Under Amendment 1 of the United States Constitution is the “Right to petition the government to fix problems”.
Problem Statement: Corporations have bought and paid for the United States House of Representatives and the Senate (with few exceptions). This means that legislation with *no benefit to human beings* is being voted on and made into law. This legislation benefits the corporations and not the American people.
The American people shall make a new amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America that shall not be abridged.
No member of the senate or of congress may accept any monies from any company, whether that company be in or outside of the United States.
If a member of congress or a senator, has a history of having received such money, then that member or senator will be excused and excluded from voting in any matter that is *in any way* related to legislation. An example is that a senator who has accepted any benefits whether they be monies or otherwise from a defense contractor, may not vote on defense spending or anything related to defense spending.
No member of congress shall be able to make laws or vote on laws that are as a result of having received any such benefit or contribution.
All people who work for any government of the United States, whether that be either Federal or of the states or territories shall agree to personal financial transparency. There is no exception to this rule.
Have you been in situations where you are consistently ignored? You can be sure that those who are ignoring you have dismissed you. You have no importance to those who ignore you. They can’t be bothered with what you need. They actually cannot be bothered with you at all.
Make no mistake, those who ignore, also dismiss. Dismissing makes you less than human in the eyes of those who ignore you. This also makes it easier to ignore you. If you have no value, you can be pushed aside.
How is this interaction created? At what point do we allow ourselves to dismiss other humans?
Many people actually do believe that they are superior to other humans and so we don’t have to explain for those. We know why the “superiors” ignore human beings. They are often people who don’t recognize their own bad behavior.
For those who love and support others, why would they ignore other humans? Talking with others, I am told that often, people don’t have time for everything that they need to get done. Thus, they run through their days only focused on what they must. No one gets a pass for this busy person. They can only focus on the things on the list.
Others; simply do not have the energy to give another. You will find them ignoring others as a matter of survival.
It’s the first group that deserve disdain. Ironically, this is exactly their treatment of others and should be our treatment of all those who believe they are “better” than others. “Superiors” only concern themselves with self. They could care less what feelings they are causing the ignored person. They usually have no reason to believe they are superior – and believe it anyway.
Our minds love to be righteous, when we have a belief about superiority, we will find ways to confirm our belief. I’ve heard the arguments: “She’s ugly, he is clumsy, look how stupid they are!” On and on the arguments roll and they include no self reflection. They are simply expressions of the baser parts of the human brain.
If you are being ignored and dismissed, you can make some choices. You may know the person who is ignoring you, if you do, you may know if 1, 2 or 3 is the source of the ignoring. It helps to know, and it does make a difference to how you respond.
To respond to #1 which is the most insidious of moods of Americans, is to be aware that you are with an extremely rude person. Treat them so. You don’t have to do anything, in fact, perhaps you can ignore them back.
To respond to #2, you can be respectful with your interruption. This person is struggling.
To respond to #3, don’t.
It really is awful to be ignored. Dismissing is a way of telling some one “you don’t matter to me”. Don’t be this person.
Valuing your life and what you do is the way to steer a course of success.
All my life I’ve needed a rudder to go with my oars, and that rudder has always come in the form of words. Those words never had to be mine. I didn’t mind copying the great philosophers and writers. Each year I set words of commitment and direction to my life, these words helped me make all subsequent decisions so that I stayed on track.
When 19 years old, I wrote this…
JB Collection
A LONG CONTRACT (for me)
Hobbes maintains that survival is basic in nature and therefore ought to be paramount in man’s value system as well.
To Patrick Henry’s question, is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Hobbes would have answered “absolutely!” How precious is life itself to you? Are there certain advantages and qualities of life without which it would not be worth living to you?
How precious life and living is for me. In my absence what sweet revenge for then do people know my support. But what then of my support if all I want is appreciation? Love so paramount in my life support system. Love and all of its intricacies being the fine line of my sanity.
And yet I know deep inside of my soul that happiness is synonymous with life and that it can be found anywhere. Comradery the loving and the living of friends. Enjoyment and freshness of one sweet hello, one new soul to learn about all the while knowing that the lessons are of myself. The reflections of my own tears, sadness, happiness and joy. And those who stay and stand by and for me through the years like the growing process of the redwood. The more and more I know the strong the broader, the taller I glow. Delving deep into my soul for new things to share with an old friend. The bond being cleaner and more beautiful.
My sons the reflection of years spent in service to my being. The vehicle for purity and time spent; love that went. And so now I see in my years the longing for the total acceptance that thus far only my sons have given, possibly all that I allow. Because I know that the real total acceptance is only within and is not coming from anyone else. So to life — the sweetest gift and all the beginnings are from there. All else that I create within my life, I must own. Even should it be chains and slavery.
I changed no words; this is an accurate historical accounting of what was written. Circa 1976
I’ve always been one of those people that defines my world as increments of life energy. My life energy is the most valuable thing I have to offer to anyone, be it my child, my husband or the Bank of America. Life energy is the expression of me through my work, my attention, my love and my actions.
My life energy is a reflection of my values and commitments. My commitment to my children is endless and that is reflected in the time, money, emotion and work that I invest in them. Any of these things can be called life energy; all of these things reflect the commitment that you make to your life.
I am always surprised when people invest a lot of energy into their own anger. They will recount their stories of frustration and anger, over and over and over again. It is as if they cannot get enough of this recountenance. Each time the story is told, the person gets angry all over again, as if getting angry again was somehow redemptive.
I have watched people tell me stories about an ex-husband (that has been gone for 10 years) who did something damning and perhaps unjust. The person will get so angry that they can froth at the mouth. I can almost see their life force ebbing away. Anger is such a huge investment of life energy. It’s not the initial anger that I am pointing to here; it is the idea of hanging onto that anger. When you hang onto that anger and re-express the anger over and over again you are investing a lot of life energy into nothing. There is no good outcome for this behavior.
If you keep adding up your anger over the years, and you hang onto it each incident, grasping it for all it’s worth, your anger can squeeze out other things in your life. It’s just a universal law that two things cannot be in one space. So, what are all the things that are blocked from your life because your anger is so huge that it consumes you and your life energy?
This love is so personal and so intimate that I have rarely spoken of it. For long months after she passed away, I couldn’t even say the word “mother”. I remember being at CVS and realizing it was Mother’s Day and leaving immediately in tears.
I realized recently that I had given my daughter an impression that I loved her paternal grandmother the most, partly because I spoke of her often. This is something that I do not wish anyone to think. It is my mother who has my heart *more and always*.
Mama the JB Collection
The most important gift that my mother gave me was adult acceptance. No matter what our discussion included, she always accepted me.
Mama in 1944, she is a 16 year old bride
I tried not to model my life after hers. In the end I did to my daughters what she had done to me. She neglected me during my childhood and I suffered. I thought I was being different with my life. I went to school, got a couple of degrees and worked full time in white collar jobs. Mama worked as a bartender for the last thirty years of her life. Several years during the time of my childhood she worked two jobs or split shifts. She was always trying so hard to feed us. We were home alone. Inevitably, I did the same to my daughters, I left them home alone while I worked two jobs or attended school for my master’s degree.
Mama was the center of my universe. She was my go-to, my wisdom, my fail safe. She accepted me perfectly and loved me fiercely. Of course, she was my center. Twenty five years ago on MLK Day we went car shopping. We spent the whole day together without any little ones. We went to lunch and talked and talked. When I went back to work the next day, my soul was full. I felt loved and treasured.
Less than three weeks later, mama passed away. They called me in the middle of the night saying that she had a stroke. I got in the shower to get ready to go and while I stood there, I felt an energy rush that stopped with my body. I felt my mother and a full measure of her grief. I felt her saying to me with sorrow “I have to go”. I tried in my soul to grab her and hold her, it was desperate, but she was gone.
When Trump took office four years ago, many of us knew that it was the “White Mans’ Last Stand”. He was working hard to keep women in their place (as sexual objects) and to keep white male superiority at the top of the pyramid.
Because of his history as a businessman *we all know that was a charade* we thought he would change Washington. However, there was a secondary agenda. This secondary agenda was simply the hope of the people being placed onto a man (Trump) who disregarded them. Americans are tired of politics as usual; they are tired of losing ground on the economic front and people are tired of being pushed into poverty by every piece of legislation that comes down the pike. These Americans mistakenly believed that Trump would help. Trump supporters looked to this man to shake up the status quo (drain the swamp), because nothing was working to get lawmakers to pay attention to the average American.
That hope in Trump was misplaced.
He courted the ‘white man’ with power grabs and blatant hostility to everyone else. He was vicious, condescending and openly; a cheater. He justified all of that with the language of superiority. He did it because he could. It became evident that Trump was not interested in the average person; what he really needed was a way to make money.
A ‘White Man’s’ War against, well, Everyone else
Trump told America that he would “drain the swamp” referring to the backroom politics in Washington that allows lobbyists influence over legislation. He actually did drain the D.C. swamp and set it up in a way that has never been seen in American politics before. He openly and publicly courted the wealthy to donate to his causes and stay in Trump hotels if they wanted to gain favor with America. “The Times found over 200 companies, special-interest groups and foreign governments that patronized Mr. Trump’s properties while reaping benefits from him and his administration.”
While Trump is using his office to gain immense amounts of money and influence; Americans were suffering in a pandemic that was ruining the lives of millions of people. Trump proved over and over again that he was never interested in America or the people who live here. It wasn’t a surprise that he did not want to give up the office of President.
From the summer of 2019, Trump’s only ambition was re-election. From strong-arming Ukraine officials to American voter suppression, Trump kept his eyes on the prize. When he lost the election, he could not accept it. He tried anything to stay in power. He was aware that prison could be an outcome of his own civilian status.
Trump’s sedition~
When it came down to it, he wasn’t going to let the presidency go easily. From the beginning, white men have loved Trump. Q-Anon and Antifa and the Proud Boys were groups of people that he would use. Trump always courted the white men and they courted him back. Trump put out a call to action to his white men and they responded.
Not only did the domestic terrorists and rioters travel from all over America, they were already present in Washington D.C.’s police force and even the capitol’s police force. They were ready for insurrection, and so it happened.
Some among America’s military allies believe Trump deliberately attempted a coup and may have had help from federal law-enforcement officials.
Whatever he had planned, it did not work. Thank the human collective that it did not work. For those of us who felt attacked by Trump’s hostilities and disrespect, we can finally breath a sigh of relief. It really has been a struggle for the last four years and that struggle is over. Joe Biden is our next president, and so it is!
I don’t want to hear about this year anymore. I don’t want to hear about how bad the virus has been on all of us. We know how bad it has been. We suffered it and we continue suffering it. It’s not news.
The election was hectic. It was so stressful drawing party lines with friends and family. Who knew that our relationships were so vulnerable? Who knew that there was a secret between us? Bigotry is so much more common than we thought.
Reaching for the truth was so difficult. When I discussed Clinton and Biden and Trump, I was told that I was lying. “Who are you going to believe? Me, or your lying eyes?” Which way led to the truth? Who was the pedophile? How do you know?
The truth is knowable and important.
The virus revealed what an inadequate financial system we have. We came to realize that the stock market is irrelevant to most of the people in the country. We came to see that the billionaires had stacked the deck in their own favor. Every politician in a power position had been bought and paid for, so the minimum wage stayed at it’s debilitating 1990 level. As businesses closed, it was the most vulnerable that paid the price of the pandemic. We suffered it and we continue suffering it.
For all the posturing of the politicians, the Paycheck Protection Program ended up being wildly and inadequately distributed. The wealthy companies borrowed, some embarrassingly returning the loan money. While some companies put the money to good use, others squandered the loan and did not save jobs.
We saw how inadequate our health care system is, designed to make a profit, human beings are forgotten. America rations health care based on ability to pay. If you don’t pay, you don’t get life saving care. How many diabetics lost their lives in the summer of 2020?
What a disappointment.
The food lines got longer and they never went away. As soon as a week ago, thousands of families were waiting in line for food. What does this tell us about our great country?
So where do we go from here? Relentlessly forward into the future is where we go. We must grow our generosity towards each other. We will vote to make sure that we express our commitment to a democratic future. We can and we will find answers to our problems. We can and we will make our country a good place to live.
The Republicans are once again crying “budget” as they are called upon to help the American people with Covid relief. They have blamed all of their inaction on the Democrats and Nancy Pelosi. Tax dollars and the budget are apparently meaningless words for this Congress.
I have to say that I am actually livid – not mad – livid. The Republicans know that the Feds are dumping money into the stock market. They are fully aware that our military budget is beyond any military budget in the world. The congress is aware of where all of our tax dollars are going. The congress is simply not going to help the American people by allowing them to have their own money to get them through the tough times of this pandemic.
Did you know – and lots of people don’t know this: Jerome Powell, Federal Reserve chairman has been pumping money into the stock market in order to “stabilize” it? Take a guess at how much he has dumped into the stock market? Initially the budget was 1.5 trillion dollars. Reuters reported a 3 trillion dollar investment as of July 13, 2020. Lest you not see what trillions mean, it’s 1,000 billions.
This is a direct transfer of taxpayer money to the wealthy owners of the stock market.
This is not “fine and dandy” because the Feds borrowed the money to make these investments: According to Ben Winck quoting Carmen Reinhart writing for Markets Insider 10-16-20:
Major economies may be well on their way to recovery, but outsized government borrowing runs the risk of fueling a financial crisis, the World Bank’s chief economist, Carmen Reinhart, said Thursday on Bloomberg TV.
Ben Winck goes on to say:
The path of governments’ fundraising and bond-buying is not sustainable and could spark debt crises should they continue, the economist said.
“This did not start as a financial crisis, but it is morphing into a major economic crisis with very serious financial consequences,” she said.
The results are staggering and Americans are suffering.
While Wall Street bailouts are an endless expense, help for human beings is not available. Nowhere is the Republican-way more clear than here: According to the New York Times, 8 million more people have slipped into poverty since May. Add that to those already in poverty, add that to the number of unemployed and we are seeing a disaster of epic proportions. It’s an unseen and unknowable disaster. Those in poverty, rarely speak out and rarely protest. However, there are consequences for all of us.
Is it really necessary to maintain a military budget that *by itself* is more than all other militarized countries combined?
The military industrial complex continues to fuel its own life while dousing the light of others. Why can’t our budget include humanistic endeavors like eradicating poverty and homelessness? How about healthcare for all?
JB Collection
America, what is your future? Will America return to feudalism? Will America always be known as having the biggest and most guns? Is that the America you would choose?
The Trump Boat Parades are the greatest examples of ignorant white privilege.
I have to say ignorant because if you are woke, you could not, would not participate in a Trump boat parade. With wisdom you could see that a boat parade is screaming “look at me and my money”.
Boats come from two types of homes: where dad does what he wants, mom says “don’t question him” and the boat payments are his way of saying “my money, I’ll spend it as I want”. The other home that a boat comes from is, the home where a boat is easily afforded and no one is deprived just because someone bought a boat.
No matter which home the boat comes from, a boat screams “I have excess dollars, look at me”. Boats are excessively expensive and the care of them is even more expensive.
Bernie’s Campaign
It’s not a good message in our economy. Not right now. There are millions of people without jobs, millions of families who don’t know where the next meal is coming from. Showing these families your money is like rubbing pepper on a kitchen cut; or rubbing salt onto a burn.
The Trump boat parades are indicative of an attitude that says “we don’t care about you and your suffering, we don’t care that you are starving, we have enough money and we can burn it”. What Trumpers don’t realize is that the people who don’t have enough money are the majority of people in this country. Pre-pandemic over 75% of Americans were living paycheck to paycheck. The country is hurting economically, more than anything else. More than anything else, we are facing economic deprivation.
It’s clear to a feeling person that showing off with money has been out of style since the nineties. No one appreciates ostentation.
The Trump boat parades are a way of identifying with Trump. It’s a way of saying “hey, greed and even racism is okay”. The wealthy are obsessed with the idea of not allowing anyone to take their own money – which is fair.
However, they (the wealthy) also want one other thing and that is to worship on the altar of capitalism. Capitalism is the thing that makes all stealing, raping and looting justified. After all, it is done for the almighty dollar.
Racism serves the purpose of having a handy victim so that no white has to feel “less than”. By having an entire race of humans that can be subjugated and told that they are less than, whites are able to keep their heads up high.
By identifying with Trump, whites are able to justify their greed. They are also able to be “better than” and to subjugate an entire other race. This is also why it is so hard for Trump supporters to give up on supporting Trump. White men can thoroughly identify with Trump. Old men whose values are under attack by the up and coming generations that cannot agree with their values.
Lots of people don’t want to give up the nineties, it was okay to be greedy and even condescending. It was especially gratifying to keep their boots on the necks of others. Feeling superior was a national pastime. Every working supervisor in America was busy grinding their feet onto the backs of working Americans.
None of this has changed. We are still a group of people that want to feel superior and one up on everyone else. Who doesn’t walk into a room trying to figure out how to present as smart, or moneyed or cool?
All Americans are complicit in the racism dance. We never did enough to resolve racism. We gave the concept a lot of lip service, but never enough real effort to eradicate racism. We could have outlawed racism decades ago. We didn’t. Just like the minimum wage, we sat complicitly allowing awful things to happen to others.
