Some people in life like telling others what to do.
"You can't have a romantic relationship with someone of the same sex." "You can't make 10 times more money than your neighbor for the same number of hours worked." "You can't put offensive lyrics on the radio." "You can't drive a car that uses a lot of gas." "You can't just say anything you want about the government." "You can't use drugs anywhere at anytime."
Note that in these examples, no one is directly hurting anyone else, nor is anyone limiting the freedoms of others.
There are folks who are, for lack of a better term, busybodies. They make it their business to know what your business is. They tend to believe that people should live as they live, and they tend to expend some amount of effort trying to force others to live how they believe life should be lived.
There are only a couple of ways to do that:
Make your best pitch and work to convince others that your way of life is better than what they currently know.
Find any means necessary to force them to comply.
The first respects freedom of will. The second completely ignores it.
Because the second way is easier, it's usually the means adopted. The first way is simply too hard... it leaves room for someone to just disagree with you and ignore you. And damn it - you won't be ignored, will you?
Therefore, these busybody types tend to become involved in government.
govern (verb): to control
They seek to use the government to make you do what they believe is right. They aim to control you and regulate your activities. Your business is their business. And to make their busybody activities life sustaining, they will take money from you to fund their busybody activities. It's for your own good, you see. Never mind that they are not producing anything. Never mind that you don't want to pay them what you earned through your own production. You owe them - because they're so right about this. It's for the good of everyone.
There are only two reasons to get involved in government:
You want to tell others what to do and what to think.
You want to stop those who want to tell others what to do and what to think.
There is no polite way to say, "Fuck you," to the busybodies of the world. It's going to be a fight, replete with disagreement and consternation and awkward moments. But so be it. Because they insist on their unproductive busybodiness.
I'm a big Peter Gabriel fan, and I bought his latest, Scratch My Back, last night. In it, he takes a completely different direction than in times past.
He's covering songs, not writing his own.
He uses orchestration and not his usual band.
He puts a ton of emphasis on his voice.
I don't mind Peter's change of direction - it's not the first time that he has changed direction completely. (Passion did that for him and changed his music forever and for the brilliant.)
Joni Mitchell, back in 2005, released Both Sides Now, which revisited her portfolio of songs but with orchestration, and to wonderful effect. The song, Both Sides Now, was utterly reborn. Take that and mix it with the occasional American Idol contestant who takes someone else's song and reworks it for a completely different spin on it. That mashup is this album.
He chose very emotive musicians to work with him on this. Every song (mostly obscure choices) wrings what it can out of the song, both with instruments and voice.
I only have two issues with this release, and they're not small.
It's depressing. It has all the oomph of Arvo Part meets Perry Como.
Peter's strength in the past is to have such a rich variety across his work. Each song was a surprise. With this album, randomly pick a starting point and you'll not know that you've left the previous song.
Hopefully, this is a phase. Mixed in with his other efforts in the past, something could emerge from this that remakes the music landscape, just as Passion did. But as it is, it's not something that will get a lot of frequency from me.
The Journey is Always More Important Than the Destination
As I painted Tamara's wedding bouquet this past Sunday, I improved as I went. The last element that I painted was the rose, and I remember looking at Tamara and saying to her, "This will all come down to the rose. If I nail it, it will work. If I screw it up, it'll look like 5th grade."
I had to forget that it was a rose. I worked to erase any knowledge of it in my head... it was just colors and edges.
And I think it came together fine. I remember thinking while I was working on it that I had no idea how it was coming along. Nonetheless, I kept pushing ahead.
Only when I was done did I really step back from it and solicit opinion. Aaron, who is always honest with me about my work, nodded his approval. Whew!
So much of life is like that... we have no clue how we're doing in the midst of it, but we must keep pushing ahead. Be it raising kids, cooking dinner, the task at work, etc... if we just see it for what it is and leave our assumptions behind, and apply ourselves to it, it might work out.
And even if it doesn't work out, we need to remember how important it was for us to screw up - to help educate us forward.
My son, Tyler, came home yesterday and I had to tell him that he was right.
I was wrong... the Republicans, politicians from a party that haven't really stood for our rights and freedoms in a while, came to do their jobs yesterday at Obama's health care summit. They succeeded, and today, our nation is better for it.
Well, damn skippy.
I will say too that Obama's obvious arrogance was on display. I can never undervalue his ability to be a snobby jerk and to be thin-skinned.
Way to go, Republicans. Now that 56% of Americans believe the government stands in opposition to their rights, the Republicans have aligned themselves with the people.
That also dovetails nicely with the less-than-majority 44% who approve of the president.
Paraphrased, McConnell announced that we're about to witness the tragic end of the Republican party.
Obama has no intention of listening to the Republicans. That's a given.
The media has no intention of giving favorable coverage to the Republicans. That's a given.
The Democrats' congressional leaders have no intention of letting their agenda go. That's a given.
The Republicans have very few among their ranks who can articulate principles based upon the constitution. That's a given.
Barring some miracle, I don't see how the Republicans, who really don't fight much for our individual rights and freedoms much as it is, will do anything but screw this up big time and throw themselves six feet into a hole to await the cascade of dirt we'll shower upon them after they screw it up.
So far, us in the cheap seats have successfully kept the juggernaut of socialism from arriving at the station. It certainly wasn't because of the Republican politicians in Washington. They wanted to work with the president and the Dems - until we beat them upside the head and told them not "No," but "Hell No!"
Now they're going to participate in Obama's reality game. Killer chess move from Barry O and company...
Unless the Republicans - to a member - are awesome and stalwart in their defiance in an unprecedented way, this is the end of the Republican party. They will either successfully defend our freedoms and our individual rights and thereby find the American people behind them in a way that they've only dreamt of, or I and millions of others will take part in the funeral procession.
Your move, McConnell.
ETC: Were the Republicans awesome and stalwart after all?
Maybe so... I'll check the rest of it later, but it's awfully hard to argue against Rep. Ryan's assertions - unless you're a socialist.
