So Over It

This may come as a shock to some of you, but I am quitting politics.  From this moment forward, I vow to discuss politics only with my family and that only occasionally. 

Why you ask?  Well, maybe you don’t ask.  Maybe you could care less.  I’m going to assume that if you’re still reading, you do wonder why.  OK, I will try to sum up my thoughts and feelings for you.

It is a waste of my time.  I’m not really going to influence anyone that has their mind made up.  From what I can tell, that is just about every person with a pulse.  They may not admit it publicly, but deep inside they know whom they favor.  Some folks feign independence or open-mindedness, but I’m not buying it.  I will allow (in the interest of avoiding another pointless argument) that some folks really do not have any idea as to which candidate they will vote for, but those types are few and far between.  Let’s face it – people, by and large, are going to vote for the establishment candidates. 

My personal belief is that the two major party candidates are selected and vetted by the real power in this country: the very wealthy.  There are other very wealthy, non-citizens outside of this country that also have a say.  Politics is all about money and power.  Money and power provide influence.  I have very little money, no power and zero influence.   Ultimately, politicians care very little about what we lower middle-class folks think.  They will only listen if we are in mass agreement, and that is almost guaranteed not to happen until we have some sort of mega-disaster that jars people into realistic thinking and caring about things outside of their own little TV and mass media soaked world. 

I’m sick and tired of it.  Seriously.  We change teams every few years or so and things never get better.  The government NEVER GETS LESS POWER.  Government never shrinks or has fewer departments and fewer laws.  It’s always a net gain for government – which should explain to any thoughtful person how we’ve ended up with giant leviathan we call our central, federal government. 

Every election it’s the same thing.  The Red Team gets mad at the Blue Team.  Red Team wins.  Government gets more power.  Blue Team gets mad at Red Team.  Blue Team wins.  Government gets more power.  Inevitably, some people begin to think that a new party or an independent candidate might be the answer.  They are then laughed out of politics by the giant money/media/corporate machine that selects the two party candidates we get to vote for.  Lies are made up and distortions of record, void of any contextual anchor are ginned up, while any past mistake or missteps that the third party independent candidate has made are blown out of proportion and context.  Viola – the candidate has no chance at election. 

People get genuinely angry over this stuff.  Some even literally hate you if you’re on the opposite team.  I have had enough.  I’m getting off the carousel.  I’m not saying I won’t vote, but I am done discussing it.  Under the current corporate owned system, I find myself amused if you think you have any real power or influence with your vote. 

I will close with a prediction.  It’s not like I’m taking much of a chance here, but I predict that after the next election, government will get bigger and have more influence over your personal life – no matter which establishment party candidate wins. 

Looking Back - Looking Forward

As I look back over 2011, I see a lot of things in my life.  At the risk of sounding the braggart, I grew as a human.  I grew in my trust in God.  Yet, at the same time, I admit that I am a weakling.  There are times when I wish to give up and scream “I don’t understand anything!” 

2011 was filled with answered prayer.  Again, at risk of sounding like I’m bragging, the prayers that my wife and I have seen answered are just too amazing to be coincidental.  Trying to list them from memory is tough, but here are a few. 

We prayed that our son would not have to deploy to Afghanistan.  Inexplicably, his deployment was cancelled.

Our son had duty on Thanksgiving Day.  We prayed that he’d be able to come home anyway.  Someone took his watch. 

Without going into detail, after a near-disaster by those that replaced me, I was restored to my former position at work.

We never really prayed for it, but we did occasionally mention how some extra money would really help us to help others, as well as set us up on a good path.  Completely by surprise, and again, leaving out details, $11,000 arrived in the mail.

We felt led to give some money to a complete stranger.  We did not wish to identify ourselves in the process, but after leaving the money in their mailbox, I decided, against the strong feeling that it wouldn’t matter, that I had to make sure they, and not the mailman, got the money.  So, I rolled by their house in my truck, and the husband was out front.  I yelled, “Hey, check your mailbox!”  He said, “Stop!  Stop!  Turn into my drive!  I got the money!  You did that?”  Well, I was busted.  He told me, “You have no idea how much we needed that money.  Thank you so much.”  I told him that I never wanted him to know that we gave the money, and I meant it when I said to him, “Thank God, because God made it possible.”  Aside from my failure to trust the strong signal God gave me that this man and his wife would get the money out of their mailbox before the mail man, this whole episode was an incredible blessing.

Honestly, I could go on, but I don’t have the time, and there has been so much answered prayer, that I’m actually losing track of it all.  I know that sounds a bit ungrateful, but I can’t help my memory.  It is what it is. 

I learned a lot over the year.  I’m amazed at the world’s western “democracies” and their power to kick the can down the road.  I don’t understand how they have managed to keep the global “Ponzi scheme” going, but they have.  I find it very disturbing though.  Why?  Because when they run out of cans to kick, the crash is going to be that much worse. 

But, back to God – a favorite subject of mine these days.  I would never expect those of you that do not believe to really listen to anything I have to say.  One can read my past blogs and see just what a failure I have been.  I never set out to fail, or to doubt, or to give my friends any reason to doubt – yet, here I am.  Honestly, I do not know how I went almost a decade without acknowledging God.  So many things happened – mostly for the negative – yet God had mercy on me and drew me back.  And that leads me to my prediction for 2012.  God will continue to grow me.  God will continue to work in my life, and I’ll report about that here as the months go by.