovation, but not at the ongoing expense of private citizens like you and me.  Granted no reasonable person still clings to the illusion of absolute privacy in today's tech-driven world (e.g., traffic cameras, bank ATM cameras, hospital cameras, university cameras, store and business surveillance systems, etc.), but to now have all of our personal internet transactions available for sale to the highest bidder is absolutely CRAZY TOWN!  Now my stalker can acquire my exact location, along with details regarding any of my online purchases, details such as lingerie, bra sizes, etc.  Just wonderful? I feel safer already: NOT!  Now everyone can have their own personal stalker too in the form of massive and invasive data-mining, legally collected and made available to any and everyone willing to pay for access to this information.  If anything, consumers should be able to sell their own information and reap the benefits and income thereof, instead of the other way around --that is consumers paying for service and then having their information sold out from underneath them to the further financial benefit of the service provider.

There are many ways to encourage and support innovation with regards to on-line businesses: gutting existing internet privacy laws is simply NOT one of them!  If you think the U.S. Congress is ineffective, misguided and dishonest now --politically or otherwise-- just wait until the potential for black-mailing our elected officials sky-rockets with a veritable feast of new private information hitting the 'market'.  Once this mass of private information becomes available to the general public/highest bidder, even Congressional term limits won't be able to reign back-in the limitless potential for abuse.

(*VIP!  See note at very bottom, under 3/31/2017*) I strongly urge you to write to your Senators and demand that they defeat this legislative attempt to gut our existing internet privacy laws, for I do not believe the Senate has yet to vote.  Then you might also want to drop a line to the White House, because the word on the street seems to be that President Trump would sign this F*****-up piece of legislation into law, if passed by the U.S. Senate, which really surprises me given the President Trump's ongoing aggravation with being 'spied on by the previous administration' --both during and post election, leading up to the inauguration.

If you ask me, selling out the American people IS NOT THE WAY TO "MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN"!  I'd rather have a wall surrounding basic internet privacy than a full southern border wall and the former would be a heck of a lot cheaper too.

Think this legislative failure is the definitive line in the sand for me.


3/30 Here is my letter to my Senators  . Feel free to copy and use.

As I sent my letters off to my own Senators, I wondered: do the majority of Congress-people feel obligated to only support the interests of those whose political views happen to align with their own? This despite the fact that I VOTE for candidates based solely upon their experience and past performance, regardless of party affiliation.  In fact, I voted for an equal number of Democrats and Independents, along with Republicans, in this past election.  What do you think???

3/31/2017  VIP!  Had some more time to investigate this matter further today.  After doing some research on-line: it seems the U.S. Senate has already voted on this deregulation, on March 23, 2017, in the previous week.  Pretty sneaky!?!  Did not hear anything about this until it was done deal with the U.S. House of Reps voting this week.  Just surprised me that the Senate voted before the House, but I suppose that is entirely possible as this legislation not technically a budget matter (all bills related to budget issues must originate in the U.S. House of Representatives, per the U.S. Constitution).  So bottom line: writing to our Senators won't probably won't affect a vote which has already occurred, however, writing to our elected representatives would let them know WE ARE NOT HAPPY.  This in turn might encourage them to reconsider their position on the matter and possibly even put this discussion back on the table again?  Anyway, as a last resort I did leave a message on the White House contact page in hopes this legislation has not yet been signed into law by the President.  Here's hoping the little guys actually winds up having some say in this matter!  At least with a President Trump in the White House the little guy has at least a 50/50 shot.  The odds have shifted in our favor.

4/5/2017  Well, sadly the "little guy" has lost again.  President Trump signed the de-regulation legislation into law on Monday, April 2nd.  So get ready to start reading the fine-print on all of your CCFSAs. Guess all you can do now is to choose your provider wisely, stay current on any policy changes for the latter and hope (pray?) the Broadband ISPs "do the right thing."  Sorry President  Trump, this one goes your loss column for me.

Blessed are the Children, for the Kingdom of Heaven Surely Belongs to Them ....

Regarding the rape of a 14 year old girl, in a Maryland high school:

If we fail to keep our children SAFE, in an environment that by definition should be safe, then anything else we can do to further the cause of humanity fails in significance by comparison.

"It was once said that the moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in the shadows of life-the sick, the needy and the handicapped."~Hubert Humphrey, in a speech at the dedication of the Hubert Humphrey building, Nov. 1, 1977.

 "Any society, any nation, is judged on the basis of how it treats its weakest members -- the last, the least, the littlest."~Cardinal Roger Mahony, In a 1998 letter, Creating a Culture of Life

Aristotle has often been quoted as saying 'You can judge any society by the way it treats its most vulnerable citizens.'


I found myself physically ill upon hearing this unthinkable news .....

Actions do speak louder than words ...

A ship full of holes will never float: Executive Order 12.333.

Some truths are, indeed, self-evident.

3/28 ... And now the possibility exists that our national intelligence may have been exploited in order to commit political espionage? Is it too late to put this genie back into the bottle?

It's About Time We Had Transparency w.r.t. Health-care Costs for Services

The only way you can truly save healthcare and keep it affordable "for all" is by means of introducing a true transparency into the system.  Meaning, people have right to know, up front, what any office visit or procedure is going to cost them, instead of being blind-sided with some horrifically enormous bill after the fact.  I mean, medicine is about the only industry today where the consumer must blindly sign upon the dotted line, agreeing to pay whatever the cost may wind up being, without first being given a reasonable cost estimate/comparison.  With today's technology, there is simply no excuse --beyond deception-- for consumers not having access to prices for medical services upfront.   Moreover, patients should be able compare prices, along with customer reviews and oversight independent rankings, instantly right on-line, in order to shop around and then get the most value for their hard-earned dollars.  Transparency in the healthcare system will also foster competition, which will work toward the end-goal of driving costs down and keeping them down in the long term.  Can the government do something incentivize transparency w.r.t. health-care costs? Allowing coverage to be purchased across state lines would also be a huge driver in lowering costs.

3/10/2017  Republicans would do well to slow the pace and heed the warnings of congressmen Rand Paul and Tom Cotton, lest the Republicans wind up hastily pushing another sloppy, ineffective (i.e., doesn't address all issues adequately), loop-hole ridden bill through congress in much the same fashion the Democrats did with their snowball piece of legislation the 'Affordable' Healthcare Act.

"Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe."~Abraham Lincoln

And what's up with the "Cadillac Tax"? How is it fair to penalize employers for providing above the base standard for healthcare to their employees?  Level the playing field by penalizing those who have access to better options?  Sounds pretty "socialized" to me.  Not what I thought Republicans stood for?!?  I'm really surprised, not to mention disappointed!!!

Stardust

"We come spinning out of nothing, scattering stars like dust."  ~Rumi

The Sower of Systems', 1902 By, George Frederic Watts

7 New Earth-like Planets Discovered 'Nearby' (39 Light Years .. It's all relative, right?)

Supernova Remnant E0102-72

September 5, 2009

[Credit: X-ray - NASA / CXC / MIT / D.Dewey et al., NASA / CXC / SAO / J.DePasquale; Optical - NASA / STScI ... read more .]

Free YOUR MIND

In the absence of critical thought, emotions and group-think will always prevail, polarizing every issue and sewing the inevitable seeds of division and discord.  The time has come to wake up, to stop blindly following others.  The time has come to engage your heart, along with your mind, in order to more fully partake in the true meaning of this shared journey we call LIFE.

The Politics of Dancing?

The fledgling Trump administration gets its first bitter, and very public, taste of "the politics of dancing." Time to clean some serious house? The former administration loyalists have overstayed their welcome?  A number of somebodies are pushing buttons (illegally, I might add --by way of leaking classified information into the public domain-- which should be the gravest concern of all in the entire Flynn-scenario) in order perpetuate the scorched-earth campaign currently being waged by the Left, at all levels of government, with the heretofore "asleep at the wheel" media --the past eight years (e.g., Obama-Medvedev "hot mic moment", March 2012)-- being complicit in this war-waging. Truth be told, Hillary Clinton using her own private server for government emails --including the transmission of classified information-- probably did far more to empower the Russians and jeopardize national security than any pre-election conversations between General Flynn and the Russian Ambassador.

Nancy Pelosi incorrectly used the word "scapegoat", in a public announcement yesterday, when referring to a Tweet attributed to what we now know to be a fake twitter account for Mike Flynn (i.e., NOT him).  Stepping back and looking at the Left's whole post-election response to the loss of their candidate, Hillary Clinton, it occurs to me that the Left are using the Russians as the scapegoat for Clinton's loss.

"Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend four hours sharpening the axe." ~Abraham Lincoln

A Time to Every Purpose

I did not vote for Donald Trump, but I am willing to give our new President of the United States of America a chance to actually be in the office, doing the work, before I will take to the streets in protest.  I respect our electoral process --even though I strongly feel the order of states voting in the party primaries should vary, from year to year, with the order being assigned by means of a random lottery-- and moreover, I respect the Office of the President itself.

Quite frankly, after eight years of soaring rhetoric, smoke & mirrors, and a profound lack of accountability across the board:  I am actually looking forward to a bit of W.Y.S.Y.G. ("what you see/say is [what] you get").  I may not like everything that President Trump tweets, on Twitter, but at least I get to hear what he's thinking, straight from his mouth, without the added step of a biased media-spin. Donald J. Trump has found a way to circumvent what has heretofore been a blatantly biased --and in some case downright dishonest-- media and I think that's AWESOME!

My advice to President Trump and his new administration moving forward?  Quite simple, really:   namely FOCUS and get meaningful 'shit' done!  Do the latter, Mr. President, and all of the protesters, nay-sayers, no-showers (at the inauguration) and other obstructionists will become superfluous to the execution of the Office of the President of the United States of America.  We've spent so long focused on the trees, we've become lost in the forest of 'identity politics'.  There is "a time and a place to every purpose under heaven." Now is the time to put America's house back in order once again, starting with some soul-searching prioritizing of critical issues (i.e., life and death issues, being able to provide for our families issues) facing the nation. After that, the rest will fall into place.

From my perspective, every President gets a clean slate at the start of his/her new administration, otherwise nothing in this country would ever get done.  The vetting process --election-- is over!  Let me repeat:  THE VETTING PROCESS IS OVER! The President should not have to waste valuable time --his and ours-- defending his past record.  That being said, President Trump should be held accountable for his actions moving forward.

So I say, congratulations, Mr. President!  I'll be keeping you and your administration in my special thoughts and prayers.  God Bless!

I'll leave the rest of you with a parting thought.  Whatever you happen to think about 'Trump the man', if you're being honest, you have to give President Trump credit for doing a rather remarkable job when it comes to reaching out to his opposition during the transition period. And I highly suspect President Trump will continue to do so throughout his term in office.  I am left wondering, however, if you --as citizens, leaders, politicians, etc.-- simply refuse to come to the table and be a meaningful part of the discussion about the path America will take moving forward and things wind up getting done without you or your party, won't that make you/your party obsolete on down the line?  Just a thought.

2/28/2017 President Trump did a  wonderful job with his address to Congress.  The President's speech was one of the best such speeches ('state of the union') I have heard in my adult lifetime.  It struck just the right measure of inspirational, with facts and tangible plans of action to actually back-up the accompanying rhetoric.  Here's to government finally getting meaningful things done for a change!  Now, let us see if the media is capable of keeping up with President Trump --and his administration-- in any meaningful way?

The tangible ...

Something to hold onto?  At the end of the day you have to be thankful for simply having a safe place to lay your head each night.  Anything else is just icing on the cake.

A beating heart, by itself is simply not enough .....

It always bothers me when I hear 'religious' people talk about the "sanctity of [human] life", as if a beating heart in and of itself makes all the rest of the stuff that comes with this life worthwhile.  It's not that I don't personally believe life is precious, in and of itself, rather it boggles my mind that people can talk about "a life" and its "beating heart" --as if these things alone make us whole-- while completely dismissing the consequences that occur in the aftermath of that same life.  Maybe it's just me and my personal life experiences, but to my way of thinking given the two choices --between experiencing an abortion (short term physical suffering followed by a return to our Creator) and a being born into this world unwanted and more often than not unloved, and then having to live [experience] a life of pain, suffering, neglect and abuse (long term physical, mental and emotional suffering)--returning to heaven surely has to be the easier and less painful of the paths one can travel.

I guess to my way of thinking, you are an irresponsible advocate "for life" unless you are personally willing to step-up to the plate in order to ensure that each and every life brought into this world has at least a shot at a purposeful life, filled with at least some small measure of love and respect, because a life without these things is simply unbearable.  So I suppose, I am sincerely wondering why we never hear "pro-life" advocates talking about this other side of the "life" equation?  And more importantly, what will these advocates do in support of the aftermath of each and every "saved" life.

Recent Nightmare ...

Had a  horrible nightmare last night.  Now granted, not all of my dreams (visions) actually come to pass and thankfully so.  This dream was of a bunch of people caught in a seemingly normal traffic jam and then suddenly all hell broke loose as armed men were shooting stranded motorists at random in their cars ... there were explosions too and the perpetrators were riding motorcycles.  Scared the living daylights out of me ... so vivid, such graphic, unrestrained violence ... so much needless loss of innocent life.

U.S. Congress Set to Vote on "Iran Nuclear Treaty" ....

What would you say if I told you that they say the path we are about to set foot upon will change all our lives, our children's lives and their children's lives, irrevocably forever and not for the better.  The "Iran Nuclear Treaty" tentatively set to be voted upon by the United States Congress, on September 17 --in a "resolution of disapproval vote"-- does not just marry the ultimate in vanity to politics; this treaty starts us along a trajectory which will bring about our (the human race as a whole) ultimate demise on every level possible.  I'd advise those members of Congress who are currently planning to pat themselves on the back for signing on to lend their support for this “ “ground-breaking” “ international treaty to find their spine, to take a courageous detour outside of their party's regimented lock-step --pushing aside, momentarily, the widely pushed (and accepted??) narrative that it is “THIS deal or outright WAR” aside--  in order to clearly evaluate the written terms of the Iran Nuclear Treaty --including its numerous “side-agreements”-- down to the very minutest of details. Then having done the latter, I ask these same members of the U.S. Congress to ask themselves if they are willing to sell their soul for short-lived “infamy” in accepting the delusion "that what they (will have) have done in voting to support such a weak 'treaty' truly does anything to promote the greater good." To ask themselves if they can live with the notion that they alone will be responsible for sealing the fate of humanity as we know it today. I'd add that history has a way of stripping away the varnish of present day perception --so often clouded by the spin of “smoke & mirrors" and the inherent need of weak men to feel that they belong to something greater than themselves-- in the laying down of facts toward the end of chronicling nations' tales, but what would be the point?  Because in the end, there will be none left to whom the tale could be recounted.


"Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." ~Oppenheimer


9/11/2015  A deal by any other name would be a "treaty" .....
 

" "Climate Change" " Show-down?

Carly Fiorina unleashes some articulate perspective on "climate change" in an interview with Katie Couric: A must see!


2/15/2017   Speaking of 'wars':  Here's some tangible fuel to justify skepticism on the whole "global warming" issue.  January 2017, NOAA scientist, Dr. John Bates, blows whistle on skewed recent temperature data. Valid ocean buoy data was discarded in favor of "hot" (known to report hotter) ship data.  Then this "Version 4" dataset was delayed in its release so as to further lend credence to the "Pausebuster" paper [“Possible artifacts of data biases in the recent global surface warming hiatus”, written by climate change scientists to explain away the apparent pause in global warming temps over the past decade, published in the journal "Science" .. just six months before the Paris conference], thereby delivering a maximum timely impact, in an effort to influence the outcome of the Paris Climate Accords this past 2016.

"The NOAA revelations are shades of the 2009 “Climategate” scandal, in which hacked emails from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit indicated that its scientists were suppressing information contrary to their global-warming agenda. A similar batch of 5,000 emails released in 2011 showed likewise and, furthermore, reported Forbes, illustrated that the “scientists view global warming as a political ‘cause’ rather than a balanced scientific inquiry” and that “many of these scientists frankly admit to each other that much of the science is weak and dependent on deliberate manipulation of facts and data.” ~The Observer, By Selwyn Duke "NOAA Scientists Falsify Data to Dupe World Leaders on Climate Change"

Bottom line?  We are absolutely called upon to be good stewards of the precious resources on this rapidly spinning and beautiful Big Blue Planet: plants, animals, earth, water, sky and people as well. We are not, however, compelled to be mindless followers, blindly changing our lives,  in fundamental ways (i.e., preventing the realization of true "energy independence" --oil, natural gas and clean coal-- with an over-abundance of regulation, which also puts hardworking men and women out of a job in an already thin economy). Nor are we called to spend a larger than necessary chunck of our own precious personal financial resource so as to adhere to a bogus scientific bent.  A bent that incidentally financially benefits both the scientists --who pursue ongoing data manipulation, in support of "the cause"/"climate change"-- and those billionaires whose products are associated with the "salvation of the earth" (e.g., green cars, green energy, green light bulbs, etc.).  Wake up and follow the money, people!

The Power to Transform Our World?

Yet another tragic shooting in the month since I've been away,  First the shooting at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, in Charleston, South Carolina, and then the shooting of Kate Steinle, in San Francisco.  Now another movie-theater shooting in Lafayette, Louisiana, last night.  And I almost forgot the lone-wolf shooting at the Army Recruitment center in Tennessee. Hard to find the right words for reason or consolation sometimes, isn't it?  Save to say those who would take the lives of defenseless others, innocents among them, are the polar opposite of those motivated to action by honor.  My heartfelt prayers go out to all involved in these senseless tragedies.  I am left in awe pondering the overwhelming forgiveness expressed by the families of the victims in the South Carolina church shootings.  I can't help but be inspired by these courageous individuals who so readily found their way to forgiveness in the immediate wake of such profound loss.  To my way of thinking, forgiveness has the greater power to shape --transform-- this world for the better.  What say you?  

The time has finally come to address the profound vulnerability of gun-free zones?  And we're way past the time where criminal illegal alien deportations should have been addressed and the laws on the books enforced.  Whenever I am in the state of Texas I always feel safer w.r.t. to the above scenarios playing out --military installations being the one sad, glaring exception-- because if someone pulled out a gun and began shooting at defenseless people I have little doubt that two or more "licensed-to-carry" gun-owners would not waste a second before drawing their weapons in order to take down the shooter, but maybe that's just me. The best defense is always a good offense.  From where I'm sitting forgiveness and the enactment of future offensive measures --in effort to prevent future shooting tragedies-- can go hand in hand, despite the narrative being pushed by the liberal left and the mainstream media.

9/11/2015  “Life is a storm, my young friend. You will bask in the sunlight one moment, be shattered on the rocks the next. What makes you a man is what you do when that storm comes.”~ Alexandre Dumas, "Count of Monte Cristo"

[image source:  newyork.cbslocal.com ]

Kelly File interview

Three young Americans riding on a train, from Amsterdam to Paris, found themselves in the eye of a potentially powerful storm.  Within a matter of mere seconds, these brave men found it within themselves to act, without hesitation and with courage and honor.  By their immediate and selfless actions these three young men saved countless lives.  Truly inspirational!  May God Bless all involved.  And may the heroism of these brave men inspire others to find it within themselves to stare terrorists, hell-bent on destruction, square-in-the-eye and to find the courage within themselves to take action in defense of innocence against the ever-growing presence of evil in our world.

"The wounds of honour are self-inflicted"

"The wounds of honour are self-inflicted." ~Film Quote from "The Last Knights"

A poignant quote from the film (movie) I happened to watch late this evening with my daughters.  Thought provoking, these words, are they not? And drawn from a fictional movie script at that.  Personally, these particular words leave me wondering if we currently live in an age where the notion of honor has now been relegated to realm of fictional tales and legends of days long since gone by.  I suppose there is still some thinking to do on this subject.  What say you?  Has honor in our modern-day society now been replaced with the politics of identity and belonging to a 'greater whole'?

"All honor's wounds are self-inflicted." - Andrew Carnegie