The following account comes from a veteran HS teacher who just became a Coach in her building. I wish every public school bureaucrat from the Federal level on down would read this.
A veteran teacher turned coach shadows 2 students for 2 days – a sobering lesson learned.
Edward Gibbon (27 April 1737 – 16 January 1794) was an English historian and Member of Parliament. His most important work, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, was published in six volumes between 1776 and 1788. (that’s a long time ago 😉
One quote of his on ancient Athens I really appreciate is the following:
“In the end, more than freedom, they wanted security. They wanted a comfortable life, and they lost it all – security, comfort, and freedom. When the Athenians finally wanted not to give to society but for society to give to them, when the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again.”
I am truly afraid history is repeating itself. I hope I am wrong. The coming election will be a watershed moment in U.S. history.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
As most of my close friends know, I’m not very religious … spiritual, yes. So I’m no saint, that’s for sure. But I heard another person bashing Tebow for his outward expressions of faith today. Seriously? Get a life you Tebow-bashing buttheads. I believe Tebow, or anyone in this country for that matter, has the right for “free exercise thereof” (see above law … the Constitution, no less) …. so just get over it, you dumbnuts. With so many “gangsta” types and “Bollywood” types out there setting bad examples for people (especially kids), I have to say I’ll take a Tebow example any day of the week over many others hogging the limelight these days. So all you Tebow’ers out there, keep on Tebow’ing. If it pisses the other side off, all the better. As far as I’m concerned, you’re standing up for the law of the land … and that’s a good thing!
This just crossed my mind so I thought I’d share. Maybe some police officers will see it and take it to their commanders and see if the idea has merit.
In an increasing trend police departments across the United States are using text messages to help fight crime and have set up a text message service that allows citizens to report any crimes that they see. While this is fine and dandy, it crossed my mind for another option.
Why couldn’t the police initiate the text when a crime has occured?
Here’s how it would work:
Step 1 – Citizens voluntarily sign up to be on a city police department’s automated text broadcast. Call it a volunteer Police Citizen Watch.
Step 2 – A crime occurs. Let’s say it is a carjacking or bank robbery. The police send out the details, suspect description, last known direction headed, car description, etc. to the text broadcast list. Instantly, the police have hundreds, maybe thousands, of additional eyes scanning the city.
Step 3 – Citizens see the message and are instantly on alert and odds are, one or more of these citizens will spot the bad guy and text back to the police the location and details.
The technology is here to do this. Seems like a pretty good idea to me. What do you think?
Life Ain’t Brain Surgery
Talk to ya later,
Richard
I smoke cigarettes. Go ahead and boo and hiss. My choice. It is a legal product. Government doesn’t want us to smoke but contradict themselves by loving the cigarette tax money. Stupidology 101. But we’re use to that from our government, right?
I’m been saying for years that since the Feds like telling us what to do, next on their list will be the fat people. They will come after them. And we’re seeing new laws all over the U.S. now to ban soft drinks, change rules for what fast food places can sell, what kind of oil we can use to fry, and on and on. It will only get worse as far as the Feds telling us what we can and can’t do – count on it.
A recent fat study came out and there has been a lot of media lately about the rankings of the “fattest” states in the nation. Mississippi and Alabama come in at No. 1 & 2 respectfully.
What I find very interesting is comparing this ranking to a ranking of states as to how many Federal dollars they receive per dollar of federal taxes they pay. For instance, Alabama comes in at No. 7 getting back $1.66 for every dollar sent to Washington. (which makes the constant shouts toward Washington to keep their hands off our business sound rather hollow.)
So here’s what we have ….
Fat state ranking Federal welfare state ranking
So all of the top 10 fat states except Michigan get more dollars back from Washington than they send them.
On the other end of the spectrum, of the 10 least fat states, 6 of them get back less from the feds than they send.
So what is the lesson here?
For certain, the farther south one goes in this country, the more likely you are to see fat folks. And could it be that many are fat because they’re not working very hard and therefore, not paying a lot of taxes?
You heard it first here in Richard’s World. The Fat Police are Coming!
Until next time,
Richard
President B is about to start making a bunch of speeches again on how he is going to get the economy going and create jobs. But I suspect we’ll hear the same ol’, same ol’ out of the community organizer’s mouth.
We’ll hear about how he inherited all of these problems. How events like the Japan earthquake and sunami and other natural disasters have hampered his plans. It was a big “mess” when he was elected and he’s doing the best he can under the circumstances. Whatever B.
I’m sorry B. CEOs and Presidents of major American corporations inherit “messes” every day … and they deal with it. That’s why the company Boards hire CEOs and Presidents … to fix messes. They all “inherit” messes all the time and because they are leaders, they fix them. Otherwise, they don’t keep their high positions very long. If I remember correctly B, you asked for the job and said you could and would fix it. Now all I hear from your mouth is the blame game.
Imagine a high-paid, corporate CEO lasting as long as you have B after not fixing the mess he/she was hired to do. Do you really think any major corporation Board would have listened to your excuses for this long? Not no, but hell no. CEOs, that’s what you are, the CEO of America, inherit messes all the time and they fix them. I’m afraid your current job is above your skill level.
So quit your whining and blame game and act like a CEO and fix the mess. Lead … or step out of the way and let someone who will get the job done. Actually, do us all a favor and just don’t run again. You’re not qualified.
Life ain’t brain surgery.
Until next time,
From Richard’s World
Richard
For Liberal Students, Turn About Isn’t Fair Play
Dateline: Richard’s World
Where Life Ain’t Brain Surgery
It has been said that you can pretty much be liberal until you get out of college. If by the time you are 30 and you haven’t converted yourself to being a conservative, you are hopelessly LOST.
Students at a liberal college are eager to redistribute the wealth but not so eager to redistribute their hard earned GPAs.
Some pretty bright young people, the College Republicans at the University of California-Merced, decided to see if their fellow students – mostly liberal leaning – would be as eager to share their GPAs as they are to share the wealth, as their heroes, especially B, are suggesting we do and making laws where we have to.
Seems these very generous young liberals aren’t so willing to share their high GPAs with those less fortunate students who don’t do as well in school.
Watch the video here: http://bit.ly/gYeGkx
They were asked to sign a petition to agree to this. Their reactions are hilarious and so hypocritical. Be sure and read some of the comments below the video. These are good, too.
Once again to you liberal folks out there, this ain’t brain surgery. If you like redistribution and support it, let’s do it for everything – even your GPA. Otherwise, catch the clue bus and realize America is a free market society and wealth creation is not a bad thing. As I tell many people over and over again, I never got hired by a poor guy.
Until the next time,
Richard
Dateline: Richard’s World
What’s Old Is New: Village Post Offices Coming Back
You probably know this. The United States Post Office is broke. Bad broke. Really bad broke. The USPS stands testament to what is wrong with today’s federal government … unionized government workers, defined pension plans, bloated workforce, non-performance based hiring and promotions, government trying to compete with the private sector … basically a government bureaucracy run amok.
I have long stated and believe that an entity such as FedEx or UPS or maybe a combination of both, could take over the USPS and it would be making a profit in less than a year. We’d have better service and probably lower rates for first class mail. But hey, even if we didn’t have lower rates for first class mail, at least our tax dollars wouldn’t be wasted to the tune of billions of dollars. Let the hate mail start flowing from the unionized government workers.
But we all know there aren’t enough politician around who will take the bold and necessary steps to eliminate the USPS. No offense to all my female friends … but they don’t have the balls.
So, I ran across this tidbit of info from the USPS Postmaster that was included in his recent speech about closing about 3,600 PO locations, primarily in small rural towns. He said, “The agency is looking to contract with about 2,500 small groceries, pharmacies, and other retailers to create ‘village post offices’.” He got my interest.
Granted, this alone will not save the USPS. It will probably delay the inevitable. But I have to give the Postmaster credit … not a bad idea.
When I was growing up on the southside of Atlanta back in the 50s, our PO was in the local grocery store … a Mayberry type grocery store. Yes, I’m that old. So I know what he is talking about when he speaks of ‘village post offices’.
At least these contracted Post Offices will be operated by business people. Your tax dollars will be going to a local business person who will then turn around and put it back into their local community. And many of these communities with closed POs will still have service … and probably better service.
Nope, I don’t think it will save the USPS but it’s a good idea. But who knows, maybe one good idea will lead to another good idea and another good idea.
Until next time,
Richard
Dateline: From Richard’s World
Well, another Republican debate in the books. And I watched every minute. Even watched some of the talking heads afterwards. And they were still talking this morning and all afternoon today. What about? Sound bites. Who scored the best laugh line? The best knock on the other candidate. And on and on …. blah, blah, blah, … yada, yada, yada. Hardly a word about substance.
Not that there was much substance. How can there be when the game is rigged? I don’t where they went to school or what their definition of a debate is, but that was no debate. That was sound bites. And right now, I don’t think we need sound bites as we try to get educated about the person who will face off in the POTUS election next year.
In Richard’s World, this is how debates would be conducted. They are based on business meetings where you bring in the big dogs, the muckety-mucks, and they all sit around a big round table and hash it out. There is a facilitator to keep things civil and moving along. Other than that, it is adults hashing it out – no physical punches allowed.
So, The Debates That Will Never Happen is where all of the candidates are sitting around a big round table. The cameras are positioned so they can get everyone – logistical matter for TV people – not my expertise. Time limit on total debate length to be determined by majority vote between the candidates.
The first one is a free-for-all. No questions from anyone but the candidates and statements by the same. They get five minutes each for opening statements. Then let the fun begin. Then 5 minutes for closing statements.
Who goes first? I don’t know., Draw short straw or do Scissor, Paper, Rock. The public would love that and they understand it – it’s simple. Everyone knows the rules.
The winner goes first. Remember, no rules, just civil debate between “friends” trying to solve a problem. Eventually, others will join in. They start having real debate. If someone gets out of line or someone is hogging the floor, the facilitator jumps in and restores order.
At the end of this first Debate That Will Never Happen, another one is planned for each and every month afterwards until the final candidate is chosen at the convention.
At the following Debates That Will Never Happen, there is a big bowl in the center of the table. In the bowl are questions submitted by registered voters. Granted, someone, maybe someone from the RNC, will need to cull through the questions beforehand and make sure the ones submitted from the dumb masses are thrown away. You know, we don’t want to waste time with questions like the talking heads ask, like, “Do you like Lady Gaga?” Seriously, I heard this question asked of one of the Republican candidates weeks ago. Seriously. You get my drift. We want good questions from real voters.
Eventually, due to the format and business-like approach, several or one candidate will emerge that shows real leadership quality. Someone will stand out. And we’ll know a lot more about the candidates than we ever would using the current talking head format.
Next, we take this same format to the Presidental debates next fall.
I know, I know. You’re sitting there saying to yourself, great idea but this will never happen. You’re probably right. That’s why it is The Debates That Will Never Happen. But remember, you entered Richard’s World where we dream … and dream BIG!
Until next time – Richard
From Richard’s World
So now our lazy, so-called “statesmen” have selected their picks for the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, also being called the Supercommittee and Super Congress. I call it Super Stupidology.
It’s just plain laziness, cowardly, and dereliction of elected duty, IMHO. And I’m afraid we’re headed down another slippery slop that will take more power away from the people and give it to a select few political insiders. I’m afraid.
The stated goal of the panel — composed of equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans from the House and the Senate — is to reduce federal budget deficits by a total of at least $1.5 trillion over 10 years. It was given a deadline of Nov. 23, 2011. Any recommendations it makes are to be voted on immediately by both chambers of Congress, with no filibusters or amendments allowed.
Read that again, please. Any recommendations it makes are to be voted on immediately by both chambers of Congress, with no filibusters or amendments allowed.
So why have the other legislators any more? Why not put the Supercommittee recommendations up on the Internet and let registered voters vote on them electronically – yea or nay. Why pay these hundreds of individuals to be there and all of their expenses and pensions and so on any longer. Shoot, we now have a Congress of 12 people. Seems unconstitutional to me … but hey, what do I know … I live in Richard’s World.
I thought making legislation was about discussions, debates, compromise, amendments, and open dialogue in public. I read today where legislation has been introduced to FORCE this new Supercommittee to conduct their business in open public. So you know what that means, don’t you? Right now, as it is, they don’t have to conduct their business in open public. This is scary folks. Be very, very scared.
I know, I know … granted, Article I, § 5 of the Constitution provides that “Each House may determine the Rules of its proceedings.” They just changed their rules a tiny bit. How convenient.
And the rules made by the Houses at one point may be changed later, and the Act acknowledges this: “The provisions of this title are enacted by Congress … with full recognition of the constitutional right of either House to change such rules (so far as relating to such House) at any time, in the same manner, and to the same extent as in the case of any other rule of such House.”
But for some strange reason I’m just getting bad vibes from this Supercommittee idea. How about you?
Life Ain't Brain Surgery 