Dear America,

a sliver.

a budget of $3.8 Trillion, operating with a $1.5 Trillion deficit, and proposing $775 million in spending cuts (fyi -- only applying to "discretionary" items, and paying no mind to items requiring immediate attention, like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid). And can we get a rousing shout out to the Patriot Post this morning, for providing the colorful  visuals... along with the unintended consequences of the nation skipping a beat that immediately follows... or was that just heart burn...can we get a plop plop fizz fizz.

all this, with only a few years to go before the trillion dollar "Affordable Care Law" kicks in all the way! remember, we are only beginning to pay for it now, full benefits don't even start until 2014 -- who's brilliant idea was that?  for they deserve a prize, as that is just fabulous...best way to fight  the rising cost of health care, start corrupting the corruption early and often.


But never you mind...that is a long time away from now...

As the echo of a president speaking to Joe the Plumber rings in my ear..." I believe when you spread the wealth around, it's good for everybody."

If you take the time to listen to the entire five minutes spent with Joe the Plumber -- which you will have to find on your own, as my link is merely a fraction of the conversation -- you will be amazed at just how dazed and confused Obama sounds.

He spins his own weave of tax rates with catch phrases, while trying to convince a hard working plumber, that now that he's kind of made it... under his tax plan... if you go back ten years and somehow have a chance to relive it, you would have more money in your pocket now -- but since that isn't realistic, what he wants Joe the Plumber to recognize, now that he is doing so well, is that he should support a tax plan that makes him pay more for his success -- you know, to help those who are coming along behind him -- you know, "because there are two ways of lookin' at it..."

So with respect to Obama's 2012 budget, there are two ways of lookin' at it --

ONE: at least it's something, right? He's put a "freeze" at 2010 levels, whatever that really means, since we were already in the hole in 2010, one would have to wonder about that; but all in all, he has a plan, a budget (given we have been operating without one, this is a step in the right direction) and he has come up with a number -- $775 million -- in actual spending cuts.  refer back to the pretty picture above, to put that number in proper perspective.

TWO: we are doomed.

Now, it has been a tough couple of weeks around the globe, hasn't it; we have fires of unrest fracturing the entire world, as if we are falling apart.
 
So, I don't know about you, per se, but I couldn't help but get the biggest chuckle in days, while watching the O'Reilly Factor during his weekly segment with Dennis Miller; me and my girl turned to each other with eyes wide open thinking this guy is brilliant (that would be Miller, not always the case for O'Reilly).

First, I have probably said this out loud before, but Miller is smart -- so quick on his feet -- and funny -- it is hard keeping up with him half the time -- what a fireball of wit, wisdom and western culture -- his mouth should be the eighth wonder of the world, but perhaps that's just me; but when he told O'Reilly, something to the affect of, you know, a good question (for the president) would have been to ask him, at the end of the game (Super Bowl) should they have evened up the score, you know, to be fair?

No need to show a pie chart to figure that one out -- redistribution, no matter how you slice it, no matter which side of the ball you're on, does not work -- will never work -- and only keeps good decent people from actually, going to work, in more ways than one.

Redistribution of Wealth, in any form, discourages -- in fair and equal proportion -- both the creators and the takers... stifling all good deed, all the way around, as if both hands are tied behind our back; did you watch Joe the Plumber's expression over the course of his sliver in time, as he was face to face with the man who would ultimately become the next president of the United States? 

His face grew twisted, he cocked his head, he tried to interrupt when things turned to mush, as he attempted to swipe the sweat, literally and figuratively, off his brow -- looking at Obama with a face of confusion, frustration, or just plum impatience half the time, yet all the while, painstakingly trying to pay him his full respect; ugh.

Joe the Plumber, as we all know now, became the face of middle America, and his moment with Obama would be replayed and reused and retained as the quintessential argument of the campaign -- not that it made any difference.  Oh, to know what we know now.  see also yesterday's lamentations which seem to follow suit...Known and Unknown, that is the question.

And then, in the midst of all the conversation on cutting spending we have another Joe, promoting the administration's plan to "invest" $53 Billion dollars in a fly-by-night cockamamie scheme to have the government get into the High Speed Rail business -- you know, Joe, if it were cost effective in the least bit, don't you think a Carnegie or a Rockefeller would have done this already?

It's simple, there are no takers because the numbers simply don't add up; oh, and what's this...what corporation stands to gain the most with this little operation...GE.  Case closed.  next.

Which, by the way, if you have not already done so, send a letter to Jeff here.    This link connects you to The Free Enterprise Project, offered through an affiliation with Freedom Works; if you get on the email list with Freedom Works, they make it incredibly easy, and FREE, to send letters to your congressmen and women, and just about anybody else worthy.

Just before I leave you, another segment from the day, yesterday, included a preview of an upcoming John Stossel report; with him standing in the middle of an ice rink,ordering people around, meddling, encroaching on free expression, restricting the natural flow, proving to America, for the umpteenth time, unlimited government intrusion is no way to go around life (as our founders intended, of course).

The thing is, the good news and the bad news is the same news -- to live in a free country, to remain a free people, to grow a free enterprise -- it actually, and boldly, requires a system based upon the principles of freedom and liberty in order to facilitate the unlimited-ness of all possibility to take shape; yes, and likewise, a system such as this, inherently, intrinsically and emphatically requires all of its members within the group to act responsibly and account-ably to that end. [yikes, as I get Glenn Beck screaming in my ear, begging the question, "can man rule himself?"]

We have proven now, thanks to the last hundred years or so, that man cannot rule man -- that man, must rule himself, tied to Something Greater Than (whether it is God, or in principle) 'said man', or else man loses  everything, including every living, breathing hope and dream along with it;

We have proven now, thanks to the last hundred years or so, that government is not the answer to the problem, but the problem itself;

We have proven now, thanks to the last hundred years or so, that one cannot spend more than one takes in, for that trajectory is unsustainable -- and of course, a pathway wrought in fear, instability, worry, unease, disease, addiction and corruption --

...robbing peter to pay paul
...getting in deeper and deeper in over your head
...finally reaching a place of total, moral, financial, emotional bankruptcy
...for the liabilities eat us up piece by piece, one by one.

bye bye miss american pie -- for no longer would we have the ability to even talk about the pie, let alone discuss what we will take away from it; no longer is it a question as to when, how much, or just where oh where would a portion not be missed whatsoever; no longer is it a question of  who we will choose to eat it with or how much we can share, for none of it would matter anymore -- for, in a manner of speaking, we would be plum out of pie. all gone. no more.  buh-bye.

Make it a Good Day, G

Dear America song is dedicated to all the Joe's of the day -- Joe the Plumber, Joe the VP, Joe the baker and the candlestick maker, and of course, my favorite Joe of all...xx... I'll never tell...and yes, even to a brother, Joe, who just so happens to be celebrating his 44th year on this earth upon this very day -- rock on, brother.

Dear America,

Good times.

You know I bet one day we're all gonna look back at these days and just laugh...

And here's a striking stat that you don't hear about everyday, did you know that a typical six year old laughs about 300 times/day?!

The average adult, try fifteen.  Now that's pretty sad, isn't it.

But for five minutes let's just set aside the agony of defeat, that came along with a hefty dose of reality, when the Health Care bill became Law -- all of which isn't very funny in the least bit for anyone beholden to the ideology of an American Patriot.

It was my birthday yesterday.

Yeah me!
Having now arrived at four times one of my favorite years of life (twelve), here I am.  For me, it is a stat downright hard to believe, but at the same time, it is pretty funny, I gotta tell ya  -- while, with both parents alive and well and living the good life on the opposite coast, I can only imagine how they must find my new age just hilarious...
how time gets away from us, and yet,
how time has a way of giving us everything we ever really need.

Age, in and of itself, sure does have it's advantages, no?  We get to a point when everything -- oooh now come to think of it -- we get to a point when everything could easily follow along with the President's recent words of wisdom antagonistically directed to republicans (blatantly mocking his own bi-partisan promise in the process, yes he can, but let's move on.org...)
for we come to the age of "GO FOR IT".

We make bucket lists...we do what we have always wanted to do...things we have had to wait for, can be done...things we've always wanted to get, can be got... while, you know, we can also find time to become like community organizers, or something.

For my birthday, I bought myself a little something that was long overdue, a new book.  And, in all honesty, I hated to give the cause two cents, but simply felt the ends justified the means in the long run.  So, showing my new found "go for it" spirit, I got it.  

I got Saul Alinsky's RULES FOR RADICALS, a Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals! 

And I'm so giddy about this purchase I could just spit on Joy "those people" Behar this morning, but as all the rest of the hundreds of thousands, if not absolute millions, of tea party protesters and Icaucus ramblers and patriot post petitioners would agree, that would be just wrong.  And in the Chosen One's three words, it is not something we would say to one another, either incite or condone, to  "go for it" in that kind of disgraceful manner to anyone for any reason (even if it would make us feel good). Besides, it's not lady like, or very funny  -- it would be like how S'linsky (my new name for him) put it:

"These rules make the difference between being a realistic radical and being a rhetorical one who uses the tired old words and slogans, calls the police 'pig' or 'white fascist racist' or 'motherf***' and has so stereotyped himself that others react by saying, 'oh he's one of those,' and then promptly turn him off."

And here's a kicker, S'linsky recognized the fundamental use of good humor to affect change..."for through humor much is accepted that would have been rejected if presented seriously.  This is a sad and lonely generation.  It laughs too little, and this, too, is tragic."  Ahh yes, back in the era when I was twelve, S'linsky
was speaking, sadly, of the greatest generation, go figure...some generations are just so misunderstood, aren't they?

I have only just begun to read the radicals handbook for all time...and I just might take it slow.  Having been in such a rush to get it yesterday, now that it is in my hot little hands, it's like I wanna savor the moment --letting the words set into motion of an entire generation of extremism, attacking Americanism of all things, sit for a bit, as cause for a little inaction, perhaps; to let it's mystery linger in the air like a prevailing punchline waits patiently for just the right moment -- timing is everything, you know.

And so, too, is the force behind a community organizer, in the hopes that the gathering of the masses will change the world.

As much I hate to do it, I must profess and promote radical action today, in every which way to tomorrow, "go for it" and go out and buy this book right now -- of course, many of you have probably already read it four times over, so to those of you already there, my sincere apologies to you for taking so long to catch up.  I will do my very best to never let this happen again, you have my promise; I would hate to be labeled as one of "those people."

But hey, my reality is what it is; it has taken some time to align myself with the enemy -- I mean, align in such a way that I begin to understand who I'm dealing with -- you know, get on the inside; promoting S'linsky's first rule of order:

"As an organizer I start from where the world is, as it is,, not as I would like it to be. That we accept the world as it is does not in any sense weaken our desire to change it into what we believe it should be -- it is necessary to begin where the world is if we are going to change it what we think it should be.  That means working in the system..."

oh, there's more,

"...Any revolutionary change must be preceded by a passive, affirmative, non-challenging attitude toward change among the mass of our people.  They must feel so frustrated, so defeated, so lost, so future-less in the prevailing system that they are willing to let go of the past and chance the future..."

"...Let us in the name of radical pragmatism not forget that in our system with all its repressions we can still speak out and denounce the administration, attack its policies, work to build an opposition political base. True there is government harassment, but there still is that relative freedom to fight.  I can attack my government, try to organize to change it.  That's more than I can do in Moscow, Peking, or Havana."

and still more, before even so much as the first chapter:

"A revolutionary organizer must shake up the prevailing patterns of their lives -- agitate, create disenchantment and discontent with the current values, to produce, if not a passion for change, at least a passive, affirmative, non-challenging climate."

But then, something magical happens, he almost begins to sound like a patriot or something (yeah right):

"Those who can, should be encouraged to grow; for the others, the fault lies not in the system but in themselves."

"Here we are desperately concerned with the vast mass of our people who, thwarted through lack of interest or opportunity, or both, do not participate in the endless responsibilities of citizenship and are resigned to lives determined by others.  To lose your 'identity' as a citizen of democracy is but a step from losing your identity as a person...That citizen sinks further into apathy, anonymity, and depersonalization.  The result is that he comes to depend on public authority and a state of civic-sclerosis sets in."

"...There can be no darker or more devastating tragedy that the death of man's faith in himself and in his power to direct his future."

"I salute the present generation.  Hang on to one of your most precious parts of youth, laughter -- don't lose it as many of you seem to have done, you need it.  Together we may find some of what we're looking for -- laughter, beauty, love and the chance to create."

So you heard it here today, from the King of Radicalization himself, let us laugh and shake things off and move on to greener pastures; let us frolic in the daisies and create real avenues for change, just like our opposition counterparts do it, laughing all the way, ha ha ha ha.

Contact your local Tea Party.org
Check out the Icaucus.org
GO to Grassfire NOW
Sign a declaration to commit with the Patriot Post.us

And remember, have some fun with this; whistle while you work -- on the inside; a spoonful of sugar always helps the medicine go down; smile -- and the world smile's with you (spitting, not so much); and finally, in three words, now is the time to "GO FOR IT."

In some very warped and twisted way, I think I am going to love my new book; IT IS a new day -- while a brand new year for me begins right now.  I have to go for it as time is of the essence; while, truth is, there is no way I can turn back now, I am in too deep and it means to much.

I will laugh more and cry less.
I will love more and hate less.
I will venture to create a thing of beauty everyday.
I will live as if it were the last; I will live as if this is the first day of the rest of my life, for it is.

This is my reality; this is my world now; and the best part is...

"with all its repressions,

we can still speak out and denounce the administration,

attack its policies,

work to build an opposition political base..."

Community Organization 102 begins with taking back our country one by one, piggybacking upon opportunities everywhere to become more involved -- all we have to do is latch on, dress appropriately, keep our hair trimmed and look alot like "them" -- "those people"; all we really have to do is play a part, sound intelligent, understand our opponent and come at them from the inside, like any other upstanding citizen would do -- calmly, peacefully, showing off our good character, the argument is already won.

Just Do It.
("true, there may be government harassment")
GO FOR IT, anyway.

Having died the year I turned twelve, I'm sure if S'linsky still walked the streets of Chicago, he would be so very proud...
as we use the skills
taught by the master
to organize,
to enjoy ourselves, 
and laughing,
all the way to the next election,
yes we can.

No need to break any rules to
Make it a Good Day, G

The first chapter lies in wait for me...

The Purpose

"The life of man upon earth is warfare..."

Job 7:1

goody, goody gumdrops,

I am just plum giddy about it

Dear America,

Under the cover of darkness, let there be light.

The holiday banners are still donned on light posts here in Solana Beach, displaying a white dove and the simple phrase Peace on Earth.  As we hasten to spring into the new year and the routines that bind us, nothing could be farther from the holiday sentiment and the lightness of being at Christmas time than the dark, sinister undermining of the people's government by our beloved Congress.

G has left out current affairs for the last couple of weeks; my way of letting the spirit of Christmas shine upon the day, instead of the day overshadowing the season -- but certainly, it's not like the world stopped for two weeks and took a break.  Aw no, if we could only be so lucky.

I must confess, this darkness stuff, this lack of transparency thing going on, this hiding behind closed doors and disguising the truth about this health care dominion over the people has sort of rubbed off on me.  It started very innocently, with just a thought about how many cigarettes our dear President must be smoking these days, and then it just happened; G purchased a pack of cigarettes (Lights, of course).

Can I get a light?
Anyone?
I know, I know -- wrong in so many ways -- mea culpa.  But I had this moment of just wanting to go to the dark side, and live recklessly like so many of us do everyday, act irresponsibly like our congress -- hiding behind the barn and doing something stupid with our health care of all things; I just wanted to feel this smoking thing -- get a taste for what our President jones's for at times (especially times under stress) --  and be a little bit bad.

First, at nearly six bucks here in SOCAL, I gotta imagine, one must be awfully well to do to keep this up.  Even though I was clearly disgusted by smoking just one, I realize just how quickly a pack of twenty can be inhaled; wow, that could add up.  Who can afford this really?

Of course, adding in the cost over the week of going through say perhaps a pack every other day...a week of tar infested nicotine can be all yours for around 25 bucks; one hundred bucks a month; times two people who support each other's bad habit lovingly and devotedly, that is two hundred dollars a month (about the price G pays for health care insurance).  Factor in the cocktails we drink or the gas we burn while smoking -- like that funny new commercial advertises -- and then the real cost incrementally rises.  Factor in the cost of inhalers down the road, angioplasty, oxygen and lung machines, we're all of a sudden on a whole nother level.

Details.

The thing is, it's been kind of fun being bad; even though now that I've all but advertised my delinquency to the world, including my parents, the thrill is almost all but gone.

Besides, it really smells.  My mouth tastes like cotton on a cloudy day; my hair stinks, with no amount of hairspray able to cover it up; my clothes must be immediately detained and decontaminated.  While at this point, besides the financial outlay, G cannot figure out for the life of me how people can do this everyday -- especially knowing it is so bad for you.

But we are just that kind of reckless these days, aren't we; live for today, not for tomorrow.  Let my children convalesce the black lunged parent and also pay for it handsomely by the acts of congress, under the cover of darkness, in the dead of night, burdening every lost soul to an unconscionable, unconstitutional, irresponsible and bad piece of legislation -- yeah, let's do that.

The whole thing stinks I tell you.

From one of my favorite links, the Patriot Post today:

"I don't know if there is a senator that doesn't have something in this bill that was important to them. And if they don't have something in it important to them, then it doesn't speak well of them." --Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Godfather) on making offers that Democrats couldn't refuse."The Patriot Post (www.patriotpost.us/subscribe/ )"

The Post just has this way of presenting things...even the things that would normally scare our pants off, they just package it in such a way that even though what Reid said shakes us to our core, the menacing entertainment factor that creeps in at the tail end, priceless.  We've returned from holiday to have the reconciliation process begin -- under the cover of darkness, behind closed doors, with C-Span clearly not invited.  Hmmmmm

But speaking of scaring the pants off -- how about that north by northwest bomber on Christmas day?

Let us seek consolation and perspective by going to The Patriot Post yet again and right off the runway:

Alpha Jackass: "What ... if terrorists were killing 45,000 people every year in this country? Well, the current health care system, the insurance companies, and those who support them are doing just that. ... Those fighting health care reform -- not those debating its shape or its nuance -- people who demand the status quo, they are killing 45,000 Americans a year. ... Remind me again, who are the terrorists?" --MSNBC's Keith Olbermann.  [If you don't get the Post yet, do it today:."The Patriot Post (www.patriotpost.us/subscribe/ )"

Yes, Keith.  That is speaking the truth and spreading the light --
in the wally world of Hysteria Lane.

On this story, G is really in the dark; how can a guy with a name like, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, without so much as a toothbrush, who had to convince agents of his credibility -- with the help of some kind of upstanding gentleman who accompanied him to the check in line -- even though the lack of papers thereof should have halted all of it, right then and there, who paid for his ticket in cash, without so much as a passport or a return trip, who had been reported -- by his father no less -- to the Intelligence that Be that he was a risk and a trained operative of radical Muslim indoctrination, be given a free pass to blow up a plane bound for Detroit (an American Muslim community hot spot and training ground)?

How?

Normal people can't travel without a passport, how can a guy by the name Abdulmutallab do it?  Some one tell me as I'm so not amused and so confused under this veil of darkness, masked as political correctness that puts everyday Americans like you and me at risk.

I don't care if the guy from CAIR says profiling is wrong -- see for yourself on O'Reilly last night.  But even if we listen to HOW this spokesperson, Ibrahim Hooper, concedes the belief we should be looking at the behavior of the people traveling, over other profiling characteristics -- then lets review:

Abdulmutallab had questionable behavior from the start -- as who travels like that?  Who gets aboard a plane, for an international flight without luggage, one-way, without proper documentation -- that behavior of even attempting to get on a plane under such a cover of darkness is not normal, isn't that enough? Isn't it? Isn't it?

And if you really want to know what's going on in Arab-American relations or the real story on this one,  you need to go to Brigitte Gabriel: ACT for America.  Just sayin.

What gave this little G great confidence though, was how Janet Napolitano, Miss Homeland Security Secretary of the Year (2009 that is) responded, you know her as the creator and purveyor of the catch-phrase "man-caused disasters" instead of calling IT what  IT really is, terrorism -- she came out right away and noted "the system worked"-- do we feel good or what?   Even more comforting was how our President got right on it --- albeit four days later; and said, um, uh, um, well, uh "As a nation, we will do everything in our power to protect our country."

Right on.
You feel good? 
I feel good. 

The guy was just an "isolated extremists" according to President Obama; nothing more, now everyone get back to your holiday and move along...while having to leave his shaved ice for ten minutes...or worse, maybe he was in the middle of a smoke behind the plumeria bushes.

If the light of a new year didn't make me so excited I would be barfing from inhaling too much smoke over the holiday; if not for this new year, I would be sick to my stomach having indulged in the preponderance of jolly good rhetoric spinning even a near death experience of 300 passengers by another terrorist -- the second terrorist incident on American soil in sixty days -- and considered part of what is now 1/3 of all terrorist activity since 9/11that has strangely come about under the all-knowing and ever powerful Obama Administration. 

Strange, because we don't have a terrorist problem.

Lions, tigers, and terrorists oh my

there is no such thing as terrorism...
there is no such thing as terrorism...
there is no such thing as terrorism.

Oh, I get it, there is no such thing as terrorism --  only man-caused disasters under the dead of night... on safe and secure Army bases...on Christmas morning... behind the closed doors of Congress...takes me awhile, but I get there (just not by plane anymore).

Make it a Good Day, G

Now you play nice, Yemenis and Sudanese, Afghans and Pakistanis, Arabs and Americans...we're watching you now, you're all on the right list now, and we've got your number, yes sir ree...be afraid, be very very afraid.

Thank you Patriot Post for helping me keep my sanity day in and day out.

Finally, to my girl -- and anybody else's baby -- who may read her mama's blog:
DO NOT SMOKE; it is gross; it will kill you; and it is totally and unequivocally NOT COOL.