Where is the power?

"Money is the great power today. Men sell their souls for it. Women sell their bodies for it. Others worship it. The money power has grown so great that the issue of all issues is whether the corporation shall rule this country or the country shall again rule the corporations." --Joseph Pulitzer

Interestingly, when you look at it closely and don't think of money as being a bad thing, money is one of the major factors in everything. I know this probably isn't a new thought for anyone, but it is something that can be looked at through a critical lens. Try to understand the forces that are acting on lives, and how those forces are using money to drive those influencers, and those connections when they are recognized may surprise you.

Now I am no conspiracy theorist in any respect, but conspiracy theorists do use thinking skills to try to frame their beliefs to conform with the facts that they observe. They piece together a narrative to make sense of the world and what is happening around them. And making sense of this crazy, beautiful, wonderful, wild world is worth the effort.

Personally, I seem to feel as if the forces of government are constantly pressuring me to give up more of my treasures and rights so they can redistribute them to others in our country, or build bombs to drop on other countries, or fund their bureaucratic pensions and golden benefit packages. They want me to focus on what they can do for me, what they can protect me from, where it is safe to go, who it is best to associate with, who I should trust more than someone else, even what I should buy and from whom. They just don't seem to realize that I am capable of taking care of myself and trusting the people I have chosen who I would trust in my bunker (I don't have a bunker, but it is how I internally measure the people surrounding me when I ask the question are they "bunker worthy?" And I really don't have a bunker. Really.).

And now we basically have a company, a brand, running the policy of this country. A brand and all those who spout corporate-speak. The Teddy Roosevelt progressives would have been running around madly with their big stick and smashing corporate trusts. But wait...You mean the company trusts are now the government? Self-flagellation may be required.

Pulitzer was also famous for saying that "The man who has not cared for sixteen mules does not know what work and troubles are." The working man and woman of this modern age that struggles with "mules"--like terrible debt, affordable healthcare coverage, police state mentality, intolerance, discrimination, and decent work--know what trouble is. Those struggles leave you with a heart full of holes.

A day of reckoning is coming and I await it, hopefully and peacefully.

Stained Glass Personality

"People are like stained glass windows: they sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light within." - Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

Can you ever really know the true nature of another person? How can we understand what has shaped their being, what experiences have impacted them during their lifetime? Even when we think we know what someone is like we can be shocked to find out what really lies below the facades of human beings. 

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross expressed this quandary eloquently in the above quote, but I would expand a bit on it. It is not just the light within that is revealed, but it is the absence of a light, a darkness that may exist. That darkness is more of what I fear than any type of light. I know that there exists both light and dark inside of me and to admit to that allows me to understand it better. If someone is going to do any type of harm to someone I love, an innocent or a defenseless person, and I can prevent it, I would not hesitate to use the darkness inside me against them. That can be a mean, dark sonsofbitch.

I often wonder also if this is a social issue. We look at the celebrities and sports heroes, in their attire that "sparkle and shine" on courts, fields, runways, red carpets, movie sets and other places they are captured at by the media and paparazzi, and usually we are left with a positive impression. Our military leaders sparkle with medals on uniforms braided with gold epaulets, for campaigns that don't quite sparkle when examined closely.

The political climate these days seems strangely lit, represented rather than by casting light on issues and problems, it is focused on that underlying darkness, that shadow of all things that are back lit by the sun.

Consequently, it is making even kind and gentle people just a tad bit angry and mean, like wounded beasts. 

Perhaps it would be good advice if the gloating stopped and the waving of red flags in the face ceased and the wounded would get a little time to lick their wounds and begin to heal. They will be far better in the fight when they are healed.