The Finish Line

Yesterday a good friend past away after a long struggle with cancer. He was in his early 70's and, if you knew Tom, his vitality always belied his age. It is at times like these that we reflect upon our own lives, how we have lived them and the inevitable that we all face. I have learned much with past experiences such as this and, from the example set by the good people who I have watched live out their lives, I have received some valuable guidance in how I should live out my life.

Finding Your Calling

I believe that everyone can be good at something. With sufficient effort we can fashion a career around that something and make us a living. But that is not what I mean by a calling. A calling requires passion, devotion, and commitment. Most of us are committed to our careers but not passionate about them. They provide us the income we need to support ourselves and families but, at the end of the day, it is still just a job. With a calling you think about it when you are not at work, you proudly identify with it and talk excitedly with others about your passion. You look forward to each day, regardless of the challenges you know you will face, and the day passes quickly because you are engaged. Most callings serve a higher purpose than just ourselves and satisfaction is derived from serving that purpose. The riches from fulfilling your calling are usually not monetary but spiritual.

Retirement

I hear my contemporaries talking about when they will retire, what they will do when they do retire and worrying about having enough money to live on when they do. Sadly, many of them have had to readjust their plans due to the meltdown of the stock market last year. It seems to be a major discussion point for the 55 and older crowd. The decision I have made makes most of the worry moot: I don't plan to retire. As long as I enjoy what I am doing and my health allows me to continue working that is what I am going to do. Obviously outside factors can change all of these plans but I anticipate a demand for my services as long as I can perform them. I still continue to save and invest but, since I don't ever expect my income to go to zero, building that huge nest egg to retire on is not so big a worry. As with Tom, I learned from a neighbor years ago about retirement. Howard died at the age of 97, but sold real estate up into his 90's. He was passionate about it, was always selling, and was a knowledge base for anyone that wanted to know about rural real estate in Caldwell County. He didn't even start drawing his social security until age 72! Even living as long as he did I doubt he got back a very good return on it as he had to keep paying in. But that wasn't important to him. His missions in life were selling and serving God.

The Nineteenth Hole

In golf the nineteenth hole is usually the club house or bar where the players go after the completion of their round. There the guys drink and analyze their play, the good shots becoming great and the bad shots are forgotten. I see life much the same. After your life is over an accounting of your good deeds and not-so-good ones is made and your faithfulness to God is evaluated. The difference is that golf is just a game and you can always go play another round. In life, however there are no mulligans! You play life for keeps and how you play it will determine how you will spend eternity. So for me I choose to live each day as if it were my last because none of us know if we will have an opportunity to atone for bad behavior tomorrow. If I did die tonight in my sleep I am content that I have given my best by my family, my community and to God and know that whatever comes in the hereafter I am ready for it.

Now before my atheist/agnostic children protest too much it is really all about faith. We all believe in something, be it science or, God forbid, His Highness Obama. You can spend until your last day trying to debunk it but you won't change many minds. I will take my faith in God and, if I am wrong, oh well.

So I take comfort that good men like Tom and Howard are with God and that I will be when my days are over. I love life, recognizing that each day is a gift not to be wasted. More importantly, it is a gift that should be shared with as many people as you can. So share a little happiness.

The Pursuit of Happiness

Recent articles have been published about the unhappiness of women. To paraphrase, women are less happy than men and less happy than women 40 years ago. As opportunities for women increased exponentially over the last 40 years their unhappiness has grown. This was not supposed to be the outcome!

I am no expert on women but I do know something about happiness. I have been a student of my own happiness for 58 years and have observe many people in their pursuits. I have bouts with unhappiness frequently but manage to beat it back by putting it in perspective. So based on my experience and observations alone I think I can explain why women are having such a difficult time achieving happiness.

Let's start with expectations for men and women 40 years ago. The women's movement was just beginning and nobody but the relatively small group of activists saw much opportunity for women other than traditional career paths : teacher, nurse, housewife, mother. The few women that went to college majored in Home Economics or Education with the primary purpose being to find a husband. The focus in business, politics and life in general was on men, primarily white men, and women had a supportive, behind the scenes role. This was how their mother's lives were and most women were happy with it. The men of that day worked hard, left the child rearing to the mothers, and provided a good life for his family. Their identities were intact as long as each accepted the responsibility of their roles.

Fast forward 40 years. Women today were taught that they can choose any career path they wanted. They outnumber men in college and are aggressively competing head-to-head with men and winning jobs traditionally performed by men. Corner offices have more women than ever and political offices are won by an increasing number of women. Sounds like pretty significant changes in a relatively short period of time. So what is the problem?

EXPECTATIONS!!!!

Along the way these gains have instilled a level of expectations in women that are hard to meet. In business they are battling the "good ole boy" system that works against them. They work hard to compete for the promotions but are at a disadvantage because most of the bosses are older men that secretly think women should be home taking care of the kids. They are forced to make a choice between career and children and when they choose children they are put at a disadvantage because of the demands of the dual responsibility. The frustration that grows from the achievement of their expectations and goals result in unhappiness. This bleeds over to their family life as they see their family responsibilities as impediments to their goals. They are experiencing the pressures that men have traditionally experienced. Men were told to "take it like a man" so they dealt with it introspectively.

As I see it life is a decision tree and as you make choices and take off on a new branch you have to reevaluate your expectations, goals, and definition of happiness. How many of us are doing what we expected to do when we graduated high school? Many of us had lofty ambitions of being a doctor, lawyer or President of the U.S. We were never short on idealism but were short on realism. I went from wanting to be a lawyer in high school, then a band director when I started college. I got a degree in accounting, became a C.P.A., a chief financial officer, and currently a nursing home administrator. Go figure!! At each point a decision was made whether to pursue the current path or make a change. Some changes were very practical; you can starve on a band director's salary when you are trying to support a family. That is the pivotal point in most people's lives and changes your perspective tremendously. When you decide, or life decides for you, to have a family your definition of happiness changes dramatically. All of a sudden it is not all about you but also about your spouse and children. Their happiness supersedes yours for the rest of your life. After the kids are educated and have families of their own you get a little self-centered but you are there if they need you.

Even people who are "happy" deal with frustration, challenges, disappointment, and failure. That's life. I look forward to going to work each day because of the greater purpose I am serving and those challenges and idiots I must deal with are the price I pay to serve that purpose. At the end of the day I can reflect on what I did and feel good about it. I believe that is a key, if there is one, to happiness.

There have been many positive things come from the women's movement of the 70's. I believe their contributions in all fields have enhanced our country. Apparently this problem is just a by-product of its success.

Career Counseling

In the past week there have been revelations that a couple of "conservative activists" pulled a scam on some employees at ACORN offices. In the scam the couple, posing as a prostitute and her pimp, seek assistance from the good folks at ACORN to establish their business in each community. Of course they videotape the whole thing including advice on how to conduct their activities and avoid the IRS and the local constabulary. The count to date are five of the ACORN offices across the country have had employees implicated. There is no telling what the final count will be as it appears that they have an endless number of employees familiar with pimpin' and hoin'.

ACORN, a community activist group, entered the national spotlight during the campaign last year. In reality they have been a major player in Democrat Party politics since 1994, receiving over $53 million from the federal government, presumably to activate the the community. They registered dead people to vote, made up names and registered them, and became very creative in pursuit of their purpose. So creative a number of their employees have been indicted for voter fraud during the last election. These allegations have been going on for years but are just now beginning to grow legs. The Senate really has their panties in a wad over this and are making all sorts of noise about cutting off federal funds from the organization. Whether this will happen to one of the president's favorite group remains to be seen. I'm sure if they do it will be because the senators are a bunch of racists. Just ask Jimmy Carter.

Just so you don't think I'm making this up here is an article from the NY Post:

The two conservative activists who captured ACORN employees giving advice on the sex trade and money-laundering only play a pimp and prostitute on video.

In real life, Hannah Giles, 20, isn't a lady of the night. She's a minister's daughter studying journalism at Florida International University.

And James E. O'Keefe III, 25, a Fordham MBA student from New Jersey, isn't a pimp so much as a provocateur -- determined to expose what he sees as the hypocrisies and moral lapses of liberals by employing their own tactics against them.

The pair met last year on Facebook after O'Keefe posted his own gotcha videos, showing Planned Parenthood employees agreeing to his request to earmark his donations for the abortions of African-American babies.

William Farrington

UNMASKED: Hannah Giles and James O'Keefe are the conservative activists who posed as a pimp and hooker to sting ACORN.

After Giles proposed the ACORN video-sting idea, O'Keefe -- who started making the videos while a student at Rutgers University -- pounced on it. "Why go after ACORN?" Giles asked. "Because I love America, I love God, and corrupt institutions don't help that."

After six weeks of research, Giles said they scavenged together their costumes from friends, except for the pimp coat, which was on loan from O'Keefe's grandmother.

In total, the project cost them $1,300.

They did the job entirely on their own and paid for it themselves, they said.

The two never became romantically involved, Giles said. "We're too good as business partners for that -- and besides, he has a girlfriend," she said.

O'Keefe contends their tactics are "the future of activism and investigative reporting."

"This is now my full-time job," he said.

Okay. So now we now grandma was fronting the operation by supplying the pimp coat. Either that is one bodacious grandma or O'Keefe was one goofy looking pimp! And Giles, the mastermind of the project, utilized all the skills learned in Sunday school to get over on these street savvy ACORN employees. And what about his "posse"? Everyone knows a good pimp always travels with one to help him keep the ho's in line. The only reason I can think that these employees were fooled was that O'Keefe had a very pimped out ride that defined his "pimphood".

Enough fun for now. It really would be funny if this was some penny-ante organization that would die of embarrassment and go away. The problem is that they are not and, with the political connections they have, they will continue to spend our tax dollars giving such career counseling advice. I just hope that they continue to be duped by such people as Giles and O'Keefe. The entertainment value is priceless!

The Politics of Race

Unless you have been in a hole the past week you are familiar with a couple of incidents that occurred that are prime examples of how the race card is being played. The first happened during Obama's 489th speech on health care reform, this one before a joint session of Congress. When he started waxing poetic about how illegal aliens would not be able to participate in the reform package a little known congressman from South Carolina shouted "you lie"! The second was the Tea Party in Washington, D.C. this past weekend. This was a protest rally of somewhere between 20,000 and 2,000,000 people, depending on who is telling the story. They were protesting runaway government spending and the plans to co-opt the health care system in favor of something "better". The common denominator in both occasion was white people were protesting; Joe Wilson and the Tea Party folks.

Wait a minute, I thought that when we elected a black president that racism would be dead. That Barack Obama being half black and half white would transcend race and bring us all together as Americans. What we learned this past week is that because Joe Wilson is white he must be a racist. And because most of the Tea Party people are white that they must be criticizing him because he is black and are therefore, racists.

Well I am glad I have this straight. So when Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton criticized George Bush they must have been racists. And when La Raza criticized him they were racists as well. What, you can't be a racists unless you are white? I never heard them or Louis Farrakhan being called racists for the vile way they referred to whites so it must be that way. I guess the race card can only be played one way!

Seriously, the only people bringing up race in the discussion are the Obama supporters and their willing sycophants in the media. So it can't be that his ideas and plans are bad it is that the white man wants to keep the black man down. How 1950's can you get!!!!

Barack Obama is being challenged on the issues and is getting his butt kicked. Like any man on the losing end of an argument he (and his people) are resorting to personal attacks. There is nothing more feared by a white person than to be adjudged a racist. It is an attack against which there is no defense. If accused you are guilty unless you can get a minority to come to your defense, and then they are attacked for being a "Tom".

Is there racism in this country? Of course and it goes both ways. But that is not the point. These claims are disingenuous and are being thrown out to deflect the valid criticism of his proposals. I had hoped that we had gotten past this but I guess that is too much to hope for.

Where Does The Truth Lie?

I watched the much-anticipated speech by Obama to a joint session of Congress tonight and was underwhelmed. It sounded like the same song-and-dance we heard during the campaign with little specifics. He is going to make insurance companies cover preexisting conditions, he is going to keep them from canceling your insurance if you get sick, he is going to provide competition with a public option that will drive down health care costs, blah, blah, blah........

Obviously he decided the "American taxpayers are a bunch of morons so they will buy anything I tell them" approach worked with the election so why not with health care reform? For about an hour he kept shoveling it and his lackeys in Congress just kept lapping it up. His crusade against the evil insurance companies (he is laying off doctors for now) would have us believe that some incarnation of Hitler is running them with the purpose of taking your money and then dropping you in the dirt if you try to use the insurance.

Then when it was all over the Republicans trot out this doctor/congressman from Louisiana for their response. This guy had the delivery of a wounded seagull scrapping for trash off a barge. It was not pretty!

Here are a few things our president didn't bring up that might address the problem with health care costs:

1. Tort reform. One of the driving forces behind the soaring medical costs is defensive medicine being practiced because of the threat of litigation. Doctors order more tests than really necessary because they know some snake-assed lawyer is waiting to ruin his life if he doesn't. Are there bad doctors treating patients everyday? Absolutely! Are these multi-million dollar jury awards justified? In most cases no. Outrageous civil awards lead to higher insurance premiums and discourage a doctor from practicing practical medicine. If a doctor doesn't prescribe a medication for cholesterol and you have a heart attack are you going to sue him? But then there is a defect in the medication and he and the drug company get sued for that! It is like running a gauntlet.

2. The Medicare and Medicaid systems. Probably the biggest area of waste and fraud in the health care arena can be attributed to the ineffectiveness of these government programs. Billions of dollars are shifted around as political payback to this interest group or that with legislation crafted in the dark to screw the less favored group. So much effort is put into navigating the channels of these bloated institutions that such incidentals as patient care are addressed after the required documentation is perfected.

3. Slimy politicians. How can we trust these idiots with anything this important based on their recent performance? The Democrats are such sycophants and the Republicans are the most spineless I have ever seen. They let staffers write the legislation (with the help of lobbyists) and then are too lazy to read it. Their performance at the town halls this summer demonstrated how inept they are. As the "Cash for Clunkers" program illustrated these people are out of touch and cannot manage anything.

So buckle up because it is probably going to get ugly. All he managed to do was to make his opponents dig in deeper. I can't imagine that he changed any minds. Certainly not mine!

The Hearts and Minds of Our Youth

There has been significant discussion during the past week about the president broadcasting a speech into the classrooms across the country. This event is scheduled to happen tomorrow, the first day of school for many of our children. That is, unless you live in Texas where they have been back for two weeks. While it is not unusual for a president to go to a classroom to speak to children I am not sure one has done it on such a nationwide scale. What turned this into a national discussion where it should not have been is the approach the president used. His Education Secretary, Arne Duncan, and his minions decided that they would "enhance" this opportunity by providing a "lesson plan" for teachers to use in conjunction with the speech. The lesson plan sought the assistance of these youngsters and smacked of indoctrination rather than the pep talk it was purported to be.

As you might imagine the right wingers, who see Barack Obama as the Anti-Christ or worse, got their panties in a bunch and likened this with Hitler in the 1930's. Schools across the nation are fretting about whether to allow the broadcast and getting parental permission to let the children see it. The result of the uproar was to get the lesson plan pulled and make the speech more of a media event than it ever would have been otherwise. Just what Obama needs, more opportunities for the fawning press to give him free media exposure! The release of the transcript of this speech today is more anticipated than what he will say to the joint session of Congress Wednesday night.

In general I think it is much ado about nothing. Anytime a public figure such as the president speaks to school children about working and studying hard, how they are the future of this country, and instill some sense of responsibility into them should be welcomed. Politics aside, Barack Obama is an icon of hope for those in the minority communities. An example of the possibilities for their future. If an hour of class time will inspire some of these children to break the cycle of poverty and ignorance in their communities I am all for it. Let's face it he has to be a better role model than some tattooed hip-hop star or athlete that lives a "gansta livestyle". It is kind of sad that they don't have parents to serve as role models but maybe they will for their children.

No, I haven't gone over to the dark side, just being pragmatic. I still believe Obama has designs on changing our country for the worse and will point this out every occasion I can. But I believe the demonizing has elevated him to a level of evil that is not reality. He is not the Boogie Man and will not eat your children when they go to sleep! He is a self-absorbed, arrogant, liberal/socialist that thinks giving good teleprompter will line us up like the children behind the Pied Piper. I believe the Health Care reform initiative has illustrated this is not the case. He and his socialist agenda WILL be defeated because this country is not ready to go down his path! Let's not give him more credit than he is due!