American debt

There have been movies from time to time that are based upon the premise of a town or city going broke and selling itself to a person. Silly! How could anyone buy a town? In the movies the buyer always comes in and saves the day, just like Super Man. We all enjoy seeing a movie where everything turns out well don't we? Lets turn that fantasy into modern day reality and change it from buying a town into buying an entire country. Is it possible or even imaginable?

Puerto Rico is not one of the United States, it is a "possession." It is my understanding that the United States does not collect much in the way of taxes from Puerto Rico or its citizens (who are also deemed as US citizens). However, the United States pours billions of dollars into supporting that country. Does that mean we bought it? How does that work with American Samoa or other "possessions"? How much do these possessions cost us each year, what are the payments? When will we have them paid off? Do we own them or are we simply renting these countries? What would happen if we stopped making those payments? What would we lose anyway?

When I buy a car I consider it an expenditure, not an investment. When the expense is greater than the benefit I get rid of it. But when I get a good one I hang on to it and enjoy the ride. What benefit is there in owning a country if the expense exceeds that benefit? What benefit does China, Japan or any other country receive for buying up so much of American debt? Will they eventually own enough of us to the point where we are citizens of their countries? Will we eventually not have to pay taxes but receive all sorts of free benefits? I don't know how this "owning a country" stuff works. Maybe its a way to get sports stars. What are we worth exactly?

Sacrifice or whining or fraud

I was just thinking about some of the things I heard on the news. Are we becoming desensitized to the true meaning of certain words? Are they overused for the sake of shock and awe? I was just wondering. Sacrifice for example. Just what does sacrifice mean nowadays? Way back in history virgins were sacrificed to appease some sort of deity. That's not done so often anymore is it? A few years back on September 11th hundreds of people sacrificed their own safety to save others. Every day soldiers, police and firefighters are sacrificing so much with little or no fan fare. Fathers and mothers are working untold hours for minimum wages with little or no health coverage, following the loss of their regular, well paying jobs and sacrificing their own wants and needs to help their kids achieve a better life. We read from time to time about one person sacrificing one of their own kidneys to save someone else who's kidneys aren't working. That's always been my definition of real sacrifice. In these times of financial difficulty for most of us, when it's hard enough to pay our bills let alone the ever increasing taxes and fees to local, state and Federal government agencies, there is much talk of the "sacrifice" of those people being paid from the very taxes we are struggling to pay. Such as: Receiving a reduced cost of living increase in pay. Having to pay 10 or 20% of their health coverage. Having to buy some of their own supplies. Getting fewer days off when they work less than nine and a half months a year in the first place. Some people who are able in every way to support themselves physically ands mentally are forced to sacrifice their lifelong dependency on tax supported programs by having to work for pay. I realize I may not totally understand the concept surrounding the difficulties endured through these individual "sacrifices" here but still, I'm just wondering if we may, just may be using the word sacrifice improperly sometimes.

Another, somewhat related, tax supported thing I was wondering about was our child tax credits. That is a credit a wage earner receives for having kids and earning less than a specified amount. In some families it amounts to several thousands of dollars. 4, 5 or 6 thousand or more. Wage earners who are working in the United States illegally, have no social security numbers and are not authorized in any way to work in the United States can use what the IRS calls an "individual taxpayer identification" number to receive that tax credit of thousands of dollars, often fraudulently. Amounting to around 4.2 billion dollars a year in our tax strapped economy with 14.5 trillion dollars of debt. Senator Orrin Hatch wants to examine a put an end to those refunds to illegal workers. I don't understand all the workings of government or have the golden key to solve all our financial problems but I think that if we paid 10 million dollars to a group of investigators with the authority to stop fraud and misappropriation of our tax monies in all branches of government we could save billions and billions of dollars, perhaps a trillion in a year or two. That'd be a good investment I think. But the people that did it certainly wouldn't be making any new friends doing it. No, I don't think they would.

Meanwhile, I will do my best not to overuse the word sacrifice or take any fraudulent tax credits or spend money taken from overworked tax payers. If we don't all start doing that there will be no one left working to pay the taxes for all those poor people who sacrifice so much. How does that old saying go?: "Will the last one out please turn off the lights?"

Rain, fun, lightning, writing and being alone

What a pleasant surprise this morning to wake up to a lightning display filling the night skies with a cacophony of fireworks crossing this way and that. Rain pounding the windows and thunder rolling like drums through the darkness. Why in the world I am so fond of these natural wonders goes too far back in my childhood to remember exactly. But, I think perhaps it may be connected with what my folks had us do when torrential storms came. After the threat of lightning passed it was our job as kids to go outside and jump into and splash around in the puddles and temporary rivers, be they in the yard or in the streets. It was exhilarating, refreshing and a welcome relief from the summer heat. When the storms come now I can almost feel the excitement I felt back then. I guess maybe that's it. Whatever, I enjoy summer storms, particularly at night. During the day, one of my greatest pleasures is riding my bicycle in the rain. However, do to a close encounter with a random bolt of lightning hitting a telephone pole just a few feet away from me on one occasion I keep my riding to a minimum when I hear thunder. I can still feel the electricity going into my feet and lower legs resting in a puddle, the numbness in my ears from the loud cracking when it hit and the lingering smell of burning ozone strong enough to tickle the inside of my nose. Still, there is a subtle thrill connected with the whole lightning and rain storm thing.

Today will end with the beginning of a three day holiday weekend. I'm not used to two days off in a row let alone three. Should I plan every minute so as not to waste them or should I fly by the seat of my pants and enjoy the spontaneity of no structure whatsoever? If I was going to be alone for three days I would absolutely not plan at all, I'd just go with the flow. Meet new people, do new things I'd never heard of or considered before, taste new food, go somewhere I've never been, take a nap under a tree somewhere in the middle of the day and savor the experience. A close relative of mine has traveled the world and he has some stories to tell about those travels. Some of the most exciting and thrilling are those unplanned times saturated with the element of surprise. I am not a world traveler but I am certainly up for that element of surprise thing sometime over this weekend. We'll have to see if I manage to have any alone time. I am very comfortable being alone, maybe that is the one thing I should plan eh? Go splash in a puddle in the street maybe. Of course, if I do that I should be ready for a trip in the police cruiser to the hospital for an evaluation too. That'd sure be a new experience.

Fishing, hunting and canoodling

Reach under a dead log in the river and pull out a catfish! That's what canoodling is all about I guess. At least according to a news feature on TV in the twilight hours this morning. I thought I was dreaming but there it was on the screen. Some guy reaching down into the muddy waters of some river in the South somewhere. He pulls out this huge cat fish he grabbed by the bottom lip. Of course that fish was not wanting much to be made into dinner for this guys family so it was squirming all over the place, but to no avail. He's probably cut into a hundred nuggets, deep fried and digested by now. I think you've got to hand it to those folks for figuring out how to still get fish when they aren't biting on a fishing line in the middle of the hot summer. Downright ingenious! In my opinion. Short of the fact that copper head snakes also lay in the places too that is. The same program covered shooting feral hogs from a helicopter too. I thought there must be too much expense involved in that one. Grabbing a fish is free. I like the free part, that sort of thing we can all participate in.

Over the years the things we are able to do around this neck of the woods has changed. The TV news I just mentioned was mostly concerned about how the laws in the South that were changed to allow those two pursuits. People have done them for years but now they are legal as well. Up North here the laws are usually made to restrict what we do. I used to be able to herd cat fish and suckers up a creek and hit them onto shore with a baseball bat for harvesting for food or fertilizer. We didn't have to worry about grabbing snakes either. I'm thinking that would be way outside of the law these days. I wouldn't necessarily be the one canoodling anywhere but I'd really like the fact that it was legal. I honestly don't know what exactly is legal and what isn't any more when it comes to putting some fish or game on the table. I wonder if some of those folks that make the laws ever did any fishing or hunting of their own.

Lions, tigers, bears, snakes and people too

A few years back someone scheduled a female comedian to sing the national anthem at a baseball game. She scratched and spit and made fun of baseball and the players. People were so aghast at such a disrespectful spectacle. Her response, "What'd they expect, I'm a comedian." I agree.

There is a story from the past about a guy walking up a mountain, just above the freeze line he comes across a snake dying from the cold. "Please sir, wrap me in your cloak and carry me down to the warm place below or I will certainly die." The guys says, "You are a snake, if I put you in my cloak you will bite me and I will die." The snake replies, "No, I will not bite you, you are saving my life." The guy relents, picks up the freezing snake, wraps him in his cloak and carries him down to the warm place farther down the mountain. When the guy pulls the snake out to place him on the ground the snake bites him and fills him with poisonous venom. As he is laying on the ground dying the guys asks the snake, "Why did you bite me? I saved your life and you promised not to bite." As he slowly writhed away, the snake looked back and said, "You knew I was a snake! What did you expect?"

There was a guy who lived up in Alaska and hung around with Grizzly bears, he did it for years. He felt that they were misunderstood and he knew the secret to getting along with grizzly bears. I saw a picture of what those misunderstood grizzly bears did to him when they got tired of being understood. They had a picnic. It was terrible. A popular lion tamer with an act in Los Vegas was attacked by one of his lions or maybe it was a tiger but either way he was almost killed. This guy wasn't surprised though. He was almost killed has been physically maimed for the rest of his life. His response, "He's a wild cat. I knew it could happen and it did, It wasn't the cat's fault."

Throughout life we all come face to face with people that have shown themselves to be lions, tigers, bears or snakes. We hear stories of how this person did this or did that. "But I trusted them!" We say. A person was sitting on the witness stand, the prosecutor asked her, "You've lied time after time all through this trial. Why should we believe you now?" The witness answered, "Because this time I'm telling then truth."??????

I think it's good to remember that:
A grizzly bear is better off being understood from a distance.
A snake is better off being allowed to die in the snow than to bite you where its' warm.
A comedian is better off not singing the national anthem.
A liar is better off not being trusted, ever.

In our dealings with people in politics, religion, relationships, and families we may wish to remember that if they look, talk and act like a snake, bear, tiger or lion, they probably are. It's more important that we understand that than if they are understood. Yeah, I think so.

Snake Oil salesmen

Just because something pops up on your screen when you're using the Internet don't bet on it being legitimate. We all know and understand that right? An ad just flashed across the screen this morning filled with wonderful ways to save money and get cheap financing on homes in "Neraska." Yesterday it was "We have ways you wish need to buys expensive goods less money and save." That one sure got me all ways excited to need.

Long before any of us were born, there were traveling "snake oil" salesmen. They sold alcohol or codeine laced, natural medicines for relief of anything from the miseries to arthritis. In truth, they probably offered some very welcome relief through their numbing affects. At a buck a bottle it was a deal back then. But now, in these days of Nigerian scams running rampant and the news filled with stories of trusted employees getting arrested for embezzlement on an every day basis it makes me wonder. At least a person could probably guess if someone was a snake oil salesman or not. Today with the obscurity of electronic media it's kind of difficult sometimes. And, rest assured if one of us attempts to take advantage of some scheme that promises to get us rich quick we will most certainly be losing way more than a buck.

This all came to a head yesterday when an acquaintance showed me a copy of the email he just received stating he won an Irish sweepstakes lottery he hadn't even entered. It was almost a miracle because he could sure use the cash right now. All he had to do was send $1400 to this special tax account to pay the taxes due and they will transfer the $1,560,000 into his personal account. "Wow! It sounds too good to be true", I said. He said "yeah it does but sometimes things like this just fall into your lap." We had a real serious talk. I am hopeful he doesn't send the $1400. Quite a few words in the email were misspelled by the way. Just in case you were wondering. And, the bank was in Nigeria. Irish sweepstakes my........................Be vigilant.

What happened to Sunday?

This morning, before the sun rose I was startled by a strange, loud, very irritating noise. I went outside into the dim predawn light and had a look around. A neighbor a few doors down had a table saw in his driveway and was cutting up some 2X4's and plywood panels by a floodlight on his garage....................Am I that out of touch with the times that I didn't catch the part about Sunday morning no longer being a time to respect your neighbors quiet time whatever they may choose to use it for? I suppose it was bound to happen what with the wide diversity we have today. There are no norms or boundaries to go by any more. The idea of Sunday being a day of rest went out the window a long time ago I know but somehow I held onto the idea that it meant something meaningful in these sometimes confusing times. Something we could hold onto. And, at the very least have at least one solitary day where we could sleep in. Not any more!

Lawn mowers are being fired up by 8am, loud radios by 9am and the telephone solicitors ringing off the hook by 9am also. What to do? What to do? After serious meditation, prayer and consideration I have decided I will drown out all that cacophony with an unmistakable silence. Yup! That's what I'm going to do. Stay just as quiet and respectful of every one else as I always have. They just might see something in there that they like..........SSHH!