What we have forgotten

This was written during a debate on rising poverty in the United States:

We have forgotten the struggles of our ancestors. The problem the United States of America is facing is one of an emerging aristocracy and a growing bourgeois class that exists to serve their needs. This is a problem since the amount of wealth required to even aspire to the Aristocratic level means that for every new economic elite there must be at least a diametric, and probably exponential, increase in poverty. The result is that we now have a ruling class. How many of us have gone to cast our votes only to sigh and choose the lesser of two evils? Even as we debate here the war in Iraq is being fought over western rights to oil, yet we pay ever increasing annual prices for gasoline and heating oil. We acquiesce when our leaders demand loss of life in the name of national interests; yet, all along we know that we are not serving ourselves but rather struggle to maintain the financially perverted desires of the aristocratic ruling class. But at what expense? The deaths of innocent men, women, and children classified as "acceptable collateral damage"? And as if this atrocity were not bad enough, there is even more loss. When we agree to such decisions are we are losing our moral and legal purpose - we are losing our very nation, the beacon of freedom for all peoples. We have lost a shared purpose and are prodded into action by trumped up national myths and icons.

Regardless of your social inclinations, whether they be left or right of center, we must always define that center as our Constitution and the creed that inspired it: The Declaration of Independence. This is our shared purpose. This is our reason for being. Sadly, we have forgotten this reason. We have forgotten why this country was formed. We have forgotten why we suffered through and reconciled after a Civil War. We have forgotten why so many brave families sacrificed their sons in both World Wars. And we have forgotten why we must remain undivided today. We, the free people of the United States of America, have but one purpose in history and on earth and that is to stand against the tyranny of a baseless and self-serving elite. This was the purpose behind our foundation. This is the challenge we have been given by our founders, the challenge they so bravely took upon themselves, and if we allow this emerging aristocracy to bend our will to theirs then we have failed ourselves, our ancestors, and the world.

A collection of old posts

Modesty
I see the way you people have been looking at me. I see your jaws drop with pure shock when you see how smoothly I maneuver my way through the grocery store, never once stopping to ask where the crème of tartar can be found. I see your eyes wide in disbelief at how cool I am when I return the “broken” fan to the Wal-Mart with only the minimal and necessary screaming at the cashier. But, you know what, I’m a pretty humble person, so I’m not going to talk about how fast and luxurious my ’97 Maxima is – all tricked out with custom indentations down the driver side – because I know that would just be rubbing it in. I won’t even begin to get into how shiny my head is or how my mom thinks I’m special. You know why? Modesty, that’s why. That’s right, even though I think it’s clear to everyone that I am, in fact, number one I refuse to put myself in front of others or think that I’m better than them – even if I am. You guys should be like me – have some modesty.

Searching for God
I have decided to search for God. I've given up with this "looking inward" crap. I've looked inside and he's just not there. Not there, I tell you! I figure this might be a long, arduous, and expensive journey; so, I'm open to donations. I'm probably going to need a lot of food, some good camping equipment (although I prefer to stay in a hotel if one is available), a knife, a couple of guns with ammo, a helicopter, a boat, a submarine, possibly a spaceship, a telescope, and some rope will probably come in handy. Not to mention cash. I'm going to need lots and lots of cash. If I find him, there's the whole trip back, which, as I mentioned, will require cash. I don't know if God is going to be able to pay for his travel or if I'll have to spot him - there's been a lot of people raising money for God so I figure he's probably going to be a little short. I'll probably start off someplace like Israel and then work in a spiral outward, but that's not final yet.I really believe that this is important because it seems that things are getting out of control here and, well, it seems like it's God's business that is at the bottom of it all. I mean, no one is sure whether we should or should not draw cartoons of God, nobody knows which people we can kill or not kill or if we're allowed to kill at all, and the whole eating meat and what kind of meat issues need to be settled once and for all. Not to mention the poverty, pestilence, and violence - he should really try to put an end to these. I mean, had he not started the whole thing I wouldn't even be bothering him, but, you know, it's kind of his fault so he really should step up to the plate and handle it. Oh well, if anyone wants to pitch in, maybe go along, just let me know.

Hurricane Katrina spawns widespread pooting
Days after the initial brute force of hurricane Katrina pounded the gulf coast the after effects are still being smelt. The human toll has been well documented, as well as the unprecedented destruction of personal property. but what has gone virtually unnoticed by America's mainstream media are the devastating effects of what has become widesprand and unabashed pooting. Even before the waters began to pour into New Orleans there were reports of small pockets of pooting going on somewhere near the rear of my home. These relatively minor instances of pooting went mostly undetected with only small complaints. But it wasn't long before these small rumblings began rippling forth from stagnant waters and working their way toward the much heavier populated areas of the house, specifically, the den and kitchen. When asked if I should have been more aware of the potential for the horrendous aftershocks that were to rock the kitchen I replied, "sure, you could say that. I mean, we ate a weird combination of fruit and pizza that evening. also, the Taco Bell I had for lunch probably made matters worse. But what was I to do?" Indeed, after nine consecutive hours of hurricane talk at work followed by a frightful and restless evening that culminated with a total loss of power to my house, options were limited. Later I was overheard pleading with my wife, "come on, let her pull my finger! there's virtually no entertainment and absolutely nothing to eat." At last report the pooting had subsided although all indications are that tonight may prove to be even more tremourous than the night before. For now, the people in this house are quietly staring at me and hoping for the best

I found out about wang's
I don't know about you, but when I hear the word "wang" I immediately think about a "pecker". As in the phrase, "I pulled out my wang." Or, "I don't want to see your wang." Or, "put your wang away and come with us." Well, you get the idea. But from now on, when I hear somebody say "wang" I'm going to think about cheap chinese food. Today I met Matt E. for lunch at Mr. Wang's chinese buffet. Matt was gracious enough to pick up most of the tab - thanks Matt, I'll include you on the lawsuit. Just kidding, your on a completely different lawsuit! I'm telling you, when you leave Mr. Wang's you can tell that you have just packed away a $6.00 meal! It was a regular cornucopia of unknown meat like substances - pink sticky meat, brown grainy meat, brown slimy meat, black meat, fried meat on a stick, and several dumplings filled with sausage ... I think. Ahhh, good food and good times. Why, I even ran into Larry "I used to do the news and now I'm the County Commissioner under investigation" Langford. We shared a laugh across the buffet from each other when I shouted "Mr. Langford!" and gave him the pretend pistol shot with my fingers. Good times, indeed. Now you must excuse me. Lunch at Mr. Wang's was only five hours ago and I still have some left in me. Now that's quality chinese!
ps - matt, i really did appreciate the lunch.

you could say that I'm kind of popular
Yeah, you could say that I'm kind of popular. Everybody knows my name, or at least my nickname. I'm Keith Cutcliffe, but all my friends just call me by my nom de rue, if you will. I like it. It's a good nickname that everyone remembers. I should know; I've had plenty. Early on I gave myself the moniker of Mr. Cool. I thought mr. cool really captured my essence - it didnt catch on so well. turns out that everybody, and i mean EVERYBODY, was more comfortable with "asshole". so it kind of stuck. it's not so bad. i mean, it's better than retard.
anyhow, lots of people call me asshole. Like the other day when I was buying cat food at the store. I dropped this bag in the checkout lane and this guy, somebody I dont even remember meeting, yelled "way to go, asshole!" Man, we all just laughed and laughed. I still dont know where I met that guy; it must have been a while back because people have been calling me asshole for a long time. The point is, he remembered me! Yes sir, I'd say 'ol asshole is a pretty popular guy.

I Read Good
Two pleasant looking young gentlemen were reclined on soft Italian leather lounge chairs at the local martini bar. Distinguished fellows, no doubt. Any one could see that these two were accomplished - dressed in the most fashionable of clothes, scented with subtle colognes, and their designer glasses lent to them an academic air. These two sophisticates were engaged in the most cherished and age-old past time of intellectuals the world over: one-upmanship. Well, as I listened I was amazed! Their conversation flowed with amazing ease over subjects as diverse as scuba diving in the Coral Sea to the molecular physics of outer space. The breadth and depth of their conversation only grew with each martini the young aristocrats drank. Why they hardly noticed the waitress’ low cut blouse, and they barely took time out to ogle the girls at the next table when their dates went to the bathroom. These two dapper Einsteins were at it for hours with this verbal jousting – one would jab with Voltaire and the other would counter and parry with Rousseau. I heard cacophonous laughter at the mere mention of “A Modest Proposal” followed by low and heated rumblings over the ethics of politics and income tax. Finally, with each convinced that they had out done the other, they rose from their chairs, patted the rumples from their corduroy pants, tapped out their pipes and said goodnight to the barkeep. As they passed I couldn’t resist the opportunity to tell them how impressed I was. So, with timid hesitation, I reached out and stopped the two. I said to them,” sorry, sirs, I wasn’t eavesdropping, but I couldn’t help hearing your most extraordinary conversation.” Both men smiled knowingly at each other and in my direction. I told them how impressed I was with their knowledge and asked how it was that they had come to be so learned. One replied to me that only through years of dedicated reading had they come to be so filled with wisdom. When I expressed an eagerness to follow in their footsteps they looked upon me with pity and explained that it required an extraordinary intellect to grasp the meanings of the books they had read. They said that while it was true that anyone could “read” the books, not just anyone could “understand” the books. With that the companions looked at each other again and, smiling, one said to the other “Yes, I read good.” To which the other replied, “no, WE read good.” With that the two gentlemen walked out into the street where they were run over by a bus.

REVISED: Attention Grocery Store Employees and Patrons
Because a couple of people (2) said that they needed a little "filler" info to understand this post I've decided to revise it. Although, I must say that perhaps Amy and Blake could be doing something better with their time, like buying massive amounts of ice cream with a piece of paper. See, the other day Blake was kind enough to let me stop and pickup a pizza on the way home (we carpool). Anyhow, I came out of the pizza place and put the pie in blake's truck. since blake was already in the pig getting some beer, i went on in to pick up a few needed items: coffee, ranch dressing, and something i can't remember. but it was only three things. anyhow, i end up in line behind this woman that has six cartons of ice cream. the cashier must have counted them five times - each time glancing at the cash register and then at some hand-written note on a piece of paper that the lady had given her. At one point the girl looks at the ice cream and says "3, 3, and 3. That's nine!" Holy fucking shit! I thought my brain was going to jump out of my eye socket and beat the hell out of this girl! There were clearly six cartons of ice cream. Anyhow, this led to a ridiculous amount of confusion that once settled allowed for the even more preposterous situation of the hand written note to take center stage. Apparently this woman had some "permission" to use this note to buy things. But what the fuck is some fifteen year old, slack-jawed kid that can't count gonna do about it? I mean, come on! This kid doesn't have the authority to just take a note in exchange for merchandise! I guess I could've switched lanes but I was already "committed" to this lane and had to see it through to the end - even though every second that passed just increased the murderous rage that was building inside of me. The whole time i'm there i'm picturing blake driving off drinking a beer and taking bites of my pizza! Thus, the requested background info which hardly makes the orginal worth reading.
Original Post Below
You should really know your numbers if you’re going to operate a cash-register. After spending about 15 minutes in the express lane of the piggly wiggly last night this point became especially clear. I mean, you don’t even need to know the alphabet so long as you can do basic matching. However, if you’re going to even attempt counting similar items and then ringing them all up at once it is absolutely necessary that you have a firm grasp on numbers. Also, if you’re going to buy things with anything other than cash, card, or check the express lane is probably not for you. And I’m not trying to single anybody out here, but it’s especially not for people making purchases with a hand-written note. You people, in particular, need to probably just go straight to the manager because I’m certain that’s where it’s going to end up. Well, that’s about it. Hope this helps clear up some of the confusion out there.
To Summarize:
1. Learn your numbers
2. Bartering needs to be done with the manager.

cars and jobs

well, i spent yesterday afternoon pushing my car uphill so that corbin could give me a jumpstart. thank god corbin is working with me - he had to help me inflate my tire a couple of weeks ago. the tire stayed inflated long enough for me to drive to the gas station where i changed it. by the way, that air in a can stuff doesn't work so well when you have a huge gash in your tire.

so, i'm thinking that it is finally time for me to bite the bullet and get a new car this fall. i keep waiting for something other than hybrid - like hydrogen fuel, but i'm giving up hope on that happenning any time soon. however, i do like the idea of bio-diesel and so that means volkswagon - which i also like! the way i see it is that if the sh*t really hits the fan and we start running out of gas I can always make my own fuel for a diesel engine. i'll probably start looking for a turbo diesel jetta next month.

as far as my job goes i'm relatively happy. my team leader (project manager) keeps wanting to add more people to our team - which is good. the thing is that he can't keep us and the work organized. so we end up with a lot of time on our hands. i know, i know, i shouldn't complain, and i am grateful for such a good job. but i like to stay busy when i'm at work. also, i'm missing traveling a lot - a whole lot. i want to go back to europe. i want to go to argentina. i want to go to southeast asia. i want to go to africa. none of that is going to happen here. so, i've got to start taking the necessary steps to get into a professional position that will allow me to travel. surely there is a need for a political anthropologist with a high level of tech skills. i hope so!

It's really simple if you think about it

I want to move to Norway. I want to live someplace where politics and government are a natural part of people's lives instead of some sort of foreign aggressive entity. Is this possible? Maybe what I really want is to live someplace where most of the people are smart enough to treat each other with dignity - this way there isn't much need for government. Have you ever thought about that? The fact that we need government? Because of all these idiots that can't seem to get it through their thick skulls that stealing, raping, and murdering are wrong. Jeesh! What's so hard about not doing things to other people that you don't want done to you? It's really simple if you just take 5 seconds to think about it. And I'm not coming from a religious point of view here - nope, just plain common sense. I mean, if people would just treat each other well then we could eliminate a big chunk of government.

But what about victimless crimes like drugs? Well, again, this is just a case of insecure people forcing people to live in a way that they feel is best. What if all the potheads made it law that everybody had to smoke bowls every morning? I bet these holier-than-thous wouldn't like it too much. So why do they want to put peaceful people in jail simply for a lifestyle different from theirs? I said it before and I'll say it again: it's simple, treat others the way you want to be treated. Let people smoke pot responsibly and we can all go back to worrying about how we're going to spend all our extra money that we'll save in taxes. And speaking of taxes... I don't know anyone that would want somebody to take half of their income to spend recklessly on unknown items. So why do we do it? I'm all for paying taxes but enough is enough - I want a receipt! Is that too much to ask for? I don't think so - you'd want a receipt from me if I took half of your money. You wouldn't just hand it over for no reason. Again, treat people the way you want to be treated - it's really simple.

Ted was a weirdo

Ted was born with the stench of weirdo grafted to his soul. All you had to do was look at Ted and you instinctively said to yourself “hey, that guy’s a fucking weirdo.” You either loved him or hated him; most folks really liked Ted, although they never took him too seriously.

Ted was smart, funny, sociable, and not too ugly – all of which made up for the fact that he was uncomfortably interested in everything and everyone. Ted was always reading about something strange and forcing everyone to talk about the most bizarre things. He once made me talk for three days about universal symbols in dreams as proof of an objective morality. After the conversation we went out and got pissed drunk and Ted ran around the parking lot of some apartments naked. So, you see, you kind of had to take the good with the bad.
I don’t know what ever happened to Ted. He took off traveling for a while. I saw him about ten years ago and he was laughing about having come back from Mexico and being in trouble with the feds over smuggling some grass. It didn’t seem to bother him too much. I pressed him about it but he just told me not to worry and then started talking about the natural acoustics of Teotihuacán and how neat it was to jog through the open air markets of Mexico City. Ted was a real weirdo.