One Touching Story
March 31, 2009 at 11:47 am | In Uncategorized | Leave a CommentOne day, when I was a freshman in high school, I saw a kid from my class was walking home from school.
His name was Kyle.
It looked like he was carrying all of his books.
I thought to myself, “Why would anyone bring home all his books on a Friday?
He must really be a nerd.”
I had quite a weekend planned (parties and a football game with my friends tomorrow afternoon), so I shrugged my shoulders and went on.
As I was walking, I saw a bunch of kids running toward him.
They ran at him, knocking all his books out of his arms and tripping him so he landed in the dirt.
His glasses went flying, and I saw them land in the grass about ten feet from him.
He looked up and I saw this terrible sadness in his eyes.
My heart went out to him.
So, I jogged over to him as he crawled around looking for his glasses, and I saw a tear in his eye.
As I handed him his glasses, I said, “Those guys are jerks. They really should get lives.”
He looked at me and said, ‘Hey thanks!’
There was a big smile on his face.
It was one of those smiles that showed real gratitude.
I helped him pick up his books, and asked him where he lived.
As it turned out, he lived near me, so I asked him why I had never seen him before.
He said he had gone to private school before now.
I would have never hung out with a private school kid before.
We talked all the way home, and I carried some of his books.
He turned out to be a pretty cool kid.
I asked him if he wanted to play a little football with my friends He said yes.
We hung out all weekend and the more I got to know Kyle, the more I liked him, and my friends thought the same of him.
Monday morning came, and there was Kyle with the huge stack of books again.
I stopped him and said, “Boy, you are gonna really build some serious muscles with this pile of books everyday!”
He just laughed and handed me half the books.
Over the next four years, Kyle and I became best friends…
When we were seniors we began to think about college.
Kyle decided on Georgetown and I was going to Duke.
I knew that we would always be friends, that the miles would never be a problem.
He was going to be a doctor and I was going for business on a football scholarship…
Kyle was valedictorian of our class.
I teased him all the time about being a nerd.
He had to prepare a speech for graduation.
I was so glad it wasn’t me having to get up there and speak Graduation day, I saw Kyle.
He looked great.
He was one of those guys that really found himself during high school.
He filled out and actually looked good in glasses.
He had more dates than I had and all the girls loved him.
Boy, sometimes I was jealous!
Today was one of those days.
I could see that he was nervous about his speech.
So, I smacked him on the back and said, ‘Hey, big guy, you’ll be great!’
He looked at me with one of those looks (the really grateful one) and smiled.
“Thanks,” he said.
As he started his speech, he cleared his throat, and began “Graduation is a time to thank those who helped you make it through those tough years. Your parents, your teachers, your siblings, maybe a coach…but mostly your friends…I am here to tell all of you that being a friend to someone is the best gift you can give them…I am going to tell you a story.”
I just looked at my friend with disbelief as he told the story of the first day we met.
He had planned to kill himself over the weekend.
He talked of how he had cleaned out his locker so his Mom wouldn’t have to do it later and was carrying his stuff home.
He looked hard at me and gave me a little smile.
“Thankfully, I was saved. My friend saved me from doing the unspeakable…”
I heard the gasp go through the crowd as this handsome, popular boy told us all about his weakest moment.
I saw his Mom and dad looking at me and smiling that same grateful smile.
Not until that moment did I realize it’s depth.
Never underestimate the power of your actions…
With one small gesture you can change a person’s life.
For better or for worse.
God puts us all in each other’s lives to impact one another in some way.
Look for God in others.
You now have two choices, you can:
1) Pass this on to your friends or
2) Delete it and act like it didn’t touch your heart.
Is history repeating itself?
March 26, 2009 at 4:31 pm | In Uncategorized | Leave a CommentBy Dick Voell, former head of the Rockefeller Group
As little as a month ago I would have thrown this in the waste basket; after watching the outright deception of the President re the budget, earmarks, appointment of an Advisory Board (chaired by Volker), and signing off on legislation and forced budget upon Republicans before the Advisory Board even met, I’m having second thoughts.
“Something of Historic Proportion is Happening” by Pam Geller
I am a student of history. Professionally. I have written 15 books in six languages, and have studied it all my life. I think there is something monumentally large afoot, and I do not believe it is just a banking crisis, or a mortgage crisis, or a credit crisis. Yes, these exist but they are merely single facets on a very large gemstone that is only now coming into a sharper focus.
Something of historic proportions is happening. I can sense it because I know how it feels, smells, what it looks like, and how people react to it Yes, a perfect storm may be brewing, but there is something happening within our country that has been evolving for about 10 – 15 years. The pace has dramatically quickened in the past two.
We demand and then codify into law the requirement that our banks make massive loans to people whom we know can never pay back? Why? We learn just days ago that the Federal Reserve, which has little or no real oversight by anyone, has “loaned” two trillion dollars (that is $2,000,000,000,000) over the past few months, but will not tell us to whom or why or disclose the terms. That is our money. Yours and mine. And that is three times the $700B we all argued about so strenuously just this past September.
Who has this money? Why do they have it? Why are the terms unavailable to us? Who asked for it? Who authorized it? I thought this was a government of “We the People,” who loaned our powers to our elected leaders… Apparently not.
We have spent two or more decades intentionally de-industrializing our economy. Why?
We have intentionally dumbed down our schools, ignored our history, and no longer teach our founding documents, why we are exceptional, and why we are worth preserving. Students by and large cannot write, think critically, read, or articulate. Parents are not revolting, teachers are not picketing, and school boards continue to back mediocrity Why?
We have now established the precedent of protesting every close election (now violently in California over a proposition that is so controversial that it wants marriage to remain between one man and one woman. Did you ever think such a thing possible just a decade ago?). We have corrupted our sacred political process by all owing unelected judges to write laws that radically change our way y of life, and then mainstream Marxist groups like ACORN and others to turn our voting system into a banana republic. To what purpose?
Now our mortgage industry is collapsing, housing prices are in free fall, major industries are failing, our banking system is on the verge of collapse, Social Security is nearly bankrupt, as is Medicare and our entire government. Our education system is worse than a joke (I teach college and know precisely what I am talking about.) The list is staggering in its length, breadth, and depth. It is potentially 1929 x 10. And we are at war with an enemy we cannot name for fear of offending people of the same religion who cannot wait to slit the throats of your children if they have the opportunity to do so.
And now we have elected a man no one knows anything about, who has never run so much as a Dairy Queen, let alone a town as big as Wasilla, Alaska… All of his associations and alliances are with real radicals in their chosen fields of employment, and everything we learn about him, drip by drip, is unsettling if not downright scary (Surely you have heard him speak about his idea to create and fund a mandatory civilian defense force stronger than our military for use inside our borders? No? Oh, of course. The media would never play that for you over and over and then demand he answer it. Sarah Palin’s pregnant daughter and $150,000 wardrobe is more important.)
Mr. Obama’s winning platform can be boiled down to one word: Change. Why?
I have never been so afraid for my country and for my children as I am now. This man campaigned on bringing people together, something he has never, ever done in his professional life In my assessment, Obama will divide us along philosophical lines, push us apart, and then try to realign the pieces into a new and different power structure. Change is indeed coming. And when it comes, you will never see the same nation again.
And that is only the beginning.
I thought I would never be able to experience what the ordinary, moral German felt in the mid-1930s. In those times, the savior was a former smooth-talking rabble-rouser from the streets, about whom the average German knew next to nothing. What they did know was that he was associated with groups that shouted, shoved, and pushed around people with whom they disagreed; he edged his way onto the political stage through great oratory and promises. Economic times were tough, people were losing jobs, and he was a great speaker. And he smiled and waved a lot. And people, even newspapers, were afraid to speak out for fear that his “brown shirts” would bully them into submission.
And then he was duly elected to office, with a full-throttled economic crisis at hand [the Great Depression]. Slowly but surely he seized the controls of government power, department by department, person by person, bureaucracy by bureaucracy. The kids j joined a Youth Movement in his name, where they were taught what to think.
How did he get the people on his side? He did it promising jobs to the jobless, money to the moneyless, and goodies for the military-industrial complex. He did it by indoctrinating the children, advocating gun control, health care for all, better wages, better jobs, and promising to re-instill pride once again in the country, across Europe, and across the world.
He did it with a compliant media – Did you know that? And he did this all in the name of justice and… change. And the people surely got what they voted for. (Look it up if you think I am exaggerating.) Read your history books. Many people objected in 1933 and were shouted down, called names, laughed at, and made fun of. When Winston Churchill pointed out the obvious in the late 1930s while seated in the House of Lords in England (he was not yet Prime Minister), he was booed into his seat and called a crazy troublemaker. He was right, though…
Don’t forget that Germany was the most educated, cultured country in Europe. It was full of music, art, museums, hospitals, laboratories, and universities. And in less than six years – a shorter time span than just two terms of the U. S. presidency – it was rounding up its own citizens, killing others, abrogating its laws, turning children against parents, and neighbors against neighbors. All with the best of intentions, of course. The road to Hell is paved with20them.
As a practical thinker, one not overly prone to emotional decisions, I have a choice: I can either believe what the objective pieces of evidence tell me (even if they make me cringe with disgust); I can believe what history is shouting to me from across the chasm of seven decades; or I can hope I am wrong, close my eyes, have another latte and ignore what is transpiring around me.
Some people scoff at me; others laugh or think I am foolish, naive, or both. Perhaps I am. But I have never been afraid to look people in the eye and tell them exactly what I believe – and why I believe it. I pray I am wrong.
I do not think I am.
About the author…
Pamela “Atlas” Geller began her publishing career at The New York Daily News and subsequently took over operation of The New York Observer as Associate Publisher.
She left The Observer after the birth of her fourth child but remained involved in various projects including American Associates, Ben Gurion University and being Senior Vice-President Strategic Planning and Performance Evaluation at The Brandeis School.
After 9/11, Atlas had the veil of oblivion violently lifted from her consciousness and immersed herself in the education and understanding of geopolitics, Islam, terror, foreign affairs and imminent threats the mainstream media and the government wouldn’t cover or discuss.
Her website, AtlasShrugged.com , winner of the “Best New Blog” 2005 Jewish and20Israeli Blog Award and finalist in the 2005 Weblog Awards, is a20counter terrorism site fighting the great fight, changing the world one word at a time. Leading authorities are regularly interviewed. She routinely confers with leading scholars on the Middle East, Islam, Eurabia, China and Russia. The objective of her website is to cover related but little reported events of great import. She provides an unblinking, glaring examination of global affairs and is a member of Pajamas Media.
“Democracy is two wolves and a lamb deciding what to have for dinner. Liberty is a well-armed lamb.” – Benjamin Franklin
THE X-BOX PRESIDENT
March 20, 2009 at 12:42 pm | In Uncategorized | Leave a CommentTags: Obama
When a new president comes into office, especially when winning a clear majority of the vote, he inherently has a certain amount of political capital. It’s sorta like that first paycheck you receive from your band new job.
And like that paycheck, you have to weigh your priorities and decide what you will do with it. How will you divvy it up? Which bills do you pay, if any? Or do you buy that new X-BOX video console game you’ve been dying for? Your future basically depends on what decision you make.
On the one hand you have the electricity bill, the phone bill, the mortgage payment, your car payment, and groceries. On the other hand your whole life of entertainment hinges on whether or not you buy “An official Red Ryder carbine action two-hundred shot range model air rifle with a compass in the stock and this thing that tells time“…oops, sorry…that X-BOX. One way or the other you are about to shape your future. You pay or you play.
Our new president had a similar decision when he first took office. He received his proverbial first political paycheck–his political capital–after moving into his new job.
While inheriting a financial mess, he had tough decisions to make. Does he use his political capital to pay the bills, I.E. fix the financial crisis? Or does he buy that Red Ryder BB Gu…dang it…X-BOX? (Sorry about that. I keep having flash backs from the movie Christmas Story where Ralphie’s mom told him, after he asked for a BB gun for Christmas, “You’ll shoot your eye out!” I get the feeling somebody should have warned the new president as much.)
President Obama’s X-BOX, however, is much more expensive and much less entertaining. He wants to socialize medicine, impose cap & trade laws, and pass laws that will grow government to an all time high. Trillions of dollars is what his proverbial X-BOX will cost. (If only he had asked for a Red Rider BB gun.)
Needless to say, Obama chose the X-BOX. This points out his misplaced priorities. Instead of paying his bills, which amounted to spending his political capital fixing the financial crisis. Which by any measure, would have used up almost all his political capital. He bought an X-BOX or what some are calling a stimulus package, TARP 2.0, pork ladened Omnibus, and a 3.6 trillion dollar budget that could buy 8.75 billion X-BOX’s or 50 billion Red Ryder BB Guns. (I’d have voted for Ralphie. At least he was willing to fight the Black Bart.)
What the president’s lack of executive experience has given him is the illusion of having his X-BOX while ignoring his bills. We have our first X-BOX president and we are all about to pay to play.
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