I’ll give you an example. I know people who argue against teaching foreign languages in public schools in America. They believe that the rest of the world should have to learn English, we should not have to learn another language. But [...]]]> Basically, what it comes down to, is a major rethink of what “education” means.

I’ll give you an example. I know people who argue against teaching foreign languages in public schools in America. They believe that the rest of the world should have to learn English, we should not have to learn another language. But what these people are doing is demonstrating their own incompetence with this belief. The greatest advantage to learning a foreign language, apart from being able to communicate with more and varied individuals, is the abstraction. The brain’s synaptic connections for higher level thought that are reinforced by the process of having to subject language to additional filtering. The ability to perform abstract thought and consider subjects as a whole rather than simply how they affect your immediate situation.

Of course, mathematics is exactly the same. Over and over again my brain-dead peers in grade school would ask the math teachers “when will we ever use this in our lives?” The teachers would react by giving situations; engineering situations, accounting situations, etc… But that wasn’t the right answer, sorry teachers. The right answer was that the abstractions that are being created in student’s brains would affect every single decision they make for the rest of their lives in a positive way by allowing them to see situations more completely.

That kind of education affects the subconscious more than the conscious, but isn’t that exactly what we need to work on? The future of education demands a focus on abstraction and decision making principles. Better ability to reason out decisions and to understand those decisions appropriately.

Most other developed countries are now ahead of the United States in terms of education, and in some cases such as the middle east and Persian countries we are literally being pummeled into nonexistence because their education is so superior to ours.

Americans like to sit around and think “why are these people coming to America and taking our high level jobs, calculus can’t really be THAT important!” But if you look at it the way I am describing, it IS that important, because their brains function inherently differently than someone who blew off calc instead of embracing it. Not to mention the fact that they often have 2 or more languages under their belt.

We have to get away from these recent generations of Americans who will decide how to vote based on the small talk of their peers or media sound bites clearly taken out of context. Or worse yet, blind political party affiliation with no actual independent research. Just because your ballot asks you about 27 issues doesn’t mean you have to vote on 27 issues, only vote on the ones you INTIMATELY know and understand, because if you cast random votes you are affecting the whole system, and your effect may have been conditioned and staged by others attempting to exert influence over you in a harmful way.

We have to understand that higher level reasoning and rationing affects every single decision we face in our daily lives in a way that we can’t always comprehend. As a result, living by some principles will help to steer our lives in a way that simple minded thinking in absolutes cannot. People who think in absolutes are fools who dream in black and white, people who live by principles are the leaders who dream in color.

Education has to refocus itself on these issues. I have been so disappointed to learn that most American grade schools have abandoned computer science programs for instance, and instead offer more classes in basic word processing and applications. It’s painful to hear the public backlash against mandated foreign language courses. Or all the students who take the easiest possible courses in order to maintain a 4.0 grade average, for a shot at the best Universities. If education is truly working, all students should be getting b’s and c’s because that means all students are being sufficiently challenged. The criteria needs to change. A grade of “A” means a student is being under-educated and is actually a bad thing. At least in my “perfect” world it would be, haha.

Maybe my perfect world could never exist. In this blog, education is the last thing. But the final lesson is that in all of our lives, education, whatever we choose to define it as, should ALWAYS, thoughout our entire lives, be the first thing.

The cycle [...]]]> History is there to teach us about lessons learned and mistakes not to make, and yet so often people instigate exactly the same patterns that have caused countless problems. There is a cycle related to the rise and fall of democratic civilizations that we all should be learning from, but most are ignoring.

The cycle of democratic civilizations indicates that there is a correlation between a society gaining a leisurely lifestyle and it’s eventual downfall. That as day to day living becomes easier, we can prosper for a while but then eventually collapse on our own complacency.

The idea is that as things become easier, we become mentally and then physically lazy to the point where we can no longer make decisions on any kind of rational basis. We are simply too dumb and too unaware of what is really going on out there. We are too easily led astray by forces that seek instant power and profit at the expense of the long-term well being of society. As a Democracy, this is disastrous, because we ultimately decide the fate of our civilization.

I propose that the point of inflection for America occurred in the 1950’s. And that since then we have been on a steady downward spiral.

I’ll leave you to research this issue on your own, because the discovery is the best part, but I advise you to at least research the rise and fall of Rome and Greece before you pass judgement on what I say here.

But to get you started in understanding the concepts, I suggest you Google two things:
1. “The Cycle of Democracy”. This quote is a combination of ideas, rather than being attributable to one person, as some have done. But the combination of ideas is very compelling and demands further historical research.
2. “Wonks and Hacks”. Learn about the wonks and the hacks in government, and why so many people are now blindly following the hacks.

The learning experience has been incredible and has really opened my eyes. I thank those of you who have [...]]]> Creating this blog has been a huge learning process for me, and I’m both sad and excited to say that it’s probably coming to an end, at least until I find a new direction for this site.

The learning experience has been incredible and has really opened my eyes. I thank those of you who have contacted me about my articles, because your information has really shown me the essence of what I have been writing about, and where to take the next steps in my own life.

A few of this site’s readers are truly brilliant people who have made some amazing observations. We have often talked about these subjects in detail in emails back and forth, and that has been fun. But the reality is that this site isn’t for people like you, because you already know what’s going on.

This site was supposed to be directed toward the hoards of people out there who are bringing the system down with their ignorance and poor decision making. The problem, as I have found, is that those people are not going to be helped by anyone telling them where they are making poor decisions in their lives. The vast majority will continue to make the same bad decisions that have given them problems all their lives, dragging down the entire system along with them. Making those people richer who have learned to take advantage of them. And no amount of reasoning or explaining will change that.

I’m going to create a couple more posts to illustrate why this happens and what we as a society can do about it, just in an effort to finish my thoughts. I doubt that it will help anyone, but coming to grips with these issues has helped me more than I could have ever imagined when I began this journey.

I always have a “stack” of articles, if you will, drafted but not quite ready to publish. On any particular day I may work on 2 or 3 different articles that I’m saving up for [...]]]> Charlie Munger’s parable about Basicland is literally the most amazing thing I’ve read in years, and I’ve read a lot.

I always have a “stack” of articles, if you will, drafted but not quite ready to publish. On any particular day I may work on 2 or 3 different articles that I’m saving up for the right moment when they have just the right emotion and polish. I had been working on an article about our country’s impending financial doom, but Charlie Munger has written something so much better than I ever could have. I’ll probably never publish mine now.

Part of what he describes is something that I mentioned two articles ago in “Being Cheap at the Expense of Others and the Story of Stuff“; I had mentioned how people like to pass their costs of living onto others in any way that they can. Mr. Munger mentions that, but it is only one small piece of the rich tale that he weaves about the impending downfall of American civilization.

For those of you that don’t know, Charlie Munger is Warren Buffet’s right hand man. If you don’t know who Warren Buffet is, go away.

You can read the article on slate.com here: Basically, It’s Over

I could not be happier to hear this. The point of my blog is to make people [...]]]> One of the themes that we are seeing more of lately in the news is the unrest that ordinary Americans have toward their government, big business, and other things that they perceive are causing stress in their daily lives.

I could not be happier to hear this. The point of my blog is to make people think. To think about their lives and ways that the wool has been pulled over their eyes to the benefit of others.

So I’m happy to see that people are paying more attention to what goes on in the world. There are a lot of issues that people need to be careful of, though. Because, just like Wall Street and corporate America, there are thousands of groups who are interested in taking advantage of any situation that presents itself in order to further their cause. These groups would love to become entrenched in any movement that would further their power at the expense of those who have been keeping them from power in the past.

Personally, I would love to see a 4 party system rather than a 2 party system. I would like to see the conservatives divide themselves into the Republicans and Libertarians (basically the members of the Tea Party movement). This is a chance for conservatives to really show exactly what it is they stand for, because right now it’s difficult to tell. It’s easy for me to call the current crop of conservatives a bunch of racist morons since they were complacent during the various Reaganomics administrations of the past that delivered our country to the nightmare it’s in today. If that’s not true, it would be nice to see conservative political leaders align themselves to a set of core values that show the rest of us exactly what it is they stand for and why they are suddenly so angry. They might gain a few more recruits that way as well. I have a feeling though, that there would emerge more than one set of core values, since there are some real divisions in the conservatives. For that reason, two conservative parties makes all the sense in the world, and I’d be happy to see it happen.

I would also love to see the Liberals divide themselves into the Democrats and Greens Party. There is a real division among the Democrats that has existed for decades and yet has no resolution. Many democrats align themselves with their party because they believe that socially and environmentally responsible and sustainable practices will lead to greater progress and personal success in our lives for everyone throughout the world. To many people, these are the so-called tree huggers, although their philosophy extends far beyond that simplistic view. There is also another subset of Democrats (the larger group) who are pushing for increasingly socialist changes to our government. In my own area, the bottom echelon of these guys are the fat, lazy, pot smoking comic book store workers who wear the socialist tee shirts and want to do nothing and get paid for it. That socialist mentality trickles all the way up to the top ranks of the Democratic party and creates a natural dividing line between two factions that currently share the same name.

As a country, the divisions that are being created within our ranks are natural and healthy, but we have to be extremely careful here, because of what I said at the beginning… There are whacko groups, wealthy elites, and even corporations, that are going to attempt to align themselves with the new divisions for power and profit. There are issues that people are going to try to align with a particular conservative or liberal movement, in the hopes that individuals have not really thought much about those issues and will blindly accept them.

As an example, earlier I said that I can’t tell anymore if “conservative” has just become another term for “racist”. Well it seems that nearly all Aryan and other supremist organizations have managed to align themselves with the conservative Tea Party movement, proving my point precisely. Basically what this is saying is that the Tea Party movement was founded because we have a black man in the “White” House, and we are going to come up with all sorts of justifications of why we are right and why our current “government” needs to be eradicated.

My point is that if the Tea Party and Libertarians in general are to be taken seriously, you have to stand up and make a statement against those that are attempting to align themselves to your cause. If you can’t do that, then you as a group are no better than the lowest common denominator.

On the other side of the table, many Liberals don’t really want to be associated with Green Peace for various reasons, and yet they are. Another perfect example of what I mean. Many tree huggers don’t want to be associated with an environmental terrorist group when the key values of the Greens are so very different than that, and yet everyone is being grouped together into something that they are not. Some Socialist Democrats don’t want to be associated with any of the tree huggers because it cramps their style, but many of them love the association because it serves as a disguise to their socialist politics. It’s time for the Liberals to stand up for what they really are, and close the door to the ideas that they are truly against.

What we have at the moment is a political system based on opposition. A new issue emerges, and one party takes a stand on that issue. The other party instinctively takes the exact opposite stand on the issue, and each try to find reasons why they support their cause from the tangle of supposed values that define who they are. There can be no forward movement in a system like this, only gridlock. The reason is that one party aligns itself properly with some ideas that can move us forward as a society, and the other party does exactly the same with different issues. Well none of those issues can move forward because party lines won’t allow it. The conservatives are 100 times more responsible for this type of idiocy than the democrats, but it exists on both sides nevertheless.

I want to see all conservatives and liberals stand up for what they believe in AND PUT IT IN WRITING, just like the Greens have already done in their ten key values. People are awake and thinking about these issues, so now is the time. Out of that process I would expect at least 4 parties to emerge from the current 2, and I believe that individuals would learn a great deal about their core beliefs and how those beliefs relate to the rest of society. Not to mention the fact that the parties would have to defend their positions against their ideology in ways that they currently do not. What could be better?

I was having a conversation with someone recently. She was talking about her children and how expensive [...]]]> This article is a segway into The Story of Stuff, what I believe to be the single most important issue in society today. I hope you will see the connections and think about these issues in your own life.

I was having a conversation with someone recently. She was talking about her children and how expensive it supposedly is to get their hair cut. She was explaining to me that she found a solution to that problem. She took one of her three children to get his hair cut. She told the stylist that she was going to stand next to her and watch the haircut, so that she could save money by cutting her children’s hair herself from now on.

She was so smug in her superiority. No thought for the hairdresser that paid good money to go to school to learn how to do this stuff. She’s basically telling the hairdresser “Hey, your job and skills are worth nothing, but you charge me money for it anyway, so I’m going to copy you so you don’t make any more money from me.”

She’s from the midwest. Her favorite store is Kohl’s. She loves to group everyone together and pin labels on them. She goes on rants about trailer trash, ghetto trash, people who have wagon wheels in their yards, whatever she can think of. And of course she’s a conservative who hates Obama. She also proudly discusses how she fought against a decision to provide public bus service to her neighborhood, because “we don’t want THOSE people to be able to come here.”

This arises out of a sort of misdirected insecurity, it’s written all over her and shows in everything she does. But is she really so different from those around her? Her attitude is the attitude of so many people in America today. The thought is constantly in so many people’s minds about how to to get most for themselves at the expense of as many other people as possible.

But doesn’t that sound exactly like everyone we hate? Doesn’t that sound like corporate America? Doesn’t that sound like Wall Street? And, aren’t you just as guilty of it as she is?

It’s difficult for people to take the time to really dive into these issues to see the far-reaching implications. In this particular case, she is subverting someone close to home, a hairdresser that probably doesn’t live more than a few miles from her. But everyone subverts others whether it be locally or globally, and corporate America is the one who profits. Just ask Sam Walton’s family.

Now that I have your attention, I’m going to direct you to the best YouTube video I’ve ever seen. The first 8 minutes are very basic (boring) information, but after that it gets interesting. I ask you to watch the entire video from beginning to end, it will be worth your time:

—– Click Here for The Story of Stuff —–

I come before you today as a man who has seen times of prosperity and struggled through times of poverty. A man who has worked hard to overcome the obstacles in my own life in an effort to realize my dreams for myself and my family.

And now, as I sit here before [...]]]> Dear People of America,

I come before you today as a man who has seen times of prosperity and struggled through times of poverty. A man who has worked hard to overcome the obstacles in my own life in an effort to realize my dreams for myself and my family.

And now, as I sit here before you today, I can honestly say that my life has never felt more out of my hands than at this very moment. Every month I work as hard as I can, doing multiple jobs to keep pace with my soaring expenses for everything. And the more I work, the more of my money is taken from me against my will, and given to people who I hate. For reasons that I cannot stand. And none of that money has helped me or anyone like me, in any way.

I watch as the homeowners and real estate professionals who created the housing bubble are rewarded for their stupidity. I asked for my fair share and I was refused, because I was not ignorant enough to make the mistakes that they did.

I watch as my hard work allows mortgage and banking execs to thrive in their beach houses in Malibu, while I’m unable to purchase an abandoned fixer-upper to renovate and rent out to my neighbor who desperately needs affordable housing for her mother and grandmother.

I received an email from my representative in U.S. Congress, entitled “Our Work So Far”. In this document my representative discusses the ways that he has fought hard for families in his state. I thought I lived in his state but apparently I do not, because absolutely no one is helping me and nothing that he talks about has anything to do with me.

I watched my state governor MORE THAN DOUBLE my fees for my vehicle licenses, in a year when I can’t even afford to drive any more than the minimum that I have to. This was done because taxpayers in my state voted No on increases to cover road construction and maintenance. Since fees are not the same as taxes, and do not require voter approval, the decision was made. The new fees that were put into place punish those of us who live at lower income levels with increases of more than 100%, while the wealthy barely notice the difference in their bills.

I wrote a letter to my state representative explaining why the fees were unfair, and she replied that she could not in good conscience fight to repeal a fee that was helping to repair unsafe bridges. I told her to shut the bridges down. She didn’t respond.

I watched as our governor faced so much opposition to his policies that he has chosen not to run for re-election, but at the same time will not change any of the legislation that has gotten him into trouble in the first place.

I watched as America sold their gas guzzling SUVs when fuel prices soared, then bought new ones after prices subsided. I saw our president create a cash for clunkers program, which was supposed to get inefficient polluting vehicles off the road in favor of better ones. I noticed that our president neglected the fact that automakers are currently producing terrible automobiles, and the cash for clunkers program just helped to replace garbage with more garbage. I watched the Federal Government misrepresent the effects of the program, as they claimed that most of the vehicles purchased were highly efficient economy cars. When they compiled their statistics they considered a Ford F-150 2×4 pickup to be different than a Ford F-150 4×4 pickup, and when they were all added up it turns out that large, inefficient, fuel guzzling gasoline-engined pickup trucks were by far the most bought vehicles in the cash for clunkers program, which I have renamed the clunkers for clunkers program.

I watch as everyone offers to pay less and less for the work I do, while every necessity I need in life just keeps getting more expensive. Every day I have to do all sorts of things that I don’t have time for, because I can no longer afford to have a professional do them for me. Somehow, they all have nicer houses and vehicles than I have, but it doesn’t matter in the end because they are suffering as much as I am, just in their own way.

I was forced to switch my family’s health insurance to a “high deductible” plan this year, because it was only slightly more expensive than the “no deductible” plan I had the year before. My “no deductible” plan became out of my reach when the monthly costs were suddenly increased by over $150. I have watched as healthcare for my family, with no major problems and nothing but routine office visits, is now so expensive that I am actually better off cancelling all insurance and using Urgent Care facilities instead.

I have watched the Tea Party movement grow in popularity, as more and more Americans have determined that, even if they don’t agree on much of anything else, the current government has become ineffective at doing anything other than protecting the rich. I have watched them protest and I have read about their efforts to convince Americans to overturn their government, and for the first time in my life I’m considering participating in such a movement.

And frankly I couldn’t care less about the current legal status of gays in the military. Yes I’m a fairly cosmopolitan person with all manner of friends and acquaintances, but I think it’s silly to discuss a procedural change in something that affects no one that I know who is currently suffering. And in my own state, large amounts of time are being wasted debating whether or not to legislate Indian mascot reform, at a time when our budget crisis is the worst it’s ever been.

Everywhere I look, I read about a war that makes no sense. A war that might have made sense years ago under the first Bush, but now just looks pathetic in the world’s eyes. I work with people from around the world who can barely tolerate dealing with me because I’m “one of those” (an American).

I boarded a plane recently and had to have the basic equivalent of an X-Ray. Burt Rutan is building the solution by using small auto-piloting commuter aircraft instead of jumbo jets. But I’m not convinced that enough people will pay attention.

We are being invaded by terrorists who know far more about us than we know about them. We fight the wrong people for the wrong reasons while more of our liberties are sold to the highest bidder.

I turn on the television and everywhere I see marketing disguised as journalism, and I’m not convinced that anyone but myself realizes that their minds are slowly being corrupted so that the rich may capitalize.

What is the state of MY union? I’ve never felt so cheated in my life. What are we fighting for? What am I working for? Who am I supporting? That’s the state of my union. At least I don’t have to fear my stock market crashing in the morning.