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Benjamin Hoppe

When the telephone was invented in 1876 (we’ll go by the patent date) it heralded a new wave of communication within the United States and the world. As time went on, the telephone became more and more advanced; it began getting features such as self-switching, touch tone, voice mail, caller id, and more. Then it went entirely wireless and “cellular”. In 2007, the telephone changed again with the release of the Apple iPhone.

Now, communication can be done in a multitude of ways, including both active communication (calling someone) and passive communication (texting, email). We have both, and now is the time for the “phone” portion to come to an end, at least as we know it.

When you text me, it is a commitment to respond back in 160 characters or less, and there is no expectation it will be absolutely immediate. However, when you call me, there is an implied expectation that I will answer the phone. It is an immediacy of communication that is being requested. It is also, in this day of constant communication forms, extremely presumptuous.

When my phone rings, I look at the Caller ID and see who is calling. Some people have special ringtones if it is someone I talk to frequently; those same people will have special texting chimes as well. When you call, you are basically saying that whatever I am currently doing is less important than what it is you want. You don’t know what I am doing right now, but whatever it is must be less important than whatever it is you want.

So does that mean someone should never call? Absolutely not, but it is about the timing of such calls. Send me an email or a text, asking me when a good time to talk would be. Check my calendar, and put an invite on the calendar. (If you are inviting me, please make the calendar entry appropriate to the length of time you need to talk. if it is a fifteen minute conversation, don’t schedule an hour.)

Most things people want are short. Most can be answered in 160 characters or less, and if they can, why not text instead of call? I don’t want to commit to a telephone conversation which will involve huge amounts of niceties during a work week when I have a thousand things going on, and I don’t want to commit to having a discussion about meaningless things like the weather when I have a stack of work to do.

Some would say that our short communications are the downfall of civilized conversation. I would say that it puts it into perspective. I can still talk to you, but when we run out of things to say, I don’t have to make small talk or try to get you off the phone. There is a time and a place for our long phone conversations, and Tuesday at 2:00 PM isn’t it.

I Used To Be Political

There was a time, many years ago, when I considered myself 'political'. Over the years, I have fallen away from my politics, and the need to ingest it all up. Probably the primary reason was the constant indigestion it was causing in recent years. 

In the 90s when I was in high school, I considered myself a moderate left leaning centrist; I was, by pure definition, a Clinton supporter. However, I also looked back at great presidents from the past, and I am including Nixon into this mix who despite his many failings, still pushed a 'progressive' agenda such as implementing the Environmental Protection Agency. As I've aged, I've done was people usually do the opposite of. I have moved further left.

As I look around the world, I see the problems. I analyze them, think about them, and let them stew in my overactive brain. In each and every time that I do this, I come up with the same conclusion each time. The conclusion is that we live in a greedy, self-serving society that would rather cast away the lessers of us than to support them, foster them, and help them grow personally and economically.

Not everyone in the world has the same potential. We tell kids that "you can be anything you want" but they can't. There are barriers in life, be they economic and educational. Some people just aren't as smart as others, some are not as ambitious, and some are just always thinking outside of the box instead of conforming. I put myself into the latter category. I can't seem to fit myself into the proverbial box, no matter how much I try. When I think about the things I do in life, and trying to be "more American", I just can't do it. I can't be as greedy, manipulative, and devious as others. This is simply not a set of traits that I posses.

As I think about that, and the fact that when I was a child growing up in the 80s, I looked up to people like Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush and admired fictional characters like Dan Fielding from Night Court. Now as I look back on that, I see it as it was. It was pure indoctrination, designed to move us towards those greedy ideals that would eventually push the country into the second largest economic decline in its history.

As we have a group of people with money and power leading us towards one direction, those of us who refuse to buy into this notion try to push the other direction. Unfortunately, and this is the crux of the problem, the people who push in progressive directions are too nice to those who are trying to push us towards selfishness. Instead of having the balls to say "NO!", they instead try to seek consensus, which apparently they believe means to give the other side whatever they want, regardless of your true ideals.

It is time for a progressive rising, and for those people on the left to rise up against the aggressors to common sense and the good will of all mankind. We want fairness, they want it all. We want good health for everyone, they want to limit health to those with the ability to pay.

The irony of the political process, and the reason why we have so many problems, is that the people who purport to believe in the kinds of things like fairness and helping the poor are also the same people fighting for the side of greed. The problem with those people is that they are either greedy as well, and don't believe the things they preach, or they are too stupid and are being manipulated by the powers with the money and media control. After all, if you believe in a virgin birth, talking burning trees, and an elderly man that collected two of every animal on Earth despite not being anywhere near many of the animals that existed, then they are stupid enough to believe antyhing being thrown at you by those with the wherewithal to manipulate them.

It's time for progressives to stand up and count off. Be vocal, be here and now, and fight against those who would rather everything go to the upper 1% rather than the rest of us. The conservatives are right about one thing, and that it is class warfare! Except they mischaracterize it. They claim it is about 'redistribution of wealth', which is correct. The difference in theory is the direction of that redistribution, and the fact that they are pushing our money, the people's money, to the wealthiest Americans.

It's nearly one month into the Republican controlled house. Where are the jobs, John Boehner?

Introversion and Self Denial (aka. Hiding from Everything)

I haven't been doing a lot of writing in recent months (or even recent years for that matter) because I seem to feel to introverted from the rest of the world right now. It's a scary damn place and I have withdrawn myself away from the world into my own little world. It's been very suburban of me, honestly.

It certainly doesn't mean I don't know what is going on in the world, and I probably know better than 90% of Americans what is happening in my country, and the implications of such. I know that the middle of the country is gaining power based on the newest census, and that their ideals are not compatible with those "on the perimeter" of the country.

One of the biggest things I haven't been doing more frequently that I should is to watch the news more often, and keep on top of what all those nutty pundits are saying; people like Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and those ilk that spread outright lies and revisionist history in the name of "news". (I won't include Bill O'Reilly in this group. Believe it or not, I think he isn't a liar but someone who tells the truth with his own political bend, not unlike myself.)

Society is crumbling around us. We have people who think the greatest cure to life is that families should pay no taxes, the rich should pay no taxes, and we should provide a great array of social services to those who continue to have children. People believe that good health is not a right, not a privilege for a few. With nine percent plus unemployment and an increasing number of 99ers (those whose 99 weeks of unemployment have run out) you would think that things would be shifting in the progressive (or LIBERAL!) direction.

Instead, people move back to the conservative policies like those of G.W. Bush who created this mess in the first place. Why? Because they are sold a bill of goods that the rich create jobs (false) and that one day, they might be one of those rich people who won't want to be taxed.

In reality, small businesses create jobs. Ask any person why they don't "work for themselves" and I guarantee their number one answer would be "health insurance" and not wanting to lose that coverage that their workplace 'working for the rich' provides. So in essence, what is the easiest way to drive small business and create jobs? Offer everyone universal healthcare in a simplified format, move medical research back to academia where it belongs, and it creates no concerns about getting cancer after starting that new business that will create jobs. 

"Corporate America" sells this concept that everyone should work for them, and through consolidation, has created a perfect storm of a few companies controlling the destinies of everyone in the country.  Unfortunately, the people of this country have bought into this.

So it is time for me to pay closer attention, write more, and bring attention to this issues to those who care about the country, their future, and the futures of their children and their children's children. We have the power to control where society will go, but we have to be educated, pay attention, and make sure to keep everyone else honest and ensure false propaganda isn't being spread in the name of "the right".

Certification of Live Birth

The last time I requested a birth certificate copy, I was moving from Ohio to Connecticut. I've probably had five or six copies over the course of my life, and invariably misplaced them during a  move or through sloppy file keeping.

When I received the certificarte, it looked almost exactly like the one below. The exception is the seal and state name being that of the Great State of Ohio (well, not that great after this November's election) and names being my own, my mother's, and my father's. 

No one has since questioned the legitimacy of my certificate, and I was able to obtain my transferred driver's permit utilizing this certificate.

A "Certification of Live Birth" is an official birth certificate. 

Death, Taxes, and America

As I contemplate the fact that I have been living on this Earth for just a shade north of thirty-three years, I have to wonder about the direction the world is going in, and what the future for the Planet Earth will bring. 

The United States of America, undoubtedly still the most powerful country in the world and my home, is populated with people who would vote with their wildest ambitions than the reality of the situation. A failure to recognize that an increasing deficit for the federal government leads them to scream that the government needs to cut back on spending, while ignoring the fact that taxes just aren't that high.

This is a people, with record unemployment with no signs forward that it will let up, is against universal healthcare because of the "evil" of socialism that was conjured out of the thin air by the wealthy for fear of having to pay for the liver transplant of a poor person.

This is a people, with CEOs making hundreds of the times more than their salary still insist that "raising taxes" on these money-grubbing idiots will somehow hinder job growth; what will hinder job growth is that the wealthy can pocket their tax breaks and continue to cut the payrolls at their companies and ship the US jobs overseas.  They do this all under their delusional guise that one day, they themselves might be rich, and won't want the tax rate that is much lower than it was 50 years ago for the people making the same amount of money.

This is a people, who while not believing in the very real science of climate change, will drive around in the biggest, most petrol-guzzling vehicle they can find. Never mind the notion that even if "global warming" as they often misstate it is not real (hint: IT IS!) that they believe that it is a license to pollute and waste. "If global warming isn't real, it means we'll never run out of oil, and the rainforests are endless and plentiful."

This is a people who claim to be a "Christian Nation" despite plentiful documentation that the "founding fathers" of America were secularists. I suppose they'd rather hide behind the parts of them that were slave-owning misogynists. They fight to "share" the wealth, claiming it is "redistribution" of their money, while forgetting that their very religion explicitly states that you are not allowed to be rich. All the while, they decry homosexuals as "sinners" despite Jesus never saying a single word about homosexuality, and picking-and-choosing which parts to accept of their holy book. (Keep the man on man thing in there despite possible misinterpretation, but drop the daughter-stoning no interpretation needed parts.)

This is a people that wants the government to cut spending, as long as it doesn't affect the multitude of programs that they utilize, such as childcare credits. Make sure you pave all the roads in their neighborhood, but then cut funding once they have theirs. They believe that having a family demands that they should be provided "credit" on their taxes, and that their cost to fund the government should be lower despite the fact that their extra people on their family are a greater burden on the expenses of the government.

Here are the realities, despite the propoganda machines at work:

• Socialized medicine works, ensures a healthier populace, and allows everyone access to the basic right of life.
• Government has to give private industry a swift kick in the ass sometimes, because corporations have always placed profits above people, and will continue to do so.
• Most people will not be extremely wealthy in their lives, and so therefore will not be impacted by the higher tax rates.
• Rich people don't create jobs; they hoard money. When they do spend it, they don't spend it where they live, or where you live. They spend it in foreign counties on nice boats that they don't have to pay taxes on.
• Roads have to be paved, otherwise you can't drive on them. Taxes pay for roads. A corporation owning a road would not repair it, because it would be 'good enough' and would cut into their profits.
• Families create a massive burden of expense on the government. Instead of a massive tax credit for each child, you should get one; after that, your taxes should go up to pay for your extra children. People claim they should be able to have all the children they want, but they don't realize the number of government services they utilize to raise these children.
• "Conservative" means standing still; "Progressive" means moving forward, "Liberal" means "time to get our asses in gear". (Coincidentally, "Democrat" means "yellow-backed liberal who won't stand on principles.)
•  Everyone's life is limited, everything's life is limited. If we don't get off this hurtling rock we call Earth, the human species is doomed to extinction. It isn't an "if" but a "when". At some point in the future the planet will not be habitable, and your children's children may not live to experience it.

As a species and a people, we have to begin to think about how we can all come together to work to better the Earth. Not just America, not just North America, and not just the "allies", but everyone on the planet. Every day we move forward at our current pace of progress, we further doom ourselves, or economy, and ultimately, our very existence. You and I will be long dead before this happens, but on your deathbed will you think, "I made a difference. Humans will go on." or will you think, "I don't know what will happen beyond me."

Circle of life. Don't break it.

Stop Teabagging Unless You Are a Billionaire

I just don't understand the whole concept of the teabagger movement.

A group of people has gotten together and decided that they will be controlled by the rich and powerful Republicans in the country. Every teabagger claims that Karl Rove is against them, but in reality, his political genius has enabled the Republican party to leverage the ignorant and lazy.

Let's assume for a minute that the teabaggers are sincere, and they they are very concerned with concepts like "deficits" and "trade" and "jobs". If this is so, then why can't they determine the difference between political terminology and economic policies, such as communism vs. socialism vs. fascism. 

What teabaggers really worry about is that a black man is going to save their bacon, and put them back on the right track. This would be an affront to their very racist views. They claim they are only concerned with economic issues, but then why are "pro-life" banners flown at a lot of these teabagger rallies.

Ultimately, anyone making $25,000 a year who thinks that a billionaire is looking our for their absolute best interests in either naive, and idiot, or both.

The United States in 2011

The Republican Part is slated to take control of at least the House of Representatives in 2011 after the election on Tuesday; there is a chance in the Senate, but it is less clear since many of the "tea party" candidates are fizzling when it was realized they were out of their minds, or witches, or both.

What this means to every America, and to the country as a whole, is a return to regressive policies, as well as new attacks on the President, as well as human decency.

So what will we face in 2011 if the Republicans take control of the congress?

• Attempts to impeach Barack Obama, despite no evidence of wrongdoing, and in fact this will be a witch hunt to find the slightest bit of anything they can. After all, they went after Bill Clinton for a blow job, and not for what he did as a President.
• Repeal of at least a part of the healthcare reforms, or Healthcare-Lite as it is today. In the future, we will return to a time when pre-existing conditions can make someone inelligible, and enabling insurance companies to drop people when they get sick. After all, profit above all else.
• Anyone of a minority class will continue to be oppressed, gay rights will be rolled back, and we will begin a full-fledged move towards the ultimate goal of the far-right: adoption of a theocracy.

Frankly, this scares the hell out of me. The "majority" will hold control of their majority, and oppress others, as much as they can, while the poor and oppressed will continue to be as such.

Remember to vote on Tuesday, and vote Democrat or Liberal Independent.

It ' s Time

Where is the passion in what I write? I don't know, and that is why there hasn't been much content written here lately.

The reality is, I just have lacked the passion in my writing in recent months. So I need to sit down beginning tomorrow, and make sure I get myself going, get myself moving, and get my goals back on track.

I need to write more, I need to get fit, and I need to share more around the web. 

Music Between Generations

Every generation generally dislikes the music of the previous generation. This is simply the way things have been for over a century; simply put, whatever is new is not good when compared to what someone listened to when they were younger.

As I move into my mid-30s this coming November when I hit the big "33", I have begun to reflect back on my younger days, and what young people listen to today. I have to say, I hate today's music. Does that make me old? No! ...and here is why...

Simply put, today's music sucks. Before everyone looks at me with that judgmental look of age, I should explain why today's music sucks. Simply put, today's music, more than any time in the past, is fabricated.

American Idol began this trend earlier in the decade, as they pushed through year after year of 'the best of the worst', mediocre singers that have their careers because of American Idol, and not because of talent. This is not to say that a lot of good singers have gone through American Idol, but most did not win because they didn't win the canned look of music. Then the Disney Channel grabbed it's big push with a lot of hit shows with tweens, pushing even more trash into the mix.

Where in the 90s and prior, talent had to be discovered, now celebrity is created through the thoughtful combination of television shows, albums, stadium shows, and the power of a major corporation backing them. Singers have to be studio corrected in order to sing and deliver a 'good' product, by which this means one or two hit songs, and a bunch fo filler; to sell the whole ball of garbage on iTunes, they include 'bonus extras' to push kids to buy the $15 digital album that used to cost $10 in the store on CD 5 years ago. Ever wonder about those stickers espousing which "hit songs" which are on the album, even though all but one of those 'hit songs' hasn't had a single minute of radio play. The recording industry decides how many hit songs a band or singer will have, what those songs will be, and the order in which they will become 'hits'.

The reality is, there is good music today, so don't think that this is simply dismissing an entire generation of singers. Look at the bands that aren't coming out of the production facilities, but are being truly discovered through normal means. For every one of those bands the record industry makes famous, they produce ten others in their hype manufacturing facilities.

At the end of the day, there is still some good music being produced, but there is a lot more crap being churned out. Ultimately, it is up to the listener to bring out the good from the bad. However, I feel bad for the young kids today who are growing up without real talent, instead co-opting whatever is coming out of Disney. Even if it isn't Disney, a major corporation, etc.; it still doesn't make music less manufactured in many cases.

After all, I can't be the only one who wants to wretch at Justin Bieber.