Through a weird combination of poetry and Stargate: SG1, I’ve been doing some thinking and have come to a conclusion.  But, before that, perhaps a quick explanation of that combination might prove worthwhile.

I’m currently working on a poem entitled “Have Faith in Me”.  I haven’t quite got the text of the poem down, but the title seemed significant, so, like most of my poetry, I am building around it.

Also, while I’m eating my dinner, I turn on an episode of Stargate:SG1.  This has become my fix for the week.  One that will likely change before I finish this blog post.  Welcome to Lockwood-land.  As it turned out, the show I picked out, randomly, was the episode where Teal’c has been revived by Apophis and has returned believing in the full might and godhood of said Goa’uld.   Teal’c spends the rest of the episode basically dying in an effort to force him to reexamine his life and come to the conclusion he made 3 years ago, in their time of course.

Yes, to the casual observer, they appear to be completely inane and of no relation to each other.  And then there’s me.

Both the poem and the show have me thinking about faith.  What is faith?  How do we define it?

One of dictionary.com’s definition of faith is the belief that is not based on proof.  I tend to have a slightly different definition.  Sometimes, to me, faith is a belief in spite of proof, but that’s for another post.

Admit it.  Once I said faith, nine out of ten of the readers immediately turned to the idea that I was speaking only of Faith.  (Note the capital letter which is indicative of a proper noun or label.)  But, no, I wasn’t specifically talking about Faith (capital F) when I’m speaking about faith (little f).  What I’m speaking of is the inevitable result of the mind of man, in any situation.

We are really a lonely species.  We don’t have the comfort of being unintelligent like lower animals that we can simply live in the moment with no regard to the past or the future.  A cow doesn’t worry about being lonely.  He simply is and his next concern is that patch of grass over there.  Us, we are intelligent enough to know better.

It’s a tough concept, first to understand, but then able to convey in simple words.  I’ll try though.

Man is a social animal.  That’s not really up for debate, it’s pretty much a proven fact.  Even the anti-social and loners among us are drawn to spend time with others who are also anti-social and loners.  Go figure.  We don’t like being alone.  We don’t like feeling alone.

Think of an isolation tank.  You can’t feel anything.  You can’t see anything.  You can’t hear anything.  You have no outside stimulus to distract you.  For the first time in your life, you are completely and absolutely alone with your thoughts.  Kinda sends shivers down your spine, doesn’t it.

The simple fact is that people in this type of situation typically lose whatever hold on sanity they may have.  We have to have some form of interaction, some form of socialization, something that distracts us from the inner sanctums of our minds.

Once you understand that, the next step really isn’t that difficult to make.  Us.  Humans.  We are stuck in one mind.  One body.  We walk around feeling so small.   How many times have you walked on a very very dark night and looked at the stars?  How did that make you feel?

I remember one night, in Arizona, during a lunar eclipse.  We lived outside a small little town of maybe 2000 people.  The nights there were some of the most amazing I remember.  This night, in particular, really amazed me.  The glare that is the typical reflection of the sun was stripped away leaving only the rock that orbits our planet.  It was simply amazing.  Hanging above the desert was this amazingly massive ball of rock that was, somehow, not falling to the ground.  I felt so small, so insignificant.

We see images of and hear stories of people dying, many of them pointlessly and we think to ourselves, what if that was me?   I think that, if you want any claim to objectivity, you have at the very least admit to yourself that you have no freaking clue what will happen to you once you close your eyes for the final time.

By our very nature, we cannot handle these situations alone.  Our minds are overwhelmed by a crushing sense of loneliness and we have to turn to something.  We have to look for an outside, well, god (lower g) for lack of a better term.

An addict turns towards something that will let them soothe away that hurt, that loneliness.  People, like me, turn towards God (upper G).  And some turn towards society.

Mao.  Stalin.  Hitler.  What do these men have in common?  Yes, yes they were brutal dictators who slaughtered millions.  But they were also atheists.  Ok, I’ll admit that Hitler did have some religious writings, comments in Mein Kampfh (probably butchered the spelling).  Personally, I don’t see how any man of real faith could oversee such a genocide.  Yes, my debating friends, that also includes the likes of Torquemada and Godfrey of Bouillon.

I’m not saying athiests are evil.  I’m not saying theists are good.  They are people.  What I’m saying is that each has a different focus for their faith.  Theists generally have a belief in God.  While in the case of the Crusades or the current Islam terror campaigns those beliefs are very inherently flawed.

Athiests, on the other hand, technically have no such belief in God, of any form.  But, does that really mean it’s the end all of their faith?  I would argue not.

One of the great things that I love about Christianity is that it has provided my sense of self and provided me with a strict sense of morals.  I didn’t create my own rules, they were created for me.  And, as a christian, I have chosen to follow those rules.

But, where do atheists have to turn for their sense of right and wrong?  In part, I believe they learn certain things as don’t kill from society in general where murdering somebody is generally frowned upon.  But that doesn’t really cover all the bases for them, does it?

Again, I don’t think so.   In the lack of that moral coverage, where can they turn?  They have to find it in themselves what is “right”.

In general, man is a caring creature.  Our sense of wanting to help another is well ingrained in us from our times when we first huddled around a crude fire.  It’s one of our traits that has helped us evolve.   Especially here in America, the greatest nation ever founded, our hearts go out, around the world when something happens.  We are typically the first to respond, unstinting in any help that we can provide, even if it means that we do with less.

Such caring has a price.  With it comes arrogance.  Not the arrogance that we can solve everything, but the arrogance that we know what is right for everybody.  We care about people that we only want to do what’s best for them.  Too bad they don’t know what it is, but luckily we know it.

It really has become epidemic, domestically more so than overseas.  Domestically, we spend infinately more than we do internationally on goodwill programs.  Welfare, Health Care, unemployment, all of these little spending bits which add up to trillions.  Don’t worry, you’ll be taken care of.

Why?  Because we have lost our focus, our faith.

For me, I know the heart of man.  I know the best way to treat people.  I look inside myself.  I mean honestly, objectively, look inside myself.  I don’t like what I see, but I force myself to strip away all the emotional junk that just hide it.  Because I don’t like what I see, I am motivated to better myself.

In other words, I’m a big boy now.  I don’t need people holding my hand.  I don’t need my living handed to me.  I want to journey out there, free of any roadblocks.  I may fall and bruise myself in the process, but that’s part of the process.

God Bless.

A thought has been rolling around in my head recently.  The 9 against the 10th does hold a lesson we can learn from.  Against 9 people, the 10th person truly doesn’t have a chance.  But what about 4 against 1 or even 2 against one.  The odds of him escaping a possibly unjust punishment increase pretty dramatically.  It helps even more if one of those 2 people are from the same area and understand the culture and ideas of the tenth person.

Let’s take that to a much larger arena.  Let’s look at an example in which 10 states vote on an issue.  Nine states want a piece of legislation that completely goes against anything the tenth state wants, or even stands for.  However, in this example, the tenth state is completely and absolutely screwed.  Forget the fact that the new law they have to enforce goes against anything they stand for.  It’s federal law after all.

Not exactly fair is it?

It’s rather like today’s model of government.  The federal government has become so large, and gathered so much power, that it can, and often does, completely enforce a policy that not only offends the sensibilities of the residents, but isn’t appropriate for the states.

Take, for example, the movement to restrict religion in the classroom.  Let’s forget that Christianity has been a bedrock of American culture for over 200 years.  We’re just looking, objectively of course, at the idea of allowing any form of religion in any aspect of school.

There is a vast diversity of social and religious opinions in America.  They differ from state to state, which is probably something that I’m being redundant on.  The point is that schools in Utah generally have a different view than schools in New York.  Utes may want a certain amount of religion in schools, where New Yorkers don’t.

Why then should Utah be forced to adopt the practices and, by definition, the views of New York?  That form of enforced atheism may be something that sickens them.  Where’s the justice in that?

Let’s imagine this.  Suppose you didn’t have so much power in the federal government.  Let’s say the power to make those decisions lay at the state level and not the federal level.  Now that pool of opposition that Utah has has been reduced.  They no longer have to battle against 49 other states to keep their own identity.  Isn’t that what we were created as?  Separate entities united for common defense?  United States in America?  Odd how clear cut a name can be.

This national identity is a relatively new phenomenon, if you can call the Civil War “new”.  Prior to that, you weren’t American, you were a Virginian, a New Yorker, etc…

Many people I talk to are sick of politics.  When I ask then, it’s not a question of expressing opinion, it’s a question of effectiveness.  Why voice your thoughts, when they don’t make a difference.  After all, aren’t I just one voice among 300,000,000?

So, ask yourself, how about evening the odds a little?  What if you are one out of 3,000,000?  Yes, still small, but infinitely more influential than you were before.  Cut it even more, maybe to the city or town level and you are now one voice among a thousand or two.  Your odds are getting even better.

I won’t promise you that you can change the future of your nations by yourself, but with better odd, you will have a better chance.

God Bless.

One of my favorite stories is a short story by Kurt Vonnegut called Harrison Bergeron.  It’s a story of a society where equality isn’t just a right, it’s enforced by law.  Pretty people are required to wear masks.  Graceful or strong people are required to heavy weights.  Brilliant people are shocked every 20 seconds or so, so that they lose what ever train of thought they were working on.

It’s a silly little story, but I think it does satirize a disturbing trend in where we are going in the fight to ensure all Americans are “equal”.

Read it here: http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/harrison.html

Animal Liberation Front

Black Liberation Army

Earth Liberation Front

May 19th Communist Organization

Symbionese Liberation Army

United Freedom Front

Weathermen/Weather Underground

Each of these are listed as far left domestic terrorist groups.  How many of these have you heard of?

The truth is that extremism exists on both sides of the aisle.  It becomes a problem when only one side is highlighted.  It is misleading.  At best, it shows a complete lack of knowledge.  At worst, it shows a willingness to lie for personal gain.  Somewhere in between is the complete inability to acknowledge that we all have idiots we have to bear in our own political houses.

God Bless

No it’s not a person who has a weird fascination with idiots, though I have known quite a few of those.  An ideophile is a person in love with ideas.  They have an unrealistic passion for the way things “should” be.

I would like to think, as a conservative, and proud member of the right wing nutjob conspiracy, et Al., that I’m a realistic person.  I understand that money is a zero-sum game.  I understand that the more I become governed by the government, the more of a number I become.  I understand that losing my independence means losing that which was meant in the American Dream.

Ideophiles are dreamers, but much more than dreamers.  For them, the dream has become real.  They don’t want to be distracted by annoying and inconvient facts.  Ideophiles are emotional.  For them, the “fairness” of an idea lies not in the competition of its merits, but in the equality of its merits.  Ideophiles don’t quite understand that, in a real world, dreams don’t really come true.

Let’s face it.  In America, we’re broke.  We’re broke financially, we’re broke morally and we’re broke ideologically.

God Bless

Except for the hotbeds of blue in the northeast and northwest, the country is generally red.  There are certainly exceptions, but for the most part, the rule holds true.  But why?  I would argue it’s the demographics of the people in those areas, more specifically, the “urban-ess” of those places.

The northeast has always been a heavily populate place in America.  Even during the Civil War, the North outnumbered the South by a rough estimate of 2 to 1.  It does make a difference.  When we look at places that are more dense, we are generally looking at places where an urban setting is primary.  This, of course, contrasts with the south and middle being less urban and more rural.

Again, what’s the point?

The point is that people think in two modes.  1. you are alone in this world, or 2. you are a part of this world.  Those that live in a urban area acquire the feeling of being part of the world.  They look about them and they have people and services everywhere.  They feel a circle of help and charity that is part of the human nature.

Rural citizens are different.  In the most rural areas, you may not see another person, other than family, for days.  Services aren’t common, I remember the closest grocery store being a 30 minute drive.  Gas was closer at about 15 minutes of driving.  The closest I had to a shopping mall was over an hour away.  This type of setting encourages people to be more independent, a feeling of being alone in the world.

One of the best definitions of the political spectrum that I’ve heard is the scale of charity.  We are all charitable.  It’s the way we were bred.  The difference is the choice of charity.  When do we give?  How do we give?

A liberal/progressive tends to believe that charity should be compulsory.  Before you scoff, think about it.  What is welfare? Medicare?  Food Stamps?  Those are program of compulsory charity.  They are less fortunate, so therefore it’s our responsibility to lift them up.

A conservative (true conservative, not CINO) still understands the need to be charitable, but he, or she, decides when and where to be charitable.  Can their families afford to be charitable?  If so, how much?  Who should get their charity?

Look at a map.  Look at where the hotbeds of red and blue lie?  Wyoming?  Montana, both red and both rural.  California, red, however Los Angeles is blue and is about 1/3rd of the population of California.  Add in San Francisco, and the conservatives really never had a chance.

Even here in Texas, we have the same dichotomy.  Dallas and Tarrant county, DFW, voted blue along with Houston, but the rest of the state, thank the Lord,  was red.

I don’t believe in polls.  Or rather, I don’t really believe in the results of most of the polls.  Think about this.  Who gets polled?  The people in the city?  Or the people in the country?

And we wonder why polls are always skewed left…

God Bless.

Pete Stark (D-CA)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1-eBz8hyoE

Nancy Pelosi:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGRUx2b0ArM&NR=1

Claire McCaskill

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDPpGJDelHI

John Conyers

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACbwND52rrw

Joe Biden

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gB2z1lhAfU8

Barney Frank

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULtgIBKemlc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1Mazjm_A5k

Charlie Rangel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeeBqtSHh1c

Marilyn Musgrave

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKqvMdMV7hM

Bob Etheridge

Bill Pascrell Jr.

Are we detecting a pattern here?

And before there is any hollering, Marilyn Musgrave is a Republican.  So it is on both sides.

Otherwise, I’ll let you decide

God Bless

One thing I’ve learned in life is that to fix a problem, you must first identify the problem.  If you just try fixing it, or even worse, attempt to “fix” it while denying the motherboard is fried, then you wasted your time and probably ruined what was left of a perfectly good computer in the process.

The same holds true in social settings.  If you are angry, identify the source of the anger.  Then you can address the issue.

Let’s face something right now.  We are in a war.  Very simple.  Call it what you will, yet we refuse to call our enemy what they are. Perhaps we aren’t familiar with the terms used in “Islamic Radical” or “Islamic Terrorist”, so let’s break down a few terms here.

Islamic – derived from Islam or the religion founded by Mohammed in which the Koran is the ultimate word.

Any problems with that definition?

Radical – one who holds strong convictions and/or extreme principles, aka extremist

Again, Any problems with that definition?

Terrorist – any individual who utilizes tactics designed to induce terror in order to force a change in policy, social or governmental.

Fair enough?

So, we have those who follow the religion of Islam (Islamic) who hold extreme/radical views (like those which force Shari’a) and use car and or suicide bombs for the intention of inciting terror in hope of social or political change.

That’s an Islamic Radical or Islamic Terrorist.  Come on people.   There’s nothing wrong with calling it what it is.  We’re not accusing the entire nation of Islam.  We are identifying the elements of their religion that have decided that the world had a few too many of us non-believers in it.  Sucks to be us.

If we’re not going to call things what they are, then don’t call me a white boy.  Don’t call me a conservative.  Those are things that define me, but have a negative connotation.

Now, we’ve identified them, how about we identify ourselves.

Who are we?  We are a nation of individuals, founded on Christian principles that decided that we couldn’t take any more abuse from an aloof government half the world away.  Notice I said Christian principles, not Christian beliefs.  The two are different.  Every time we respect the right to life of a single human being, we honor the 1st commandment, “Thou Shalt Not Kill”.

Are we arrogant?  Probably.  But, it’s our arrogance that set us apart.  The arrogance of George Washington or Thomas Jefferson to rise against their earthly noblemen who have the inherent right to rule over them.  We showed that arrogance in 1812 when the British tried it again.  How dare we refuse to simply follow those nations who know better.

That arrogance has made us enemies around the world.  I’ll be one of the first to admit that.  But, it’s that same arrogance that has kept us safe.  I give the examples of Kennedy/Kruschev and Reagan/Gorbechev.  Both presidents with the arrogance to stand before a growing threat and refuse to back down.  They flinched, we didn’t.  As a result, the missiles were pulled out of Cuba.  As a result, Russia (USSR) fell apart around their ears.

We can’t afford to be in a position of confusion about who we are and what we’re fighting.  There’s not room for that.  Let’s call it what it is, and acknowledge who we are.

God Bless

I admit, I knew what it was going to be about.  Yet another article decrying those right wing extremists (don’t forget racist) that happen to be disgusted by what’s going on in the world.  But, I had to pick my jaw off the ground and squash a solid rush of disgust and anger over what I read here.

First, let’s make this perfectly clear.  There are nutjobs on the right.  I admit that completely and honestly.  Those idiot groups that tape themselves in their mother’s basement holding plastic uzis in front of an american flag reading from a piece of notebook paper they scribbled some notes on.  Not exactly a new tactic.  I wonder if they thought it was cool when al’Queda did it so they decided to give it a try.

However ridiculous and stupid those groups are, there are other groups of individuals being vilified with little reason except that they are going against the grain of where we are heading.  We seem to be the stodgy ones who cling to such outdated ideas such as God, Responsibility and Loyalty.  Such as it is.

However, what borders on criminal is the one-sided nature of what’s being reported when it comes to these extremist groups.  We’ve all heard of the KKK, but have we all heard about the real Black Panthers?

If you have, it’s probably this sugared up version that we seem enamored of.   A group of militant black men banding together to protect their neighborhoods from police cruelty.  Frankly, without the militant part, this is a great idea.  When the group was founded, brutality and corruption in the white police stations was rampant.  However, the Black Panthers have expanded their repertoire to include intimidation at the voting booth or other mafia like actions intended to pressure others.

Let’s be fair.  There are crazies on both sides.  I just find it particularly disgusting that the right hand crazies are being blown completely out of proportion.  Blown out of proportion, not simply because they are a true danger, but because there is a golden opportunity to milk political miles out of demonizing men and women with their own brand of patriotism.  Just like the left brand of patriotism.  I think it’s patriotism at least.

Oh well, let’s give them the benefit of the doubt.

God Bless

Not quite.  The short answer is that the only thing we are all equal in is death.  Each one of us have different qualities about us that make us unique, things that make us something other than another brick in the wall.  Perhaps that why the social cycle continues with a revolution after a totalitarian government.  People may yearn for the protection provided by a governing body, but, they refuse, eventually, to be yet another number on a table of statistics.

As people are unique, so are nations.  Each nation has it’s own quirks and history that make it uniquely them.  So, in that sense, I guess we are all alike in the world.

However, we can also look into the hearts and souls of the people across those countries and see the same, never ending pattern being repeated time and time again.  They never seem to really learn from their mistakes.  I pray we learn from both their mistakes and ours.

America is exceptional.  No where on this planet, anytime in its history (exception of Rome maybe) have we had a nation such as the USA.  The freedoms we enjoy and the opportunities that we have created among ourselves is breathtaking.

I think the greatest foresight that the Founding Fathers had wasn’t in creating a republic form of government, France had tried that before.  Their greatest foresight was to recognize the seed of darkness that lies within ANY man. But, instead of bridling that seed, they chose to guide that seed.  They crafted a system that gave the power to the people and created enough government to keep us all playing nicely.  They realized that power corrupted, not simply because man was evil, but because they were easily misguided.  They recognized that no one entity should have all the power to make the laws that govern our lands.  That’s why we have the 10th Amendment to the Constitution.  It limits the power that is given to the federal government.

One thing I wish they had foresaw was the ability for man to fool himself into thinking he’s owed something.  Perhaps they should have seen the weakness inside a man when he/she looks to another for their needs.

How could they have seen that?  In their time, men and women worked and took pride in that work.  Charity was handled by the churches and individual groups, not by the government.  The only hand out that you received was the one to pick you up when you slipped in horse crap.

But, for all that, I’m still proud of my country.  I think our lady of liberty, though bruised and battered, still look after the children of the Founding Fathers.  I think she still tries to guide us in the path of freedom that they laid out.  I’m sure she weeps when she sees how far we have strayed.  All for a few pounds of gold.

We need to return to those roots.  Those roots are what built us up from a ragged, scared nation of colonies to a superpower in the world stage.  The idea that work, and taking pride in your work was your contribution to your nation is something that we need to remember.  The idea that the money that you work to earn is yours, not to be handed out by a politician in Washington.  It’s a radical idea, I know, but when we start hitting tax rates of historic proportions, we begin to wonder how the heck did we get to the point where we’re filling out the census for the sole reason that we get more federal funding?  It’s actually rather sad, or hilarious I haven’t figured out which yet.  We pay money to the government, to get that money back in funding……….

Now that I’m done laughing, or crying, I have to sit back and scratch my head.  Why?  Why are we shelling out money to be “redistributed” according to what others decide?  If we’re going to get that money back in federal funding, why can’t we keep it local to pay for local needs?

This is the system that the Founding Fathers didn’t want.  They didn’t put an income tax in the Constitution.  They wanted government to be small.  They tried to keep it small by putting the government on a diet of tariffs and exports.  The income tax didn’t come around until about 1913.

I’ll pay for my America, but that America should work for me.  If she can’t, then she needs to stay out of my way.  I’m loyal to America, but when is she going to be loyal to me?

The USA is the greatest experiment on the face of this planet.  The idea that people can govern themselves in a fashion that allows them to be free is astounding!  Think about it, really, take a moment and think about it.  What pressures to you have in your life?  Bills? Car Payment?  Needs?  Wants?   All these things influence us.  We work to ensure that we continue to have those items.  What about funding that comes with strings attached?

We can be, once again that exceptional nation that I grew up in.  We are the shining example of what the future of mankind can be.  We show the world that, HERE, here is the result of men and women, Americans, when they are allowed to be citizens, not simply a resource.  Is America exceptional?  Hell yes!

God Bless