Making Sense of What's What


Welcome to Making Sense of What's What!!!


This blog is devoted to addressing those issues which impact our daily lives. Political, educational, relational and transitional issues are all grist for the mill. Life is personal and my need is to personally share with you those things and issues that impact me and others of us as we move through our daily experiences.

Thank you for checking in.

Monday, December 25, 2017

Some Christmas Reflections


Tis’ The Season To Be Jolly, Chestnuts Roasting On The Open Hearth, Joy To The World, Oh Little Town of Bethlehem and so the hymns and carols sound out across the lands during this season of hope. This is all about the anticipation that we can be our best selves in relation to one another. Togetherness, love, caring, giving to others as we would like to be given to are all expressions of us as the aware, compassionate and lovingly kind potential that exists within each one of us.

By contrast, many of us feel a sense of alienation from ourselves and one another.  All of us have been wounded by life in some way.  For many, we listen to our self created narrative, in our attempt to make sense out of our life experiences, and our inner critic trumpets that we are not good enough.  For some it is having experienced abuse in one form or another.  For others it is hunger, having no place at the Inn or hope for anything better in life. Then, there are those whose pain has had to do with illness, loss, and death.

The world in which we live either enhances our sense of togetherness or magnifices our sense of alienation. How our political leaders treat citizens and those who are not citizens makes an impact on how we feel about the world in which we are living. Are our leaders lovingly kind or do they turn away immigrants who are seeking asylum from certain death in their own countries.  Do we, as Americans, take these  who are seeking a safe, better world and imprison the parents in detention centers, and send their children away to some other detention facility for months at a time? The image of the Inn in Bethlehem comes to mind.  Only in the case of Mary and Joseph, they found safe lodging, if only in a barn, and were able to remain together as a family.

To be able to experience togetherness, hope, love, caring and giving to others, we need to feel a sense of trust in one another.  Not being truthful, acting out of greed, being vindictive towards others all erode the possibility for such experiences of love, closeness, and wellbeing.

Our world today holds the potential for togetherness and hope.  It also holds the potential for continued alienation, mistrust and despair. Each of us can play a role in determining which path we take. Do we express our true potential for compassion, loving kindness and awareness in relating to ourselves and others?  Or, do we treat others as a means to an end, as so much collateral damage in decisions that benefit our interests, only? 

Bringing Joy To The World can be as simple as treating others as we would like to be treated. Imagine what it would be like if we treated the next stranger we come upon or family member, or even ourselves, as we would like to be treated. Hope your today is filled with much love and many hugs.



Monday, December 18, 2017

Trump’s Poisonous Pen: Its Attempt To Destroy Obama’s Legacy and Our Basic American Values...

Americans are truly impacted by the political environment in which they live.  If we have a government that is felt to care about meeting the needs of people… our children, our seniors, those who are ill, our veterans, those who live in poverty, those in the work force, we live in an atmosphere of trust, hope and security.

If, on the other hand we live in a political environment that does not seem to care about meeting the needs of people, we become uncomfortable, we feel stress, on alert and wondering what is coming down the road next that we will have to deal with?

For the past year, we have had a man in the White House who has systematically destroyed everything he has touched with a pen. His obsession with reversing every Obama proposal is exactly that, an obsession.  Whether it is due to policy considerations or to get back at Obama for the way that Obama roasted Trump at the 2011 White House Correspondences’ Dinner, the result of Trumps slashing pen has been to destroy, not create attempts to meet the needs of citizens. 

His administration, in general, seems to be predicated on destroying everything that has been created over the past 80 years to protect and defend American Citizens.  He is functioning as Steve Bannon’s proxy to destroy our democratic structures with no constructive alternative in mind. What do we gain by removing over time pay requirements for those who are working over time, who still have a hard time making ends meet? What do we gain by removing Social Security, Medicare and other safety net provisions that were created to protect citizens from another 1929 Stock Market Crash?

What do we gain by having people in Cabinet positions who oppose the work that their very agencies perform on behalf of our citizens?  The Secretary of Education who is against public education.  We have a Secretary of Labor who is against unions and minimum wages and overtime pay. We have a Secretary of Energy, Secretary of Interior and an EPA Administrator who refute the impact of human induced climate change on our planet.

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention has been ordered to not use seven words—diversity, fetus, transgender, vulnerable, entitlement, evidence-based and scientific-based, in documents used to create next years budget. The elimination of these words negatively impact those who are transgender, abortion funding, and using science and evidence as a basis for funding. This new directive from Trump brings back the Orwellian 1984 assertion “it’s a beautiful thing, the destruction of words.”  Without words, things, issues and people just go away. Is this more delusional thinking on the part of Trump?
 
We have lies becoming the new normal for a President. His position is that if the news media disagrees with him, or criticizes him, it is “fake news.” He admonishes us to listen to him, because he will give us the real news. He has also said that he “knows more than the generals and that he is the only one who can fix our economy.” It has been documented that fifty percent of what he says is not true.

We have collusion charges levelled against Trump and ongoing investigations that are looking in on what has actually transpired in relation to Russian interference in our 2016 Presidential election process.  We have Trump reportedly readying to “fire” the very person who is charged with a Special Investigation that is looking into those charges. And, there is mounting evidence that suggests that the Trump campaign was, in fact, being aided by the Russians in his attempt to defeat Hillary Clinton. How is it possible for the very person who has allegedly done something wrong to fire the person who is investigating the various allegations of his involvement in doing something wrong?  This is the kind of crazy behavior that, left unchecked, makes citizens uncomfortable and discouraged about their political leaders.

We have had efforts made, by this President and the GOP, to destroy health care legislation that the Obama Administration had passed into law. The Trump supported legislative process itself was an example of hastily slapping together proposals that were decided upon behind closed doors. Their's was a rush job to get something passed, regardless who was hurt in the process. Thankfully, it did not pass.  

One of the goals of the Obama effort was to ensure that millions of people would be able to gain affordable health care.  This was felt to be important because the biggest cause for bankruptcy in the United States was the inability for citizens to pay for catastrophic health care costs.

With the Trump/GOP plan, millions of citizens would have been taken off of the rolls for medical care. One of the convoluted reasons the GOP wanted to replace the Obama Affordable Care Act was because the GOP felt that people needed the right to choose not to be insured, or for people to be able to choose substandard health care options. 

Obama’s ACA required a minimum level of coverage that would protect everyone one from going without health care and would ensure that the public would not have to pay for emergency room visits that others needed and could not afford.
This was viewed by Trump and his supporters as being too ‘socialistic’ and not democratic enough. 

With that in mind, how ‘democratic’ is it for Trump to outlaw the use of specific words that relate to certain groups of people and situations in the creation of the the Federal budget? Or, what about denying First Amendment rights to people for using certain words in the creation of a Federal Budget?

Now the same process has been repeated with the Trump/G.O.P Tax Bill.  It has been hastily slapped together proposals that were decided behind closed doors. The plan to vote on it was set before anyone has had the opportunity to read what was being voted on.  Not only is the Congress in the dark about what was being proposed, so is the public.  The Congressional Budget Office has not even had the time to review the bills implications and costs. 

The review of what is presently known about the bill suggests that it is filled with untruths about what good it is suppose to be doing for the average citizen, who it is really going to help and what are its real goals.  

So far what has been discussed has only had to do with domestic issues that reflect Trump’s destructive tendencies and practices.  Internationally, his first week in office, he caused conflict between himself and the President of Mexico and with the Prime Minister of Australia. He is verbally setting the stage for another Korean War, by provocatively taking on ‘little rocket man’.  And he has caused upheaval in the Near East as a result of his Jerusalem- Israeli-Capital speech. In effect, he has taken the United States our of having a role in participating in a peace settlement in the area.

As was said at the outset, we are impacted by the political environment that is created by our elected officials.  In the past year much of that atmosphere has been fed by actions on the part of Trump and the G.O.P that have been created by a feeling that the needs of citizens and their welfare are not his administration’s focus.  As a result, we are living in stressful times of uncertainty and threat. This is not the America that our fore fathers have fought for and given their lives to defend.  It is the world that has been created by delusional and deceptive thinking by the likes of Bannon, Trump and those who enable such people in their abuse of position and power. 

    


Monday, December 11, 2017

Moving From Dogma, Delusion And Denial, To Seeing The Light Of Day...


Eckhart Tolle has written: “Dogma…religious, political, scientific---arise out of the erroneous belief that thought can encapsulate reality or the truth.  Dogmas are collective conceptual prisons.  And the strange thing is that people love their prison cells because they give them a sense of security and a false sense of “I know.”

Nothing has inflicted more suffering on humanity than its dogmas.  It is true that every dogma crumbles sooner or later, because reality will eventually disclose its falseness; however, unless the basic delusion of it is seen for what it is, it will be replaced by others. What is this basic delusion?  Identification with thought.”

Our world, today, is filled with fake news, the equating of opinion with fact, conspiracy theories and persistent belief in something that has been proven to be untrue. Why is this? What is going on that promotes this grasping for the unreal? Donald Trump is a symbol of this belief in the unreal whose solution to what is going on is to “build a wall” and to make “America Great Again.”  Little does he appreciate the fact that because American is great, our economic recovery from the 2008 Recession has been the strongest among the world’s economies.

The truth is that there are those among us who are afraid of change.  These people need things to be the way they need them to be in order to feel safe, secure and comfortable in their own skin. If something presents itself that deviates from what brings these people a sense of the known and security, they will attack it mercilessly. Change threatens these folks sense of wellbeing. This is one explanation of the ‘tribalism’ that we see playing itself out in Congress and in the more general world of political discourse.

We have experienced changes throughout our evolution as societies of people.  We have gone from farms and tilling the fields, to cities and factories, from factories to high tech based economies.  We have gone from manufacturing to service oriented ways of making a living.  With every transition from one way of life to another way of life there are gaps where some individuals are left without the means to make a living. Historically, during such times, people have to retool their skills to meet the new demands of the work world. During these times of transition, there has also been societal unrest.

During these transitional periods, the world seems like a hostile, out of control, threatening place to be. There is a desire to have things return to the way they were and the resistance to the new becomes intensified. Holding on to what is unreal is a defense against having to embrace the new and the unknown and the insecurity of living in a new ordering of what life has become.

We are traveling through such a historical period, today. As a result, some are attacking anything that smacks of change.  We have climate change that is causing upheaval all around the world, including the United States. People are losing their homes. We have mass migrations of people from tornadoes, hurricanes, floods, drought, famine, as well as from war and poverty.

We have minority groups becoming a part of the majority. We have changes in social standards, where same sex people can legally marry, where we have elected a Person of Color as President of the United States.

In addition to the changes we have already discussed, we are also recovering from the greed inspired financial collapse of 2008.  Americans have lost their homes, jobs, and retirement programs.  Due to the severe nature of the financial disaster, while the recovery has been persistent,  the creation of programs have been slow in providing assistance to many families in need of food, homes, medical care, and above poverty line work. Targeted groups like single mothers, children in poverty and veterans have suffered as a result.  

In essence, while Wall Street’s recovery has flourished because of a citizen provided bail out, Wall Street has turned its back on the very citizens who bailed them out, so that Main Street has continued to flounder.

The solution to this is not to deny the truth of what is taking palace.  It is not to hold onto the hope of catching the train that has already left the station.  It is to see the truth of what is going on.  It is to demand that our representatives stop treating us like a bunch of ignorant, gullible children who can be led around by denying and deflecting the facts of a need or solution to a problem. 

The disrespect our Congress has demonstrated by their special interest dominated ways of trying to cobble one defective bill together after another, to show that they have done something before the election cycle of 2018 and 2020,  regardless of who is hurt by there actions, is a disgrace.

Each of us, in our own way has a role to play in the changing of what is going on around us.  We can vote people out of office who are failing us in the creation of legislation that protects us and enhances our quality of life.

We need to call out those who lie and take an active role in addressing the realities of what is true regarding climate change, economic strategies, the elimination of regulations so that 2008 will not happen again, the cutting of social security, Medicare, and other safety net programs that have stabilized society since the 1929 Depression.

One of the biggest things we can do is deal with what Tolle has suggested.  He asks the question “What is this basic delusion?” His answer is our “identification with thought.” One of the things we can do is to change our thinking. We are not our thoughts. We are the awareness, the witnessing observer of our thoughts. If we make such a change in our focus, we will change how we view ourselves and the world around us. If we change our thinking, we change our view of people and life, itself. We will rediscover our ability to come up with solutions to problems that have forever confronted us in our lives.

Give this a try.  Take the person who cuts you off on the merge lane approaching the toll booth.  How do you feel about people who don’t play by the rules and take advantage of situations for their own gain.  Most people find themselves feeling angry. 

Now, find out that this same person had just received a cell phone call that their five year old daughter had just been hit by a bus and was being transported to the emergency hospital, that her condition was serious.  How would feel about this person cutting you off in the toll both merge lane.  Most of us would willingly move to the side of the road to let him pass to get to his daughter.  Our thoughts do determine how we view people, events and the would around us.  Changing our thoughts is the antidote to our dogmatic thinking that causes endless suffering for all of us.






Monday, December 4, 2017

Living In A Fantasy World: Twenty-First Century Delusional Thinking


It is okay to destroy our planet, polluting the air we breathe and the water we drink, as long as it is for financial gain…

In San Bruno, P.G.E. was responsible for destroying 38 homes and killing 6 people, in order to save money for needed maintenance on at risk gas pipes lines...

After research found that the bolts they contracted to use were faulty, Caltrans used those very bolts because the original contract they signed called for using those same defective bolts...

Caltrans paid a man a 40 million dollar bonus for completing a faulty bridge ahead of schedule...

Conservatives who do not like the federal government, refuse to pass legislation for nearly five years, and choose to close it down just to prove that government does not work.

One mentally disturbed individual kills 20 kindergarten and first grade students, along with 8 adults, and mental health funds are cut because such atrocities can not be prevented...

Oppose every proposal a Black President makes, to ensure his failed Presidency...

When a Black President attempts to use his Executive Powers to finally get something done, in the face of a do nothing Congress,
he is criticized for over achieving and acting like a dictator.

Destroy a nations economy because people can get
away with greed and fraud...

After 2008, Main Street bails out Wall Street, and Wall Street Flourishes...Then, Wall Street turns its back on Main Street, and Main Street flounders...

A dictator slaughters hundreds of thousands of citizens and barrel bombs towns into rubble, to preserve a failed dictatorship...

Greed creates our best results, in the belief that we are not a society, we are only individuals...

We superimpose our “democratic” form of government and political culture, onto a tribal, war lord dominant culture, that has been at war with itself for centuries and then, deny that we have destabilized the region and have created a political vacuum that has allowed groups like Isil to come into existence.

The Electoral College has selected someone President who has demonstrated the following:
• He is someone who lost the popular vote by three million votes, and has claimed that the three million votes he lost by were cast by illegal emigrants.
• He is someone who demonstrates ignorance on essential  subjects that relate to his role as President, who is intellectually lazy, delusional, a narcissist who lies and denies that he has lied.
• He is someone who is a misogynist, is xenophobic, a racist, and, has a history of being a sexual predator.
• He is someone who serves as a role model for our children, his leadership is the face of American for the rest of the world to see, and he engages in unfiltered Twitter Tantrums on a daily basis.
• He is someone who has said that it is his task to make America great, again, that he is the only one who can solve America’s problems.
• And, he is someone who, after nearly a year in office, wants the Congress to pass something, anything, no matter who it hurts, to be able to say that his administration has done something, anything so he doesn’t look like a loser as the 2018 election season draws near.

 One group that will be hurt by the new G.O.P. tax plan that cuts corporate taxes from 35% to 20%, will be the nine million children whose health care has been cut because there is not be enough money in the government coffers to pay for it.