5/1/11
4/30/11
Music Break: Lester Flatt
Foggy Mountain Breakdown...
Live TV Letterman
with Gary Scruggs (harmonica), Randy Scruggs, Vince Gill, Albert Lee (guitar), Marty Stuart (mandolin) Glen Duncan (fiddle), Jerry Douglas (dobro) Paul Shaffer (piano) and Steve Martin (banjo)
http://youtu.be/icMTVV5Lwaw
Live TV Letterman
with Gary Scruggs (harmonica), Randy Scruggs, Vince Gill, Albert Lee (guitar), Marty Stuart (mandolin) Glen Duncan (fiddle), Jerry Douglas (dobro) Paul Shaffer (piano) and Steve Martin (banjo)
http://youtu.be/icMTVV5Lwaw
4/29/11
We are headlong into a Double Dip
The Great Recession is far from over...
What is important is our attitude and determination regarding it.
A lot can be said and written about the various events and problems that the United States and the global economy have. I will leave that for a video blog I'm working on.
What I will write is that the vast majority of our government and elected leaders has done us great disservice and has not been acting in the best interests of the American people. We, the people, have allowed this to go on too long and it is up to us to change it. We need to figure a way to get rid of the entrenched political and bureaucratic class along with their friends in the financial world without too much clash amongst ourselves. It is inevitable that there will be discord among us as conditions deteriorate and we disagree about solutions. That is part and parcel of a Democratic Republic such as ours. We will loudly and acrimoniously disagree but we need to avoid violence, we have had one Civil War in this country and the current conditions do not require another. Rather, it requires a revolution of a different sort, one that can be carried out in the vein that the Founding Fathers clearly laid out for us.
One thing is certain in my mind. I have studied enough US history to know we have been here before in our long history, at times in worse conditions, also that in the past people have thought we would never return back to a much better place. I also know that the American people themselves will dig us out of this and not our government or any other forces but by our sheer will and skills. It is The American Way and that is still alive and well among us, even if it seems dormant for the moment. We will endure, survive and overcome but there is no short term fix for this. It is a journey that requires a minimum of 5-10 years of hard work and we can do it, even as spoiled as we've become after 30 years of prosperous times.
Now, more than ever, is the time to revive the American Spirit, remain positive and realistically optimistic and determined to overcome and defeat the obstacles before us. This country has done it before and can do it again. There will be times we will feel down, disheartened and discouraged and it is important during those times we continue putting one foot in front of the other and keep going. It is interesting to me that two opposing forces, unionists and the far left along with tea party sympathizers and the far right, are the ones stirring up debate and flexing their muscles. They are the ones that will eventually move all of us to remove the roadblocks causing the idiocy emanating primarily from the northeastern corridor stretching from Boston to Washington, DC. The government will once again be directed by the citizens of the country and not the other way around.
What is important is our attitude and determination regarding it.
A lot can be said and written about the various events and problems that the United States and the global economy have. I will leave that for a video blog I'm working on.
What I will write is that the vast majority of our government and elected leaders has done us great disservice and has not been acting in the best interests of the American people. We, the people, have allowed this to go on too long and it is up to us to change it. We need to figure a way to get rid of the entrenched political and bureaucratic class along with their friends in the financial world without too much clash amongst ourselves. It is inevitable that there will be discord among us as conditions deteriorate and we disagree about solutions. That is part and parcel of a Democratic Republic such as ours. We will loudly and acrimoniously disagree but we need to avoid violence, we have had one Civil War in this country and the current conditions do not require another. Rather, it requires a revolution of a different sort, one that can be carried out in the vein that the Founding Fathers clearly laid out for us.
One thing is certain in my mind. I have studied enough US history to know we have been here before in our long history, at times in worse conditions, also that in the past people have thought we would never return back to a much better place. I also know that the American people themselves will dig us out of this and not our government or any other forces but by our sheer will and skills. It is The American Way and that is still alive and well among us, even if it seems dormant for the moment. We will endure, survive and overcome but there is no short term fix for this. It is a journey that requires a minimum of 5-10 years of hard work and we can do it, even as spoiled as we've become after 30 years of prosperous times.Now, more than ever, is the time to revive the American Spirit, remain positive and realistically optimistic and determined to overcome and defeat the obstacles before us. This country has done it before and can do it again. There will be times we will feel down, disheartened and discouraged and it is important during those times we continue putting one foot in front of the other and keep going. It is interesting to me that two opposing forces, unionists and the far left along with tea party sympathizers and the far right, are the ones stirring up debate and flexing their muscles. They are the ones that will eventually move all of us to remove the roadblocks causing the idiocy emanating primarily from the northeastern corridor stretching from Boston to Washington, DC. The government will once again be directed by the citizens of the country and not the other way around.
4/27/11
4/26/11
If You're Looking for a Road Map
In the New Economy you won't find one...
Use your inner compass; be your cartographer.
There has never been a better period in my lifetime for an individual to be able to have a chance to cut a swath for their own path. There was a moment in time in my young life, the late sixties and early seventies, when opportunity to become my own person, create my own road, direct my life in any direction any way I wanted to. Most of that had to do with my youth and part of it was the times. Fortunately I was free to make decisions that were appropriate for me but some previous options available to me vaporized a decade later due to the juncture of history we were in. The eighties were a period that recalled an earlier era, since the turbulence of the two previous decades had unsettled so much without satisfactory resolution, that most people wanted a return to "stability." Stability meant going back to values that were not bad and were likely necessary at that interval. Technology had not reached a point where it could change or improve our lives or the world.
The nineties became a transitional era when technology, especially communications, the internet, medical and other sciences became highly developed and rapidly advanced as well as methods of doing business began to change. It was a time of duality of good and bad to be followed by a decade when much of what had occurred was assimilated, digested and culminated in an economic disruption that was inevitable. We were moving unaware from the Old Economy to a New Economy which inescapably impacted the social and geopolitical elements of daily living. Consumerism and the accompanying debt load that came with it, the old conservative structure cracked and the hankering for a new form of politics that we have discovered does not lie in the opposing progressive liberalism. In the US we voted for a President who had the image of change but not the substance of it. Far from it, what looked like what we were hoping for did not actually hold the values we desired. It was a valuable lesson for not only the United States but for the world.
For those of us forced out of our former careers and way of life, we need to go beyond what we used to be and get on with what we are becoming and going to be.
Now, more than ever is the time to have that second chance, another shot at a "do over" at life. Where there is adversity, difficult times and a seeming downfall from former success there is opportunity. We are never likely to see such a significant change in the economy, political world and society as there is now as long as we are not blind to it. Especially for those of us in our mid-forties and fifties, we are old enough to know a lot more than we did and not too old to recover and recoup what we may have lost. More importantly we have the chance to recreate our lives more like the image we envisioned when we were younger, before life took us in directions that we didn't think about and opportunities we didn't have. The former trails are still there, well worn and found just as easily as a long driven US Highway long ago replaced by an Interstate, themselves showing the wear and tear of age and also not travelling at the high speed of broadband internet. The time is now for us to rethink what we want to be for the remainder of our lives, choosing wisely and creatively the New Economy road we want to build to reinvent ourselves and lead us in new and more satisfying directions, since the existing highways and byways belong to Old Economy of yesteryear.
Use your inner compass; be your cartographer.
There has never been a better period in my lifetime for an individual to be able to have a chance to cut a swath for their own path. There was a moment in time in my young life, the late sixties and early seventies, when opportunity to become my own person, create my own road, direct my life in any direction any way I wanted to. Most of that had to do with my youth and part of it was the times. Fortunately I was free to make decisions that were appropriate for me but some previous options available to me vaporized a decade later due to the juncture of history we were in. The eighties were a period that recalled an earlier era, since the turbulence of the two previous decades had unsettled so much without satisfactory resolution, that most people wanted a return to "stability." Stability meant going back to values that were not bad and were likely necessary at that interval. Technology had not reached a point where it could change or improve our lives or the world.
The nineties became a transitional era when technology, especially communications, the internet, medical and other sciences became highly developed and rapidly advanced as well as methods of doing business began to change. It was a time of duality of good and bad to be followed by a decade when much of what had occurred was assimilated, digested and culminated in an economic disruption that was inevitable. We were moving unaware from the Old Economy to a New Economy which inescapably impacted the social and geopolitical elements of daily living. Consumerism and the accompanying debt load that came with it, the old conservative structure cracked and the hankering for a new form of politics that we have discovered does not lie in the opposing progressive liberalism. In the US we voted for a President who had the image of change but not the substance of it. Far from it, what looked like what we were hoping for did not actually hold the values we desired. It was a valuable lesson for not only the United States but for the world.
For those of us forced out of our former careers and way of life, we need to go beyond what we used to be and get on with what we are becoming and going to be.
Now, more than ever is the time to have that second chance, another shot at a "do over" at life. Where there is adversity, difficult times and a seeming downfall from former success there is opportunity. We are never likely to see such a significant change in the economy, political world and society as there is now as long as we are not blind to it. Especially for those of us in our mid-forties and fifties, we are old enough to know a lot more than we did and not too old to recover and recoup what we may have lost. More importantly we have the chance to recreate our lives more like the image we envisioned when we were younger, before life took us in directions that we didn't think about and opportunities we didn't have. The former trails are still there, well worn and found just as easily as a long driven US Highway long ago replaced by an Interstate, themselves showing the wear and tear of age and also not travelling at the high speed of broadband internet. The time is now for us to rethink what we want to be for the remainder of our lives, choosing wisely and creatively the New Economy road we want to build to reinvent ourselves and lead us in new and more satisfying directions, since the existing highways and byways belong to Old Economy of yesteryear.
4/25/11
Ron Paul on "The View"
Liberty Defined...
Whoppi Goldberg and Joy Behar couldn't get him to bite their bait.
http://youtu.be/z3MiKO6K1Zw
Whoppi Goldberg and Joy Behar couldn't get him to bite their bait.
http://youtu.be/z3MiKO6K1Zw
4/24/11
4/23/11
Music Break: Dwight Yoakam
It Won't Hurt/Today I Started Loving...
Live TV 2007 MSNBC
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9mSfwHkDH5A&feature=feedrec_grec_index
Live TV 2007 MSNBC
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9mSfwHkDH5A&feature=feedrec_grec_index
4/22/11
Living In America
Toxic People, Toxic Situations...
Avoid them.
We're in poisonous times right now as we head into almost four years of when the world became aware in the summer of 2007 of the great economic disruption. It is a toxic time for many people who aren't prepared to guard themselves from noxious fumes. As someone who is interested in the social sciences I've had to be careful at times of absorbing and emitting too much toxicity. An ironic situation itself, since in 2007 when I was personally struck by this global financial fiasco, I was determined to remain positive and above it all. Generally I have been upbeat and made the most of the situation but at times have paid too much attention to the economic, political and social events of our time. That is not to say that I think anyone should remain uninvolved and obliviously unaware, only cautious about how to absorb it and manage personal thought toward current events.
It was a conscious decision on my part to not participate in the psychological downside of this recession, that seems to have developed into a depression. One thing I have learned, through periods of unemployment, temporary and underemployment, involuntary and voluntary, is being "laid off" from a "real job" in 2007 was the best thing that could have happened to me. Since I was 16 years old I've worked long periods for a major corporation, a huge bank and state government. According to the standards of the Old Economy, these were "real jobs" that were considered "careers." I struggled with identity when I was booted out of the first one, an epically long 30 plus years off and on journey. I also felt I had to replace that so-called career with another one, which I managed to do not once but twice.
The New Economy has been liberating for me. In many ways I was fortunate since I had several small sources of income and a support system that allowed me to get by financially. Not always having funds to do everything I wanted to do when I wanted to do it wasn't as bad as I would have once thought. It is through a process of time I began to realize I had been relieved of the toxic situation of trying to fit the proverbial square peg in a round hole. I was never cut out for a career in the world of major corporations and banks and I managed to survive among toxic people but it was at a cost to me. It was too draining. That was when the economy was supposedly good, although on reflection most of us know it was a consumer economy based on a false happiness I couldn't buy into. That kind of life was a more poisonous time for me than the one we live in now.
What I have learned about this entire situation is to avoid toxic people and toxic situations. For me that means not being employed in a job that is poisonous to me due to negative people and oppressing organizations. It has now become irrelevant to me that the part-time job I have, that I generally enjoy, is considered by many as my being underemployed. What those people don't realize is that part-time underemployment provides me with medical benefits, some additional income and most importantly, free no-stress time. During that time I am able to be creative and supplement my income from freelance work that is creative and enjoyable to me. Most importantly I don't feel I have to fit into a work situation I don't feel comfortable in, a toxic situation for me and for the most part allows me to avoid toxic people. That is as valuable to me as the skyrocketing price of gold.
Avoid them.
We're in poisonous times right now as we head into almost four years of when the world became aware in the summer of 2007 of the great economic disruption. It is a toxic time for many people who aren't prepared to guard themselves from noxious fumes. As someone who is interested in the social sciences I've had to be careful at times of absorbing and emitting too much toxicity. An ironic situation itself, since in 2007 when I was personally struck by this global financial fiasco, I was determined to remain positive and above it all. Generally I have been upbeat and made the most of the situation but at times have paid too much attention to the economic, political and social events of our time. That is not to say that I think anyone should remain uninvolved and obliviously unaware, only cautious about how to absorb it and manage personal thought toward current events.
It was a conscious decision on my part to not participate in the psychological downside of this recession, that seems to have developed into a depression. One thing I have learned, through periods of unemployment, temporary and underemployment, involuntary and voluntary, is being "laid off" from a "real job" in 2007 was the best thing that could have happened to me. Since I was 16 years old I've worked long periods for a major corporation, a huge bank and state government. According to the standards of the Old Economy, these were "real jobs" that were considered "careers." I struggled with identity when I was booted out of the first one, an epically long 30 plus years off and on journey. I also felt I had to replace that so-called career with another one, which I managed to do not once but twice.The New Economy has been liberating for me. In many ways I was fortunate since I had several small sources of income and a support system that allowed me to get by financially. Not always having funds to do everything I wanted to do when I wanted to do it wasn't as bad as I would have once thought. It is through a process of time I began to realize I had been relieved of the toxic situation of trying to fit the proverbial square peg in a round hole. I was never cut out for a career in the world of major corporations and banks and I managed to survive among toxic people but it was at a cost to me. It was too draining. That was when the economy was supposedly good, although on reflection most of us know it was a consumer economy based on a false happiness I couldn't buy into. That kind of life was a more poisonous time for me than the one we live in now.
What I have learned about this entire situation is to avoid toxic people and toxic situations. For me that means not being employed in a job that is poisonous to me due to negative people and oppressing organizations. It has now become irrelevant to me that the part-time job I have, that I generally enjoy, is considered by many as my being underemployed. What those people don't realize is that part-time underemployment provides me with medical benefits, some additional income and most importantly, free no-stress time. During that time I am able to be creative and supplement my income from freelance work that is creative and enjoyable to me. Most importantly I don't feel I have to fit into a work situation I don't feel comfortable in, a toxic situation for me and for the most part allows me to avoid toxic people. That is as valuable to me as the skyrocketing price of gold.4/21/11
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