Excessively bitter tirade (EBT), and the new American dream

So, I've confessed many times that I'm a craigslist junkie—no need to revisit that point. I'll try to keep the rest of this post short, so as not to rant for too long.

I always look at the freebies on craigslist. It's how we landed our awesome couch, and a handful of other goodies. People are wealthy, or comfortable, or in a sticky situation that requires immediately unloading items that still hold value... For whatever reason, folks sometimes choose to simply give away perfectly good stuff. Craigslist is a treasure trove for cheapskates like me.

A few days ago, I saw that someone was giving away cooking magazines on craigslist, exceptional publications that mirror and complement a fascinating, high-level cooking show on PBS. I can't watch the show, as we don't have cable and we live at the bottom of a hill. I also can't justify ordering the publication because, frankly, I never follow the recipe anyway... Plus I have lucked into free, cast-off copies of this very magazine from friends who did subscribe... But then, they changed their subscription to an on-line version. Sad for me.

Alas, though, this someone on craigslist was unloading a bunch of the very same magazines! More recent printings, to boot. And the map showed that the giver was located very close to my favorite grocery store. Huzzah! I wrote a note, the giver responded, and the next morning on the way to shop, I swung by to pick up the magazines. There they were, on the spacious front entry of a stately brick home in a nicer section of our neighboring hamlet. I snagged the mags and went about my errands.

Later, as I unloaded my trunk of the car, I first put away frozen items and then quickly sorted the magazines by year. There were a bunch of them, not just my desired publication but also many other foodie mags, the pricey, glossy-covered seasonal editions that catch your eye at the checkout; most of them looked as if they'd never been opened. As I separated the items, I was shocked to find a couple of pieces of mail stuck between covers. One looked as if it might be a check, the other appeared to be an electronically generated pay stub for automatic deposit, and a piece of junk mail, too. I will drop this mail off at the correct house in the next few days, when I find myself in that area again. I will leave a note explaining where the pieces came from. Hopefully, the person will learn a valuable lesson about craigslist anonymity and how it's wise to remove personal items from anything you give away to strangers. (Duuuhhhhh.)

But then, as I emptied one bag of mags completely, I found a receipt. From Giant Eagle, one of southwestern Pennsylvania's prominent grocery chains. The receipt contained a few items: lunch meat, name brand kid drinks, that sort of thing. And I couldn't help noticing that the items had been paid for with an EBT card. I also couldn't help noticing that the card had already been used to purchase an alarmingly expensive amount of food, because (who knew?!) the receipt prints the card total used thus far in addition to the total for the current purchase. I'm guessing it's a per-month stipend, but I am not certain.

Okay, I know what you'll say. Perhaps this receipt, stuck in the bottom of a used plastic grocery bag, perhaps it got there by accident. But how? If those bags are reused, it's by the person who originally had them, yes? And if you do recycle plastic grocery bags, you take them to a recycle container at the Giant Eagle and shove them in there to be sent away to a plant and made like new. So how did that receipt get in there? I must conclude (perhaps wrongly I know, but let's be serious here) that the person who gave me the items was the same person for whom that receipt was generated. There is a very good chance that is the case. My assumption isn't ironclad, but it is likely.

In which case, I am left wondering how that can be. That nice big home, in a good neighborhood, and all those expensive magazines, ordered and purchased... then given away. It doesn't add up.

I have long been a supporter of separate purchasing facilities for recipients of government assistance. Maybe that sounds mean, but the fact that all stigma has been removed from the hand-out culture contributes, I feel, to the abuse of that culture. Requiring assistance here and there is human, but an able-bodied person requiring it as a lifestyle is ridiculous. If this person needs help with food costs, why don't they begin by shopping where I shop? I go there because it is cheaper. And maybe cutting out the name brand items would keep costs down, too. Name brands are not required for health and physical prosperity.

Then I argue with myself. Maybe that particular Giant Eagle store is the closest grocery to that person. But if the card-carrier is the person in that home, then my theory is not true. We live in Suburbia, for cryin' out loud—there are grocery stores handily located in every direction. And the grocery store that I frequent doesn't even HAVE those shiny magazines by the checkout.

Maybe I'm wrong, maybe that EBT receipt ended up there by some fluke. But if it belonged to the giver of all those magazines, purchased by someone hanging out in the fancy-shmancy Giant Eagle, buying name-brand items and spending over two times as much on food per month as we average here in our eat-in household? Then my suspicion that all these helpful systems are being abused is confirmed tenfold. I know abuse occurs, even without this proof. I have personally seen people qualify for WIC, over-buy, then give away the excess milk and other items so their allotment won't be reduced because of under-consumption. It is sickening. Needless to say, I have not yet accepted the handouts, from either abusers or the government.

I read an article about the death of America: the day that Oblamma was re-elected. I didn't want to believe that this great country was over, even though the statistics prove me wrong, as the contributors are now out-numbered by the receivers. Each day, however, I am being forced to accept the truth of this situation.

My only hope now? That my little family can achieve the new American Dream: finding a secluded, undesirable plot of land somewhere far from a city, and hiding out to live our quiet, low-cost life. We'll try to find a little community of faith wherever we end up, will stay in touch with family, will try to make friends with like-minded people, and we'll support those people in need and pray that they return the favor when the time comes... because that's the superior help system that preceded Big Daddy Government. That's who we would go to now, if need be; if I am forced to ask for help, I'd much rather seek it from people whom I know and respect.

We've enabled and trained up a majority population of lazy, helpless luxury-lovers. God help us.

Diatribe, or die tryin'

My goodness, I certainly have been an absentee blogger, haven't I?! I didn't realize just how many days had passed since my last post. It's been a loooong time. This might be my new record for blog neglect. Alas, the hiatus has ended because I am moved to write.

I finally caved and became a Facebook member; I'm sad to report that it is often as pathetic and pointless as I feared. Yet. It seems to invite people to become at least partially informed, if you happen to be friendly with informed people who post meaningful links to factual information. Facebook is responsible, at least in part, for my need to express myself today.

Why am I writing? I suppose that I'm at my wit's end with clueless people. I'm frustrated by the general lack of interest most Americans display. I'm embarrassed that my fellows would rather follow the World Cup than the immigration crisis and its mealy-mouthed managers. I want to shout at the masses, to expound upon the reasons why we even had all those picnics and fireworks last weekend. Did you know that an alarming amount of Americans don't understand the point of Independence Day, let alone how and when it came to exist? They know the finalists on the latest television talent show, but they don't know about the recent Supreme Court rulings that had conservatives celebrating a tad.

When did apathy become fashionable? And more importantly, when did the land of the free become the land of free? How quickly we choose to be distracted from bad news, from violence and murdered children, from evil marching across a country with intent to destroy good. If it's not our country, or our children, we turn the channel. It's disheartening how quickly we disconnect from everything that does not directly affect us.

But what happens here will affect us, you see. Because we're a united group of states, under Oblamma's inept leadership and tutelage. We're like the separate systems of the body, which also function to create one large being. And we all end up impacting each other—just like all the water eventually gets mixed with all the other water, rain and storm drain and purified sewage and chemical run-off. One drop must be affected by the rest. We are not exclusive.

And what happens in our high levels of government affects us all, in time. What happens in other countries and their economies affects us, in time. We're all globally interconnected. But I can't even touch on that whole mishmash of ignorance about world affairs. I'm too concerned about ignorance at home.

People came to this country years and years ago because they were desperate. They wanted freedom to pursue the things they valued: God, jobs, family, community, food and homes. They wanted to start fresh in a place where your rank in society paled in comparison to your work ethic. Equal opportunity was intended to mean access to opportunities, not assured success and acceptance. The home of the free was aptly named because people exchanged tyranny and control for opportunities to work and earn, to climb from poverty on a sturdy ladder that would not sway or snap when the government changed hands.

The land of the free isn't supposed to offer everything for free. Capitalism believes in competition. That is where opportunity truly lies. And everybody in America will never all be completely equal. Some people are smarter or richer, some are destitute or unattractive, some had a great childhood while other scraped a living out of garbage. But the opportunities still exist for everyone to grow, to learn, to change their story. That's freedom. It's not government-dictated equality. People will share when they have enough to do so, or when they are moved by their faith in someone bigger than themselves to help them multiply what they have to help take care for others. Charity and generosity of spirit can't be mandated without resulting bitterness and hard feelings.

Hobby Lobby is not telling its employees they cannot seek an abortion. Hobby Lobby is not denying its employees the opportunity to end an unborn life. It's not even forbidding them to use birth control; in fact, it's still paying for some of those prescriptions. Hobby Lobby's offense? It's simply not interested in paying for the more gruesome forms of that "choice" to terminate a pregnancy. Isn't that the right of the employer? If I owned a business, and had an employee who drank loads of hard liquor daily, then came to me and wanted me to pay for a life-or-death kidney transplant, I'd have a problem with that. The condition, after all, was caused by choices that person made. That's why people created this country—to have choices. Isn't it? Why is a bakery being forced to bake a wedding cake for a same-sex couple? Isn't that the choice of the bakery? It's certainly the choice of the people in love who are shopping for a cake to go where they want. That's why competition works, people. Because there are choices. If someone bakes horrid cakes, no one goes there. If someone bakes great gay cakes, then word gets out. Right?

Choices. We must uphold the ability to choose in this country. To choose. Period. Our self-appointed king and his big-mouthed wife can tell their own children what to eat for lunch; I'll make that decision for myself and my own family. And citizenship? Yes, it's a choice, and an opportunity. We will never be able to make all those helpless children into comfortable citizens. Even if we do? By the time they're grown, the term "citizen" will have no meaning, and the greatness of the country that drew those people will have fallen to unrecognizable standards that no longer even resemble our forefathers' Republic.

Those first true Americans weren't perfect. They were determined, and they had an opportunity... and ultimately those were worth more than any hand-out. Don't let their hard work slip away. Watch, read, learn, and speak when informed. It's still your choice.

For now, at least.

He said it better—so I'll let him

I sat down to try to explain why I've been physically ill since Election Day. I penned a long-winded, hot-headed rant that meandered from one point to another in a huff. Thankfully, I saved it for possible posting on another day, and then I found this fellow's work, which said all I felt but with well-spoken, intelligent candor instead of emotionally driven wrath (that was mine).

So, without further delay, I share with you the wise words of Andrew P. Napolitano, a former judge of the Superior Court of New Jersey, and the senior judicial analyst at Fox News Channel. Judge Napolitano has written six books on the U.S. Constitution.

**********

Only in America can a president who inherits a deep recession and whose policies have actually made the effects of that recession worse get re-elected. Only in America can a president who wants the bureaucrats who can’t run the Post Office to micromanage the administration of every American’s health care get re-elected. Only in America can a president who kills Americans overseas who have never been charged or convicted of a crime get re-elected. And only in America can a president who borrowed and spent more than $5 trillion in fewer than four years, plans to repay none of it and promises to borrow another $5 trillion in his second term get re-elected.

What’s going on here?

What is going on is the present-day proof of the truism observed by Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton, who rarely agreed on anything in public: When the voters recognize that the public treasury has become a public trough, they will send to Washington not persons who will promote self-reliance and foster an atmosphere of prosperity, but rather those who will give away the most cash and thereby create dependency. This is an attitude that, though present in some localities in the colonial era, was created at the federal level by Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt, magnified by FDR, enhanced by LBJ, and eventually joined in by all modern-day Democrats and most contemporary Republicans.

Mitt Romney is one of those Republicans. He is no opponent of federal entitlements, and he basically promised to keep them where they are. Where they are is a cost to taxpayers of about $1.7 trillion a year. Under President Obama, however, the costs have actually increased, and so have the numbers of those who now receive them. Half of the country knows this, and so it has gleefully sent Obama back to office so he can send them more federal cash taken from the other half.

It is fair to say that Obama is the least skilled and least effective American president since Jimmy Carter, but he is far more menacing. His every instinct is toward the central planning of the economy and the federal regulation of private behavior. He has no interest in protecting American government employees in harm’s way in Libya, and he never admits he has been wrong about anything. Though he took an oath to uphold the Constitution, he treats it as a mere guideline, whose grand principles intended to guarantee personal liberty and a diffusion of power can be twisted and compromised to suit his purposes. He rejects the most fundamental of American values -- that our rights come from our Creator, and not from the government. His rejection of that leads him to an expansive view of the federal government, which permits it, and thus him, to right any wrong, to regulate any behavior and to tax any event, whether authorized by the Constitution or not, and to subordinate the individual to the state at every turn.

As a practical matter, we are in for very difficult times during Obama’s second term. ObamaCare is now here to stay; so, no matter who you are or how you pay your medical bills, federal bureaucrats will direct your physicians in their treatment of you, and they will see your medical records. As well, Obama is committed to raising the debt of the federal government to $20 trillion. So, if the Republican-controlled House of Representatives goes along with this, as it did during Obama’s first term, the cost will be close to $1 trillion in interest payments every year. As well, everyone’s taxes will go up on. New Year’s Day, as the Bush-era tax cuts will expire then. The progressive vision of a populace dependent on a central government and a European-style welfare state is now at hand.

Though I argued during the campaign that this election was a Hobson’s choice between big government and bigger government, and that regrettably it addressed how much private wealth the feds should seize and redistribute and how much private behavior they should regulate, rather than whether the Constitution permits them to do so, and though I have argued that we have really one political party whose two branches mirror each other’s wishes for war and power, it is unsettling to find Obama back in the White House for another four years. That sinking feeling comes from the knowledge that he is free from the need to keep an eye on the electorate, and from the terrible thought that he may be the authoritarian we have all known and feared would visit us one day and crush our personal freedoms.

**********

Thanks, Judge. I'm with you. I just wish you weren't so right.

I'd add only this from the book of Daniel, which has brought me hope, peace, and the sincere desire to seek truth even when many around me pursue dust:

The Lord reigns forever; he has established his throne for judgment.

Flag Abuse

Speaking of the flag, here's an abuse of the American flag, plain and simple.
flag abuse

People, I try to keep politics at a minimum here on Melmoirs. I do. But honestly, at this point, I'd have to find out something unspeakable about Mitt Romney or Paul Ryan to make me vote for anyone else.

I urge all of us to open our eyes. Understand the bloated and unfounded ego, the unhealthy agenda. Please try to grasp the threat to America that is clearly evident in one man's utter disrespect for what made this country great.

This is why I don't watch the news

Watching the news, any news, for more than a couple of minutes is nearly impossible for me. The stories on the news are either ludicrous, horrific, or feature mind-numbingly evil antagonists. And sometimes, those stories infuriate me.

The local news can be awful, but often equates a soap-opera news option—overly dramatic broadcasters, all blonde hair, raised eyebrows and deadpan delivery, covering fires in abandoned buildings, bearded men who are arrested for not placing reflective triangles on their buggies... Sometimes the stories are tragic, and sometimes it's just a slow news day.

The world news? That's usually too disturbing to watch for long. We've become immune to violence and death from over-exposure. How many people were killed in the bombing? Was that a dead body I just saw covered in rubble? There was another natural disaster? What was it this time? Oh.

Let's take a look at what's going on now. Okay, there was a large-scale exotic animal massacre in Ohio because some loon of a guy who had amassed all these amazing creatures decided to 1) release them and 2) kill himself. Huh?! What in the world? Why did he collect them all, and then why did he free them and take his own life? Did he think this was some sort of statement? Did he honestly believe the animals would roam freely and not come to harm? How did he even get them? Was it legal? Apparently there were complaints for years about this goofball, yet he continued to acquire (both animals and bizarre personal traits, I'm guessing) and here we are today with a boatload of animal corpses in Ohio.

It gets better. In Philadelphia, authorities uncovered a dungeon of suffering for mentally challenged adults and an assortment of youth who receive government assistance of some sort. A sick little trio of friends decided, apparently, this was an easy way to make some money. How in the world this seemed like a defensible idea to anyone, I will never know. I can't even go there. I am ill just considering the conditions and suffering that these people were held in.

Now, those are stories that turn our stomachs, as they should. I don't want to know about them, but I probably should be at least informed so I keep abreast of what people are capable of doing. I can't begin to understand, but I should be aware and be reminded: This is a really messed up place with some seriously twisted people in it.

But then there are stories that enrage me, too. Like the whole Occupy Wall Street nonsense. What are these people against, exactly? Joblessness? If they had jobs, they likely wouldn't be able to participate in this lovely demonstration for very long. So maybe that's the beef? Or is it that big, bad corporations weren't held accountable for money loss? Were they hoping for college loans to be forgotten and that didn't happen? Have they come to the depressing realization that they can't drive new, fast cars on their current budgets? Do these folks even know why they're there? Are they angry that their cell phones are out of battery power? That their designer duds got dirty and/or no longer match? What, really, is the main complaint?

I can't stand to watch much of it, these people camped out in the very spaces that corporations provide for them, the displeased crowds who all manage to have what they really value (technology, name brands, nice camping gear) but bemoan the lack of money and opportunity. I hate to burst everyone's bubble, but here's the truth: many lives begin with (and sometimes continue with) un-fantastic, uninspiring, unrewarding work. Many of us started there, and frankly, more than a few have remained there. I can tell you why the middle class is shrinking; it's because the middle class tries very hard to have a lot of the same baubles that the upper class enjoys. We here in middle world have a very serious case of misguided, confused priorities. I want to live in a country that appreciates hard work, the basics, and has values. I don't really care to join with a band of creative hippy types who are whining about the lack of handouts.

Stop looking for handouts. Stop kvetching about who got them. Contact the president who's exacerbating the situation, your local and state representatives (do you even know who they are? did you vote?) and share your frustrations with them, and then go to work somewhere. Drive a small used car, live in a smaller house or apartment, shop where I shop, and most of all, Shush. Vociferously occupying a space that lies in the shadow of the very corporations that fund your hobbies, hand-helds, and highfalutin pursuits is hypocritical. If we look back at the history of this country, our success has been the result of individuals who competed to make money and make things better, and who worked hard. Sometimes, success has rested on the ability of many to do without, to sacrifice willingly. Nobody got rich by spreading the wealth, which actually means taking someone else's wealth. Which that wealthy person likely worked to attain. It's not the government's job to provide for us. The government owes us nothing but rights, freedoms, and protection from crazy people.

All right. I'm stepping off the soapbox now. I'm getting fired up just thinking about all this, weird people, cruel people, uninformed spoiled people, etc. I don't want to live in a bubble, but I also don't want to immerse myself in a boiling cauldron of information that fills me with helpless fury.

So, I'll keep the television off, and limit my time online. If I want to maintain a healthy balance in my mind and heart, I need to restrict my exposure. I want to feel genuine love for my fellow man, but golly, they can be an unlovable bunch.