Are We Broke ... or Broken?

What follows is an admittedly rambling and disjointed musing about the state of America today, the situation in the state of Wisconsin, and the state of the American people as we trudge through the syrupy 'emotion vs. logic' atmosphere that has been poured over us in the last few years.

The Boogey Man That Broke Your Piggy Bank 

Not to be antagonistic to what those in power (Republican, Democrat, or Tea Bagger) would like you to believe so that you'll give up your retirement benefits (if you even have any), accept a smaller salary, pay more fees, and basically settle for the life your great-grandparents had, but America is NOT broke.  Not by a long shot!  This country is awash in wealth and cash.  It's just that it's not in your hands anymore.  It has been transferred, in the greatest filching in history, from the workers and consumers to the banks and the portfolios of the uber-rich.  Think about it.

This should make you absolutely sick: 400 obscenely rich people in this country now have more loot, stock and property than the assets of 155 million Americans combined.  If you can't bring yourself to call that a financial coup then you're simply not being honest about what you know in your heart.  I do realize that denial is more than just a river, but come on ... admit it.

And I can see why.  For us to admit that we have let a small group of people abscond with and hoard the bulk of the wealth that runs our economy, would mean that we'd have to accept the humiliating acknowledgment that we really have surrendered our precious little Democracy to the moneyed elite.  Wall Street, the banks and the Fortune 500 now run this Republic -- and, until this past month, the rest of us have sat by and felt completely helpless, unable to find a way to do anything about it.  In some cases, even actually voting to make it happen!

So Thank You, Wisconsin.
Thank you for seeing through the veiled rhetoric about budgets and deficits, taxes and cuts, etc.  Thank You for not being lemmings by simply lining up to fear the next boogey man this time. 

You have made people realize this was our last best chance to grab the final thread of what was left of who we are as Americans.  For 3 long and wintery weeks you have stood in the cold, slept on the floor, skipped out of town to Illinois -- whatever it took, you have done it, and one thing is for certain: Madison is only the beginning. 

No matter how the drama there plays out, no matter who “wins”, you’re sparked something and I firmly believe it’s only the beginning… finally.  Teachers, who play more of a role in the economic development than anybody who wants to take a chance on Wall Street, are just one of the groups being vilified and targeted unfairly.  Nobody goes into teaching to get rich - everybody knows that.  Similarly, nobody goes to take a chance on Wall Street to learn about business ethics.

This time, I believe, the smug moneyed power players have overplayed their hand.   They couldn't have just been content with the money they raided from the U.S. Treasury.  They couldn't be satiated by simply removing millions of jobs and shipping them overseas to exploit the poor elsewhere.  No, they had to have more – something more than all the riches in the world.  They had to have our soul.  They had to strip us of our dignity.

Corporations tried to control the message but the people said "Screw you! We have Facebook, and Twitter, and Bebo!"  They tried to feed you a poison pill - their version of mutually assured destruction - and you said "Hell no!"

They had to shut us up and shut us down so that we could not even sit at a table with them and bargain about simple things like classroom size or letting a pilot just get a few extra hours sleep so he or she can do their job -- their $19,000 a year job.  That's how much some rookie pilots on commuter airlines make, maybe even the rookie pilots flying people to Madison or D.C or the Iowa pre-primaries.  But he's stopped trying to get better pay.  All he asks is that he doesn't have to sleep in his car between shifts at O'Hare or Dulles airport.  That's how despicably low we have sunk.  The corporate pirates couldn't be content with just paying this man $19,000 a year.  They wanted to take away his sleep, his voice, his dignity.  They wanted to demean and dehumanize him.  After all, he's just another working slob and he should feel damn lucky to even have a job, right??!!   Yup, he’s just another overpaid whiny slob like the rest of “us” … and after all, lest you forget, this is all OUR fault, right?

But fear not, my fellow stooges, “THEY” will be our heroes and stand up to all the other whiners and overpaid union employees and public servants – the ones who actually have it much much better than we do but don’t work nearly as hard as we do.  (sarcasm intended)  Teachers, who spend way more time molding our children than we do.  Putting up with our kids' shenanigans so we can bitch later about how unfair they were to fail little Susie or bar Johnny from the game.  The reason for that must be because they have tenure or union seniority and make way too much money.  If only all of us had it as easy as THEY do!

Oh, ok.  Now I get it … it’s actually THEIR fault, not my fault.  Good, now I can contemptuously point my finger at them.  This is all so confusing; I’m so glad I was able to get it figured out.  It’s … THEIR … fault!  Not your fault … and definitely not my fault.  Turns out it’s much much easier for us to point our fingers at each other in heated debate rather than even thinking about all of us pointing our fingers at the puppet masters who skillfully control the economic movement, dialogue, and rhetoric.

"There's something happening here, and you don't know what it is, do you...?"

America isn’t broke!  The only thing that's broke is the moral compass of the rulers.  And we aim to fix that compass and steer the ship ourselves from now on.  Never forget, as long as that Constitution of ours still stands, it's one person, one vote, and it's the thing the rich and powerful hate most about America -- because even though they seem to hold all the money and all the cards, they begrudgingly know this one unshakeable basic fact:   There are more of us than there are of them!

It Takes Balls!

The same type of balls one little fruit cart vendor in Tunisia had.  The balls of Stihl (pun intended) that helped Germany resurrect its economy and carried it out of the Great Recession more quickly than most major industrialized countries.  Germany could be compared to the China of Europe in that sense - it alone accounted for 60% of the GDP growth of the euro zone in 2010!  And family-owned powertool manufacturer Stihl manages to make manufacturing profitable even while paying the nation's high wages.

It's good to remember that, in the end, the prairie fire over the rights and benefits of union members and public employees is about people.  Some of them are overpaid and under qualified.  I personally know people like that that AREN'T in any union and don't work for a government agency.  But that's certainly not the majority of people.  Most people are in about the same boat as I am and some are less fortunate.  School bus drivers, home health care workers and cafeteria workers who, even with union 'protection', barely make enough to keep their families afloat.

It's also good to remember your history.  America's most prosperous time - the period from the 1950s to the 1970s - was also when it's trade/union movement and its middle class were at their strongest.  That was not a coincidence.  The rights and wages won by workers in the turmoil of the 1930s created a soncumer class eager to buy every product - from homes to hula hoops - that America could produce.

Will history repeat itself?  We'll have to wait and see.

Madison, do not retreat.  Stay strong.  We are with you.  We will win together.

Because THAT'S what America is all about.

My name is Thad (just Thad) and I can confirm that I may or may not announce my political aspirations (if I have any) soon (or at some point in the future) if I choose to.  Please stand by.  :)

A Friend Is Someone Who Walks In When The Rest Of The World Walks Out.

Having been on a lifelong journey of unrequited love and gut-wrenching heartaches, I've decided not to be bitter (I know, right?!) and use this Valentine's Day to celebrate family and friends.  After all, THAT'S true love too isn't it? - and too often forgotten about, overlooked, or just plain taken for granted. I told my grandpa once that instead of getting married I was just going to find a woman I can't stand and buy her a house - cut out the middle part, right? - and he laughed. But I want today to be about friendship so everytime I see a FB post from one lover to another today I'm going to post a friendship quote.  Some of you will hate that, but the greatest weakness of most humans is their hesitancy to tell others how much they love them while they're still alive.

Woke up early this morning bridled with some way RANDOM thoughts on my mind for some reason.  Feeling the need to purge a few of them here - just the thoughts, no reflections - since I don't have the time or desire to really go there right now.  Basically I just don't want them dragging along with me all day.  Hope you don't mind me sharing ... well sort of sharing.

1) I have plans for Mexican brunch this morning but am craving Coq Au Vin for some strange reason.
2) I haven't seen or heard from my stalker in almost 2 weeks.
3) I'm confused about a few things from last week and full of anxiety about a few things this coming week.
4) I don't like the Packers but I think I want them to win today and go to the Super Bowl for some reason.
5) I think I'm regretting that you can't delete text messages after you've sent them.

There, five is enough to share ... feeling better already!  Thanks for listening and have a good day.  :)

L.A./Orange County Area In Chaos

Orange County, CA September 28, 2010
Horror and disbelief swept through the greater LA/Orange County area this afternoon as a minor and spotty power-outage caused by extreme heat and a stressed utility grid turned the area into a virtual war zone, and local residents struggle to deal with the devastating aftermath.

The outage struck at 1:38pm, during the busy afternoon coffee and Pilates rush hour.  Traffic lights fell dark, local gyms and sushi restaurants were without power for nearly 30 minutes and many businesses were illuminated only by the light of the sun and its blistering 90 degree heat.  "It was horrible," said out-of-work actor and voice-over artist Debbie Hussong.  "I was at Jamba Juice on Melrose when it hit and the blenders simply shut down!  A woman lunged for my Berry Lime Sublime and after that, well, it got pretty ugly."

In the ensuing panic, local radio stations broadcasted conflicting reports as to exactly which local businesses would be offering relief supplies.

Almost 100 people flocked to the Starbucks at Santa Monica and La Brea only to find helpless baristas, no hot coffee and a totally meager selection of baked goods.  "My mother is 83 years old and we heard on the radio that this Starbucks was going to be up and running.  If she doesn't get a venti Arabian Mocha Sanani I don't know what's going to happen to her," said Ginette Rodeos of Marina Del Rey.  To make matters worse, those few people who did get coffee were further thwarted by a total lack of artificial sweeteners on site.  "Sugar in the Raw?  Are you friggin' kidding me?" sobbed local homosexual and avid salsa dancer Enrique Santoro.  "I'm on the South Beach Diet and my insulin levels are going to go crazy if I use this.  Why isn't the rest of the country doing something??"

Deteriorating conditions will force authorities to evacuate the thousands of people at local Quiznos, movie theaters and upscale shopping centers, including Fashion Island in Newport Beach, where a policeman told CNN that unrest was escalating.  The officer expressed concern that the situation could worsen quickly after patrons defaced multiple "Dancing With The Stars" posters, looted a Baby Gap and demanded free makeovers en masse at a MAC cosmetics store during the afternoon.

At least 2,000 refugees, a majority of them beautiful, will travel in a bus convoy to Laguna Beach starting this evening and will be sheltered at the 8 year old '7 Crowns' on North Canon Drive where soft omelettes with confit bacon and Hudson Valley foie gras was being airlifted in by the National Guard.  Thank heavens.  Laguna Beach mayor Christina Winthorpe told a group of embedded reporters at a Koo Koo Roo chicken restaurant on Palm Canyon that "The scope and scale of this disaster is almost too much to comprehend.  Local carwashes are at a stand-still, and apparently the tram at Disneyland has been on hold for almost an hour now!"  She said she had also met a woman earlier that had been waiting for a rotisserie leg and thigh with a side of green  beans for upwards of 15 minutes.  "This truly is our tsunami", said Winthorpe.

In Los Angeles, Mayor Villaragosa said he wants "to accommodate those people suffering in the Beverly Center as quickly as possible for the simple reason that they have been through a horrible ordeal."

"We need water.  We need edamame.  We need low-carb bread," said Martha Owens, 49, who was one of the thousands trapped in the Beverly Center when the escalators stopped moving.  "They need to start sending somebody through here."

Along the coastline in Huntington Beach, the power simply surged, causing writers to lose upwards of a page of original screenplay material, causing DirecTV service to work only intermittently and forcing local residents to walk outside and look helplessly at the breathtaking Pacific from their ocean view decks.  "I can hardly begin to put this experience into words," said seasoned Two and a Half Men writer John Edlestein.  "I was just getting into the rhythm and making some real headway on a scene where Charlie Sheen parties with a busload of female volleyball players when my Power Book crapped out.  I have nothing.  Simply nothing."

Delivering his weekly radio address live from the White House, President Obama announced he was deploying more than 7,000 additional active-duty troops to the region.  He comforted victims and praised relief workers.

"But despite their best efforts, the magnitude of responding to a crisis over a disaster area this sunny and trendy has created tremendous problems," he said.  "The result is that many of our citizens simply are not getting the help they need, especially in Anaheim Hills, and that is unacceptable."

"Orange County is resilient though.  I have no doubt they will bounce back like this never happened," professed Cellulite Reduction Specialist, Kim Bellevue.  "The therapy sessions could reach an all-time high though."

How did I end up here??!

It's funny how I ended up here, in the blogesphere I mean.  I was up late and felt the need to write an atypical Facebook post (for me anyway) and didn't realize until I was done (over 5,000 characters later) that the FB post limit is 420 characters.  Good thing I'm not on Twitter.  At any rate, rather than hacking up what I really wanted to say so that it would fit in FB world I decided to create a blog.  Not sure where this new path will eventually take me.  And I worry about that to tell you the truth lol.

I've been inspired and thinking about blogging for a while now thanks to three intelligent, passionate, visionary, and strong females who blog and I've been fortunate enough to call my friends. Thank you Darcie, Alyssa, and Christina.  I may not compare and I might be faking it here at the starting line - in fact my jittery new blog fingers can't seem to find the correct keys often enough - but I think I'll be ok.  If you like what you read or feel passionate on either side of the commentary you find along this path (however long or short it may end up being) always feel free to pipe in.  But please at least be nice and diplomatic - I'm fragile, lol.

So here it goes... my first blog.  The one that was prompted by a simple network tv show, a bit of insomnia, and an overweight Facebook post.  Don't worry, they won't all be this deep.

WARNING: NOT THAD'S TYPICAL FACEBOOK POST.
This post is long - and it's late - I know. But I'm hoping that if you take a minute to read it that you just might feel a little differently when you're done. I'm glad you're here.

For some reason I wanted to tell you that I'm a little embarassed to say I teared up a bit watching Undercover Boss at home alone tonight.  I know, I know ... go ahead and laugh. The stories of the people on the show are emotional of course, but I think it was due more to the fact that it hits home for me.  You see, in the past few weeks I've been trying to do some soul searching (for whatever reason) which has prompted me to want to do a lot of "good" things for people for no reason other than the basic recognition of the common thread of the human need for recognition, love, and support.  Some of these things have been done behind-the-scenes for people (some of whom I do not know) as well as trying to be more of a good and empowering friend to the few friends that I'm lucky enough to have. Helping someone realize how special they are is a really satisfying thing and to watch their face change and their shoulders strengthen because of what you've said, recognized, or acknowledged is awesome.  I think that sometimes it's honestly because I too long for that more than I think I feel I receive it but nonetheless I still want to do more. (calling Dr. Freud)

When I watch a show like Undercover Boss or Extreme Home Makeover (et al) I get emotional.  Not because of what I've seen on the tv but because I can FEEL the difference it just made to those people.  Where has that feeling gone lately? Those of us that think we don't have the resources, or the time, or that it won't matter are WRONG.  Giving someone just a little tiny boost can completely change their day and their heart, as it inevitably simultaneously changes yours as well. There's no way around it.

Have you been a little selfish or self-centered? I have. Do you have a friend or family member or someone that "knows" you love them but you haven't actually looked them in the eye and said it lately ... or given them a big smile and a hug for no reason? Have you forgotten to tell them how much you enjoy going to lunch with them or neglected to tell them how your day is so much better because they made you laugh? Well stop it!  We've all been through a lot of shit the past few months and we need each other. Economic, political, religous, climate, petty differences and misunderstandings.  Seriously - I know you feel it too.  How 'bout a simple pat on the back, an arm around the shoulder, or a quick tug on their arm.  And if your nose gets that all too unfamiliar "tickle" to it when you do this, then you know you're doing it right and you know it's been too long.

I'm suggesting you try this: Do one thing for someone tomorrow, selflessly, that you know there is no way you can be "paid" back for.  Buy lunch for someone you know is going to be cutting it short because rent is due this week. And leave a little bigger tip for the server too - just a couple extra bucks than normal - (s)he works very hard for it and you can afford it (check your couch cushions or the car ashtray or don't buy that nice gum with the crunchy shell). Put some money in someone's parking meter that is about to expire. Take homemade cookies to work and share. Or call that toll-free number on your receipt and let Corporate know how good and pleasant the cashier was at that store. They'll never know it was you but boy it feels good to hear that after a long day at work.  There are thousands of ideas and ways to pay it forward. Pick one!

Like I said, I've been trying to figure out how to be better and what it is that I'm supposed to be doing in life, and it probably isn't sitting up writing on Facebook at midnight when I have to work in the morning but dammit there's one thing I do know for sure... I didn't get here on my own.  I have a great family and come from a great community. And each one of my facebook 'friends' - all 80 of you - had a little something to do with it too.  Each of you is someone that has touched my life and you've each made your own impact.  Trust me, I remember when I met EACH of you and I have memories of each of you too. And for that I thank you. I've never really been the one to show that very well. I've always felt a bit uncomfortable in my own skin I guess. Some people have really put me through some shit for whatever reason. But I'm going to try to change that and be better. You need me and I need you - otherwise we wouldn't both be on here reading about each others' happenings. And each of you know someone else that needs you too. Be there.

So remember ... tomorrow, choose just one thing to do for someone else who will never see it coming but will be so grateful you did it.  You just might change their day ... and yours.  Feel free to share your thoughts and experiences with me. I'm curious to hear about it. Thanks for hanging in there! Good night.  :)

PS: Boy, wait until my new-hires see me tomorrow!!