Another random irrelevant comment oh yeah and some sports ones too

This may only mean something to students of American politics, but with the current crop of candidates LBJ and Richard Nixon are starting to look good. I think I said something similar in 2012. Wow! how much more do they now? It is no longer choosing between the lesser of two evils, it is become something even scarier.


Hmmm sorta makes sense, lose 21-5 to the Yankees and then go and trade for a pitcher. A really good pitcher. Gotta give the Rangers brass some Kudos. Lets hope it works out for the next couple of years. Long time fans are having a hard time picturing two aces on a team called the Texas Rangers. Competitive now, next year wow! who is number one in the rotation?

Okay 6’9” 200 lb NDour and 7’2” 235 lb Mejri hmmmm the trees are awfully thin in North Texas.

I still think the Mavericks should go small ball a bunch next year and even with the weird notion having a 7 foot center named Dirk being part of the small ball. How many centers do you know can stretch the floor with Parsons, Matthews and rotating the tandem of Williams, JJ and Harris? These would be the who cares about defense moments, just try to outscore us. Yeah trying to make the glass half full with just about a third of it containing liquid. hahahaha

I am still nowhere close to thinking about the Cowboys yet. Too hot here in North Texas.

Part 3 The Family

I am going to start by taking a Biblical verse completely out of context.

Render to Caesar what is Caesar’s and render to God what is God’s.

Or I could say you cannot legislate morality. Or can you? Or can’t you?

Let’s look at what is known by some as the The Law and more commonly in the United States as the Ten Commandments
We have made the law of the land and local law from some of the Commandments or at least there could be that perception

You cannot kill, so here you get so many years to life in murder cases

You cannot steal, depending on the amount and the severity of the crime you could get a hand slap to years in prison.

Is this legislating morality?

Think about the other commandments.

How do you legislate coveting thy neighbor’s goods? If I go over to my neighbor’s house to watch football every Sunday on his 100 inch big screen TV, am I coveting it or am I taking advantage of his so I don’t have to spend the money? Who can tell? And how would you create laws and punishment to address this as a crime?

In the United States we have already dealt with the first two commandments with separate of Church and State. So no one can force us to keep the Sabbath or choose only one God. So if we create a document that separates God from government are we now institutionalizing never being able to legislate morality?

So can you? Can’t you? And what does all this have to do with the Family?
First you have to realize or at least accept the laws against killing and theft could be considered more personal not morality laws. Our government is predicated on protecting the individual and so in doing that we protect lives and property. Well there then… we are not legislating morality……. So how about laws against harm of children, fraud, rape, burning down a house etc… these aren’t exactly in the Commandments, yet where do we get the notion to make these laws. So can we protect the individual with our laws and have a fundamental moral foundation to them?
And if we create a government that separates church from state why do we even have laws with a moral foundation? Shouldn’t all laws be based solely on the concept of protecting the individual if this is our law of the land?

So where does this leave us today? If we say all laws should be about protecting the individual then how do we choose or write laws? It creates a nice little circle. If I am protecting the individual I have to have a basis on which to determine what is the individual and what is it the individual needs for protection? Where does that come from? Morality? God?

And this is where the family can come in. Society thrives when there is a strong code of ethics and trust among the members of that society. When that trust and the ethics break down society breaks down. You do not legislate honor thy Father and Mother. That comes from a strong family bond. Loving and yes even at times stern parents can foster the mores and morals of a society in their children. This is why the family is important.
And yes a family could foster behavior that is not conducive to society, which in some ways proves the worth of the family. The behavior is learned. Yes some of a child comes from genetics and some from environment. If the environment is strong then the potential of the child (genetics) can flourish, if the environment is not strong or detrimental then the weaknesses in the genetics survive.

The family gives us the first line promoting what could be called morality. Generation after generation can create strong family values that contributes to the overall good of the society. The more the concept of family thrives and the more each generation instills these values into their youth the stronger the society becomes. And the family can be more than the nuclear family. This goes back to what I said in one of the earlier parts of this topic. A family can be built of various parts or could just be an influential adult in a child’s life. As long as the child receives a positive set of values from someone they can truly trust they will carry it forward in their lives and hopefully to their next generation.

And so why all the morality talk today, well in the next part I hope to show that you can have secular laws that strengthen the family for the benefit of the whole of society. I got a bit sidetracked today, but I wanted the reader to have my sense that it is hard to determine what can be Caesar’s and what should be God’s. And that it is okay to find the middle when it comes to making a law of the land so that all can thrive. We can educate to our youth our values, our beliefs, and our faith. That is what the family can do, but even if you do not believe in the faith you still can believe it will benefit our country and society to protect and help the family thrive in our brave new world. So you have to have secular laws in place to protect from harm one of our society’s greatest treasures, otherwise our society will eventually decay, decompose, and become a page of history for some unknown future.

Social media propaganda, media, and

I do not know about you, but every now and then while reading through the posts of various news and political stories someone posts something to the effect that people are getting paid to troll sites and make favorable comments about certain topics. These topics usually are around supporting certain businesses, (oil), some aspects of a certain political party (If it is happening I suspect both), or some extreme right wing view point.

I actually went to Snopes.com today to see if there was any validity to these accusations. I do not know if I wasn’t searching correctly or what, but I got absolutely nothing in my searches that resembled the topic I was trying to explore. So I still do not know if this is false or not.

I am of the group that believes that at some level though social media is being used to push certain viewpoints and some of the information being pushed is of a questionable nature in regards to facts. I am sure many of who have heard the phrase: say it enough times and it will seem to be true. Social media is now the same problem on steroids.

More and more social media is a news outlet, not officially of course, but opinions are being created from tweets. And anyone with even a smidgeon of paranoia can imagine how dangerous this can be. I fear anyone with enough computer power could create a media firestorm solely based on what they wanted to have happen. Imagine the movie (was it) Wag the Dog taken to all sorts of extreme scenarios. How would sane, rational, and just plain folk be able to pick through the insanity to find the truth in the story? Every now and then my brain takes a turn to the dark side and scares the crap out of me.

And just who do we go to trust? Shoot I like Jon Stewart, but even he has his biases. Anybody else and you are just pushing it. Did quality media die with Walter Cronkite and David Brinkley? What happened to the McNeil Lehrer report? Yeah I know this sounds old fashion, but………

And the media now a days just cannot keep it’s head on straight or its head out of its back end. And in doing so they have made Donald Trump a media sensation. Have you seen one story that actually asks what is Mr. Trump going to do if elected? There is the occasional mention that he has said he will bring jobs back to America and a build a fence. Doesn’t anyone want to ask him how? Some context here Mr. Trump or at least the media should be pushing him for some. Ain’t seen nothing!

And now all this is hissing me off personally. I have been trying for decades and for the last four or five years in this blog to get people to realize we need change. I have offered a whole political platform for a rehash of a historic political party. Argued constantly the need to build from the ground up a party to replace the two dinosaurs we have now. And from a couple weeks of insanity in the press everyone is now worried Mr. Trump will go at it as an independent.

And quite frankly even if he won, it wouldn’t matter. I once wrote a post about how an independent President would be a failure. You need a political party to actually create laws and policies. If he wins both parties would probably gang up on him and not pass any of his ideas. And anything they pass would be vetoed by him. The big question would be would establishment Democrats and Republicans be able to muster enough votes to override the veto. Maybe. Then would Mr. Trump prevent the executive branch from acting on the overrides? It could get really fun around D.C.

Yet that still brings me back to my continuous point. To make real change in DC and for the betterment of our country you need a new major party that builds up from the ground. A true grass roots organization that that can overcome the media’s bias towards the establishment parties and can enact enough legislation in a hurry that has enough of a benefit for the middle class to take root. Sure in fifty years they may become just as entrenched as the current group, but we could get 2 decades of change which would also be the framework for future generations to use when they needed it.

Mr. Trump is just a sideshow on the political stage that will produce no real benefit, but enough people actually believe in snake oil and love carnies that he is going to have traction for awhile. If this traction holds on too long we may have to unwind some real serious problems that will keep us from any positive traction to actually move us forward.
So our loveable Mr. Trump, if he becomes an independent candidate, will become the radical candidate, the one to win over a large group of people thinking he is actually different. And in some ways it is now chic to be a Trump lover, you are now the edge, even being a Republican has some radicalness to it. Sheesh and here I am the one person espousing change, a real radical departure from the norm, now sounding too staid because I am looking towards practical solutions to make actual radical change.

My world floats upside down.



And I am going to come back and finish up some thoughts on the family and how some of all this ties together. Have a great evening

Sports Blast with other comments

Well Pro football is about to begin. And not soon enough. I am not talking because football is here, but because Presidential Politics are way too over the top right now. Seriously; 16 official candidates for the Republican Party vying for our attention and now they are all trying to get into an argument with one just to get on the media’s radar screen.

Back to football and back to guessing what kind of year are the Cowboys going to have. Last year we had no expectations, this year we are back to winning the big game expectations. What is the reality?

Training camp is suppose to help give us the answer so no predictions from me for now. I will make these statements. Cowboys still need to establish a solid running game. Tony Romo is not going to be the reason we might have a winning season. He will be an integral part, but he cannot come close to being the super hero he never was. I still feel he is a viable quarterback in the NFL and we need him to win, but it cannot be up to him to win. He needs a team effort. Dez is important, so will the new contract embolden him or spoil him? Lets’ hope he decides he wants to be the shine on the star this year and keeps up what he has done over the last few years. Yet we still need a running game and two good solid receivers to support Dez to give our offense some true balance. We will need to score points. Lets hope DeMarco was only a player loss, not a loss in production. If three backs get more than 1500 yards that will be real beneficial. That is a big if, unless one steps up and has a fairly good year by them self. The offensive line is there so the potential is there. The defense improved last year from the previous year, however, we still need it to take another step up for us to be successful.
I will make my season predictions closer to 09/13.

How bad was it for the Mavs? Sheesh. I wish they had pursued another plan in free agency, but right now I am only sitting on the sideline with hindsight. Lets hope something happens between now and the start of the season or this wunderkin of a center in the summer league turns out to be somewhat of a real deal. Otherwise I will maintain a positive attitude and suffer through the season. Anyway more to come for them once we get close to the regular season. Still love the Mavs. Wish they would learn to love the draft for a few years.

The Stars made somewhat of a splash in free agency, but since I am only a casual fan I will let others comment on the pros and cons for them.
And the Rangers keep trying to give us reason to hope. You have to give them credit. I had said if they are a few games over .500 at the All Star break that would be good. Well…… now they need a 15 out of 20 hot streak to get back in it before too much longer. Still miss Darvish, yet Prince came back from his injury last year and is helping to fuel the hope. If some of the pitchers could find something, well who knows. They are doing better than I thought. And so for you Robert, I am still behind your little red shoe Rangers.

Have you ever noticed all the qualities that help you get elected are the qualities the public doesn’t need you to have once you get elected?

Movies are just too damn expensive now a days. Add in the snacks and forget groceries for the week. There are so many movies I want to see, ain’t going to happen. So which Presidential candidate is going to lower movie prices? Hahahaha

Oh and in case you didn’t notice, it is hot outside. Glad I am not going to training camp. And what is worse there use to be something called Bllllueeee Beeelllllll ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh the wait is killing me. How can you have national ice cream day without the best ice cream???????

And unfortunately the countdown is about to begin for Jon Stewart. Sorry to see him go.

The Family continues

Family is an interesting concept now a days. There is the famous phrase: You can pick your friends, but you can’t pick your family.

What is a family though? Nowadays they come in all shapes and sizes. We have step family, blended family, there use to be an extended family (kind of becoming less important over time), families that we choose, such as a child being closer to their friend’s parents than their own, you can be an adopted child, you can feel your friends are your family, skip generation families (grandparents raising grandkids), and some more iterations I cannot think of right now.

There is the concept of the traditional family: Mom, Dad, and children. So am I trying to argue we should only keep this type of family or is any/all types of families acceptable?

The key is what works. The traditional family is the best place to start or gives us the best framework. And yes this is the model the Christian right holds as the only model. I am a Christian, but I have a hard time with people trying to mold society by beating them over the head with a Bible. Yet I do agree there is great validity in this model. Why?

The traditional family gives us our foundation, our start in life. First of all, it is basic nature. We need the Dad and Mom to make us. Second it is the necessary structure to raise children since on most accounts we, as humans, aren’t ready to leave the nest as fast as the rest of nature. And this is good. To be successful in life and not just monetarily we need a foundation and if the family has strong values more than likely the children will develop them and pass them on.

Cultures throughout history thrive when the family is an integral part of the society. Once the family starts to decline as a centerpiece the country or culture starts to die off. Once a more self-centered way of life comes into play values decline, the fabric that binds the culture erodes, and a splintering of people begin. And a new country or culture arises and sometimes it is dominated by interests that over react to the moral or structural decay and rely on overly religious control to rebuild. This is an unfortunate consequence. Not because of the belief in God, but the fact they move backwards not forwards with their belief in God. Yet this is a discussion for another day.

Going back to nature. Nature gives us one of the strongest arguments to the value of the traditional family. This is observable within the mammal group. Even though some mammals do not always mate for life, enough come together long enough to raise the offspring to maturity which of course helps the offspring survive.

And not just in mammals. It is prevalent all over nature. A few years ago we lived in a two story house. The porch was very basic. A step up to a four by four area that was the entrance to the house. The covering to this porch was up to the top of the second story. For a couple of years some birds nested on the corner of the ledge. At first this was cute. After a while though the young birds started to learn to fly. Since we were coming in and out of the house the parent birds would dive bomb us to protect their young so they could fly back into the nest. We eventually learned to avoid walking outside at certain times of the day. This only lasted for a week or so and eventually the whole family moved on. They came back the second year and the same thing happened. I ticked off the kids when they left and got the ladder out and cleaned out the nesting area. Even for a week or so this dive bombing and constant chattering was a big pain in the back end.

For my point the parents raised the children till they were ready to fly on their own even to the point of risking their lives to take on us humans to protect their children. And another observation was both parents pretty much took on the same roles once the eggs were hatched. Both would take turns going out for food and both protected their young from us while they learned to fly. So one thing we can learn from nature is the role of the sexes is mostly, maybe not completely a human construct. Or is our way the correct way because of the way we are made? I think that some of it is, but mostly we have roles that can be interchanged between the sexes, but there is a need for both roles to be played out. Which is another reason the traditional family is important.

Does it work best when one person stays home to be a primary caregiver? And is this different from the birds, well actually it isn’t. The birds played both roles simultaneously. Does this mean humans cannot? Actually in this country over the last few decades we have been. The question I am trying to ask you to think about is this best for us. And is it best for us as humans, for our way of life, or can we remodel the family as times change to suit the times? Basically what do we need as family or to define family so we can keep our values, cherish them, and pass them on to the next generation?

Honestly I believe we still do need the traditional family. I feel this is the best way to preserve what we have and still be able to move forward in the future. Unfortunately I do not think it works for everyone. Or a failure happened and it didn’t work for some. Either way we need to preserve to two main aspects of what a traditional family offers us to continue to grow as a country, culture, and society.

We need to raise our children with the love and guidance parents should be offering. And we need to give our children stability in their lives so they have the best opportunity to succeed on their own and then pass it on to their children.

The way our politics and to hear some parts of our society you would think neither is important. Obviously I feel differently. So how do we keep the family in our society? Some of that is up to us as members of society. Our government cannot solve all problems, but in my next post about this topic I will propose some policy ideas our government can do to strengthen our ability to hold onto the value of family. Basically I will attempt to come up with secular reasoning to allow us in society to keep the family strong.

The traditional family

Don’t want anyone to be confused, but this is a post about one of the silent victims of the last recession. And actually their world was deteriorating long before the recession began.

I am talking about what is happening to children in our world. With parents being forced to be more and more preoccupied with their jobs, time is being taken away from parents being able to be the more important factor in their children’s lives. The recession just made the situation that has been developing over the last couple of generations worse.

And I am not talking about parents that really are not concerned with making their children their number one priority. This is probably a lost battle. Parents that are possessed with their careers and having everything are not going to make the sacrifices that many families make to give their children the most of themselves they can. And when I refer to sacrifices I am not necessarily talking financial sacrifices, I am talking about the time sacrifice to raise children in a value conscious world and spend the time to make them appreciate and learn to respect themselves. This seems to be a dying aspect of the so called modern family.

At one point we had one parent working and the other staying home and basically it was Dad at work and Mom at home. And we all know the 1950’s American Dream that was basically a false reality. Yet the idea of one being home and the other working actually could be the best benefit for children.

To start it seems for so many families, parents are trying to over compensate by spending activity time with their children. There is this obsession with sports or dance or some other competition that requires endless amount of practice time and competition time and going to events every weekend. We fill up this time to replace the actual quality time of spending with our children and really getting to know them.

And on top of all this even if you are not trying to have a super career even the most average job is requiring extra time at home. People spend hours in the evening catching up or keeping up with so much extraordinarily unnecessary hyperbole because someone is obsessed somewhere with trying to be number one. And half the time the extra work is just people spinning their wheels doing routine tasks, but someone wants to prove that they are so much better than everyone else they create a false sense of accomplishment that has to be matched. Yet if someone does not answer the email at ten at night or stay up all night creating the fanciest power point presentation our work culture is set up to make them look less than others. Realistically though they are not being more productive they are just stuck in a maddening world of over achievers achieving nothing.

Now do not get me completely wrong. There will be times where we do have to work extra to get ahead, or something happens that we cannot control that requires busting back ends to repair or improve and most of us are very willing to work hard when needed. Or we will work hard when we can truly benefit from our efforts or it creates true achievement at work. It is the totally over reaching requirements of keeping up with people that do not accomplish anything, but give off the appearance of working hard. And there are way too many people like this in the workplace. Or the unreasonable demands that some businesses or people within the business create that may get them ahead a bit more than others, but the amount of work by others to get there is not worth the effort even for the company’s bottom line. There are true successful people who work hard and we should respect. For this discussion’s sake I am not talking people dedicating them self to a goal, but people who overrun the larger organizations and the effect of the work they create is not that productive.

So take into account just these two factors, the unnecessary (and I hope you recognize what I mean by unnecessary) work load and the overcompensation of trying to spend time with our children, but never really connecting with them and then add on the extra pressure of what happened to many of our families in the last recession and this has created a vacuum of a family in which our children are growing up. There is a shell that exists, but internally we have lost touch with ourselves. And of course this is not all families, but if you spend enough time observing you can see what is happening.

And this phenomenon is not new and over the last couple of decades there have been some articles, reports etc. that discuss the decline of the family. And these articles discuss some causes and possible solutions. Many deal with how we can better interact with our children. Yet as the generations go by, it becomes harder and harder to interact with your children if you were not raised in an environment that did not have strong bonds and a good foundation. And many of these families were not bad families, just lost touch with the most basic of fundamental interactions that parents and children should have.

Add on the current trend to towards technology, isolation, peer pressure amongst both adults and children to be seen as successful, and a host of other social factors and how do children learn what is a family and how to be part of one.

We are losing one of the most valuable commodities the human race has and that is parents raising and being a positive influence in their children’s lives. And the good news is, many families want to have some type of relationship. They want to create the environment that does create strong, self-respecting children that are able to interact with the world in a positive way. This is why they over compensate with the activities or work the extra hours trying to get extra money to spend or save for college etc. or working to get ahead to have a better life for their children.

Do we go back to the 1950’s ideal of having one parent working and one at home? And I am trying to be a bit modern by not defining these roles by male at work and female at home. There are some males that could be good stay at home parents and some females may want super careers. And if you look at wanting to have your children in a wide range of activities, just for planning and logistic purposes it would help to have one parent being a full time parent. The other should be involved, but having the dedicated person at home does give the children a foundation and needed stability. The benefits are enormous. Benefits such as values, security, and sense of self-worth that children need to develop in their formative years come from a parent being there as they grow up. And this is especially true if the parent grew up in a positive environment.

And if this is reinforced from generation to generation, the strength of our country actually grows. And this is not a pipe dream, however, to achieve this goal we do need to redirect some of the thinking in our society.

So this is actually the first of a few posts I am going to write off and on for the next week or so to hopefully create a sense of possibility and offer some practical ideas to recreate or reenergize the desire to rebuild the importance and the structure of family. Most will attempt to be practical ideas to build a society that allows for the family to come back into prominence and importance in our country. To me this is one of the building blocks of a great culture and country. I may throw in a post or so of other items as I go along, but overall I plan on dedicating some time to adding a positive direction to the discussion of family in general.

Who is strong/strong leader?

Now that the Republican Party’s Presidential hopefuls are already in full gear, the topic of being a strong leader will become a major talking point for the various candidates. We are going to hear all sorts of definitions of what is a strong leader and why they consider themselves that person.

Is it really a dog eat dog world? Are the winners winners and the losers losers? Can we define who is the strongest by who is on top? What is a strong leader amongst strong leaders? How all the candidates plan to address this is going to be interesting. And of course all of them will be comparing themselves to Hillary Clinton and how much stronger of a leader they are going to be than her. So yeah, we are going to get the irony of a bunch of men trying to prove they are stronger than a woman.

And before you go off and say are you too machismo here. I do believe there are strong woman and woman who can lead countries. I didn’t always agree with Margaret Thatcher, but I always admired her. Germany’s Merkel is doing well as a leader. You can argue with her about Greece policy or other policies, but you cannot disagree she is leading Germany. And there are other good examples such as Indira Ghandi in India and Golda Meir in Israel. This is not going to be a discussion of man vs woman though. I do feel that Hillary Clinton is not a strong leader. So for me the probable comparison mentioned above is going to be a bit more comedic.

The real discussion that won’t be brought up is how can you prove yourself to be strong. There will be some boisterous talk and some of the candidates that are governors or were governors will bring some examples of how they led their state. And some of it will have some credence to it.

The candidates that can talk about how they create opportunity for all or have come up fighting for opportunities for all and experienced truly overcoming obstacles have the best start at the topic. This to me is the first test. And I am not talking about the ones born with silver spoons in their mouth not overcoming obstacles, I am talking about the ones who can truly prove they understand the importance of being successful while competing against all in an equal playing field. This is true strength.

As regular readers know I have been very critical of those who buy the government to create the rules that only benefit themselves. They are some of the most poisonous people to our constitution’s foundations and values on the planet. There are external enemies that we can identify, but it is this internal manipulation that is just as dangerous. Basically too much of our electorate has a blind eye to this problem.

And these are some of the weakest people on the planet. Why? This is because they try to eliminate the playing field. You cannot call yourself a leader if you spend more time trying to eliminate or prevent competition than actually competing. Yes it is good you won, but competition is ongoing. True leaders or people who are truly strong are not afraid of change, not afraid to keep fighting the good fight so they become better leaders. Once you reach a point where you don’t want others to have a chance you are no longer a leader. If the only answer you want to hear to a problem is your answer you are doing more harm than good to yourself, your organization, or whatever is your responsibility.

You will hear some people say the humble people are weak. You need to learn the difference between being humble than someone who may just acquiesce. Here is the sports analogy. Would you rather have Kobe Bryant or Tim Duncan on your team? Most people will probably say either, some will be smart and say it depends who else is on the team meaning which person either fits in better or do you need a guard or a forward. Yet think about which team has a longer lasting success rate right now. The big difference is Tim leads by example, he does have high expectations for his teammates and communicates this, he does not hold himself above others nor puts himself first above the interests of the organization. Yes Kobe has been successful, but now that he is past his prime his behavior of putting himself first is hurting his team, where Tim is finding ways to continue to be successful. The Spurs always competed, worked to find the best team within the competition and now everyone wants to be a Spur. This is strong leadership. Yes they win and looks like they are going to win for a long time even after Tim Duncan retires. This is successful leadership by him and the organization. Yet Tim never talks about himself. He has always been humble in his success and attitude. This is an example that being humble is not being weak. Hopefully this example shows that you being humble is a trait of being truly strong. A person does not need to tell me they are great, their actions and life prove it to me.

You hear everyone say change is good. Is it? Well yes, but this gets more lip service than action. Leadership knows times change. If you want to move your organization forward you need to adapt to a changing world. And unfortunately change became a buzz word that hides people trying not to change. Have you ever been in an organization where you say the more things change the more they stay the same? Sometimes this is just the case of an organization with a large bureaucracy. They just can’t change without something radical happen, but they try. The difference is when problems are not solvable by the current methods of doing business and you keep the course or keep the same action plan. No one wants to step up and be the leader, sometimes because the organization is run by leaders who use fear as their power source. IE do my biding or don’t have a job. These organizations eventually fail and take everyone down with them. The organizations that can change and adapt are the ones that thrive.

Which leads to the next point. The leaders who can hear new ideas from others are the ones that survive. No one person has all the answers, much less all the right answers. Even I have to admit that to myself once every blue moon. And my kids will confirm that more than I care to admit. Leadership is driving the ship and using all the resources not to hit the iceberg or end up in an unplanned destination. Strength is being able to listen to others, truly listen to others at all times and not when it suits you. You will hear the phrase that person only has yes men; so what do they learn. Unfortunately having no contrarians on the staff is one of your own worst enemies.

Will any of the candidates in the next year plus talk about leadership in these terms? I doubt it, however, I put this out there for you to maybe read between their lines to see if any of our current candidates have these qualities. Folks I mean truly look at them for these and other qualities. Don’t just think your guy or gal is a leader just because you want them to be. That is one of the great obstacles of the people following the leader. It goes back to the old children’s story, does the emperor truly have on clothes? Be the child. Funny how the child had the less fear of anyone in the story. What does that say about us as adults?

And what am I asking you to look for in a leader: Do not be afraid to question. Are they true to their words? Are they afraid of competition or are they competing in an artificial environment? Can they understand that tomorrow will not be the same as today? Can they adapt? Will they adapt? Who is the most important person in their world? Is it them? Or is it you? How do you know if it is you? Review their past actions, not their words. Who do they listen to? Or are they even listening to anyone? Where do they get their answers? How varied are the answers they are receiving?

The people who try to manipulate their environment or the environment in general are the ones who weaken us all. It is their failings that cause them to manipulate us. We have to be on guard. Or on guard for the ones who create artificial or superficial strength as an image. Remember when T Roosevelt said speak lightly and yield a big stick. Sometimes strength is knowing when not to use the big stick also.

Strength comes in a variety of ways and from a variety of people, but many times it is not from the person telling you they are strong. Now some people will talk about sacrifice as a characteristic of a strong leader and I do not disagree, but I left it out of this discussion for now. For now I would ask you look to yourself, to ask yourself, what do I expect from a leader? I ask you search to find what truly works, not what you are told works.

We are the United States and we are about to do something very few people in the history of the world has ever had the opportunity to do. We can honestly affect the world in a very positive way as the people of a country. We have the opportunity not to be led, but lead by who we choose. The world has many problems that need to be overcome. We can be blind and choose like we are told or we can tear up the status quo to keep the great experiment of democracy going and choose someone who can actually find the right paths this century is demanding we follow.

Unfortunately I do not see that person in our current crop of potential candidates from either the Democrats or Republicans. Hopefully I am wrong or hopefully someone chooses the reality instead of the image and crawls their way out of the madness we are about to partake called the Presidential election and stand up as a true leader.

What say you?

“What a long (not so) strange trip its’ been……..”*

Well we weren’t truckin’ off to Buffalo, but we just did spend the last week or so on the road.

Much has happened while on the road and I even made a quick post and misspelled a word writing in a hurry which definitely changed the meaning of the post: liar vs lair; it is corrected now. Anyway was there for a very short time and we only spent a few dollars and it only went indirectly to the man who wants to be a king maker. Youngest daughter use to watch the Cake Boss religiously so we had to buy some treats there.

And Happy Belated Fourth to everyone. I hope yours was safe and fun. Apparently there were some gruesome tales out there for some people.

And belated congratulations to the USA Women’s soccer team. I got to see that game and was in disbelief about how fast that game started. I wasn’t even settling in when the first goal was scored. Great job Ladies.

The trip was great, name a desert and we were probably in it at some point this past ten days. Much ado about family and friends on this trip. We had a great time. Our youngest was at an event for a week and we picked her up as the trip got started and she had done well and came home with accolades for parents to brag heavily about.
We went through Phoenix, San Diego, Las Vegas, El Paso, and South Padre. Actually went through much more, but these were the stops where we saw people and did things. Spent Fourth of July on South Padre with family so it was a great way to end this maddening drive around the Southwest.

Tons of happenings: Greece, Donald Trump, NBA free agency, and much more, but unfortunately no time to talk this evening, more family events around the household today.

We did want to stop by a Trump property and take a salutary photo, but luckily we didn’t since I try to present a positive approach to problems.
So for Mr. Trump and all the individuals like him I have this thought of the day.
We weren’t created so others can hold us back from our potential.

*And thanks to the Grateful Dead for all their wonderful music over the years.

Riddle this

I am in the lair of one of the super 1 percent. You know, where they come to beg money to be President. Where am I