Prayers and Wishes

What I want to know, is this: Are prayers really answered? Do wishes come true?

The few times I've had prayers answered, they've had strings attached. And not just little strings...huge, massive, make ya choke they're so hard to swallow strings. And when I've accepted the strings along with the blessings my life was always changed and usually irrevocably. At the very least, I'd get the hairy eyeball from those with the conventional view of life.
In fact, I've found most often that the only way to tell if it's God talking to you or your own thoughts tends to be this; it's can't be you when the answer you get is so far from what's in your head that you know it's emanating from somewhere or something else. And if you are overcome with peace, the strings tend to be really thick, and yet you're totally fine with going through with the consequences of having your prayer answered.
Case in point; leaving my ex-husband. I prayed about it for years. Finally I got told that I could go, but.... BUT (see the string? Yeah it was a doozie!) I had to let my daughter stay with my ex. In the natural I'd have come unglued at just the thought of it, let alone the circumstances surrounding it. My ex was addicted to crack cocaine, recently unemployed and his latest round of decisions lead to us being evicted from our apartment.
I was supposed to leave my daughter; the one I'd stayed home for 5 years to raise, the one people called 'mini-me', my only reason for breathing and not offing myself during the really bad times, My Girl... I was supposed to leave her with my ex. And yet, I had peace about it, cause God promised that she would be in his hand the whole time. I should have known it was messed up when I got the peace; but once it gets you, all things are possible, and you believe.
So, being more fearful of what would happen if I stayed than if I went, I left. After the peace wore off, I tried everything imaginable to get my girl back. But the decision had been made and the universe was making me stick to it. I was blocked by stupid coincidences at every turn.
Within a couple of weeks, something amazing happened to him. Once he became the 'sole parent' to our daughter he got straightened up and fast. First he sobered up... not just drug addict, "I'm off the shit, man" sobered up which only lasts till the next monies come in, Real sober. Then he packed everything and moved to Southern California, got a place to live, a job in his lucrative field, and a sponsor-- not necessarily in that order. Because of where they moved to, my girl was enrolled in the top 5 ranked public elementary school in all of California. She's been on honor roll for two straight years (they only start that in 3rd grade) and is spoiled--in the good way--beyond belief. God kept his promise that she would be safe. And, she, in effect, saved her father's life.
I see now, quite easily, why that string was attached. But it was a difficult and bitter pill to swallow. It left a bittersweet aftertaste. She is doing much better than I could have managed to provide for her, both in school and living situation. She has a strong relationship with her father now, one that she no doubt would never have had if I had continued to be her primary caregiver. And, she would have had to cope with the loss of her father, too... I am convinced that he would be dead of the drugs in one way or another. So yes, I guess prayers do get answered.

And wishes? Hang on, I'm laughing so hard I need to get back in my chair...

Let the Games Begin

Well, I got my first political email of the '08 election season the other day. Of course, it was from someone who has opposing political views from my own. It was originally written by someone so ignorant that they were inflammatory and was sent on by my mother. This is the part that disturbed me most, cause I thought she was intelligent, but after receiving that particular monument to biased ignorance I'm wondering if she doesn't need 24 hour monitoring so she doesn't eat her shoes and call it steak.
I could not even stomach to read the entire email... until after my sister added her opposing insights to it and sent it back to us all. Her outrage evident with every response and not surprisingly, matching my own very closely. But it all goes so much deeper, that it's stopped being an issue of political parties, the scope is too massive to be contained or changed by any party or one candidate. Honestly, haven't we all been eating our shoes and believing it was steak... and how long have we been doing it?
We have become a country overrun by fear. And too busy either lining our pockets and screwing anyone that curbs our greedy ways; or we're working two plus jobs to pay rent and hopefully have enough left over to eat crackers. We, as a general population, have given into the Jerry Springer Show mentality; the lowest common denominator of American existence, right along with shows like Big Brother and Survivor. Scriptless ugliness towards our fellow man played out in technicolor.
The middle class is dead and awaiting a proper burrial. With it went consideration, questioning authority, human contact, open mindedness, and the ability to think for ones' self about the state of the country, not to mention doing something about it when something goes wrong. It's actually not surprising since it takes work, time, and strength to be middle class in the sense that I've described. So much easier to sit back and let the news tell you how to think. That Iraq makes sense, all teachers and adults for that matter are child predators, gas prices, while high, are just something we have to deal with, and pharmaceutical companies aren't scum sucking frauds with false test results molded to fit the outcome they wanted. We have bought into it all as a nation.
Part of me wants to be vigilant and watch the news every night so I can call the establishment on it's bullshit because someone has to keep watch, and too many other people already gave that up and have left it to others, that's how we got to this condition in the first place. The other part of me doesn't want to watch at all because it's so deeply infuriating that I'm afraid I'm gonna stroke out because my blood pressure goes through the roof.
Here's the rub... How do we fix it? It's all been going on for so long, unchecked that it's just gotten worse and worse to the point of overwhelming. So what do we do now? How do we fix this massive beyond scope pile of lies, fear, greed and bullshit? We as a nation have been carrying it around for so long that we don't even realize how big it is anymore... More so, some people don't even remember a time when it wasn't SO huge as to swallow up the possibilities of our lives. Oh, we think we're a free country, and we have so many choices. We're just in a bigger, fancier box than most and we're blind to our own censorship.
I am as guilty as anyone for the state of this Union. For most of my 20's I didn't vote. I used to say that I wasn't well informed enough to choose a candidate or make a decision on a proposition. In fact, that made me more guilty than the voters. My choice was to let the country go on autopilot, trusting blindly that the universe would continue to spin and this country would continue to uphold the values I was raised with. By making no choice at all, I allowed the decline of America because I didn't question their bullshit rhetoric and stand against it.
Just like it is now, in another election year for president. We have chosen to be Republican or Democrat based on the most visible candidates instead of what each party is really supposed to have for ideals. That's all gotten lost in what the news tells us and the candidates are the issues. So, my idea to start fixing the hideous, humongous, pit of American existence is to clearly define again what each party stands for... REALLY stands for, not the spin-doctor bullshit they all say. We may find out that as a country, as a whole, we want a lot of the same things. Then we have to re-establish our right to do something about getting those things, not just buying the spin. We deserve better, but we also have to be willing to work harder as a nation to get the better. Make no mistake about it, the way things are going now, we stand to become the biggest fucking province of either China or Saudi Arabia. Think about that over your afternoon Jerry Springer watching.

Updated 1/12/09
And here it is, in all it's explosiveness ~ the scarlet letter...

Lawyers and That Fucking Email

Since you all felt inclined to send me this email (as I appear to be the most democratically vocal person of the 4 of us) I would like to add comments to this absolutely ridiculous email you all sent me. My responses are in red.

These are some amazing facts Facts determined by whom?and solid observations I'll give you observations, doesn't mean it's fact. as to the Democratic Party's thought processes. Laws do not make people honest; it is their inner character that makes them honest. Just like George W. Bush, Tom Delay and Dick Cheney, right?

Subject: Lawyers

This is very interesting! I never thought about it this way. Perhaps this is why so many physicians are conservatives or republicans. According to whom?

Thoughtful (read Retarded.) point of view...

The Democrat Party has become the Lawyers' Party. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are lawyers. Bill Clinton and Michelle Obama are lawyers. John Edwards, the other former Democrat candidate for president, is a lawyer, and so is his wife, Elizabeth. Every Democrat nominee since 1984 went to law school (although Gore did not graduate). Every Democrat vice- presidential nominee since 1976, except for Lloyd Bentsen, went to law school. Look at the Democrat Party in Congress: the Majority Leader in each house is a lawyer. I wont' try to contest this as I have not done the research to support these statemens. What I will start with is that at least in Law school there is are required course called Ethics.

The Republican Party is different. No shit. President Bush and Vice President Cheney were not lawyers, but businessmen. Who have managed to rape this country for all it's worth. Check out big oil--which funds ALL the Bush's including your loved W. and Haliburten which has reaped billions of dollars from the American people through government contracts in Iraq--much of that money can't be accounted for... oh wait, it's going into Cheney's pocket... check it out. I'm not kidding. The leaders of the Republican Revolution were not lawyers. Newt Gingrich was a history professor; Tom Delay was an exterminator Wasn't Delay the one who tried to exterminate the people of New Orleans, La? Great job for an exterminator... the head of FEMA.; and, Dick Armey was an economist. House Minority Leader Boehner was a plastics manufacturer, not a lawyer. The former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist is a heart surgeon.

Who was the last Republican president who was a lawyer? Gerald Ford, who left office 31 years ago and who barely won the Republican nomination as a sitting president, running against Ronald Reagan in 1976. The Republican Party is made up of real people doing real work. Are you fucking serious? real people? These people don't know the definition of real. They are making millions of dollars from heading large corporations or being on the boards of said corporations. They wouldn't know a real person if they were forced to sit on a bus riding next to the single mother of 2 that can't pay her electric bill because she's making minimum wage while those assholes sit in huge offices with people catering to their every need. Most if not all came from wealthy families. Do NOT try to tell me they are Mr. Average Man and Ms. Average Woman. It's the lawyers who have defended the average man and woman that have SEEN the blight that many of those great businessmen have put the AVERAGE person in. The Democrat Party is made up of lawyers. Democrats mock and scorn men who create wealth, Yup, You're right. They scorn those men. But it's not for making money. It's for squashing the average person under horrible pay structures forcing many Average people to hold 2 and 3 jobs just in order to make rent. like Bush and Cheney,Who has raped the American public for millions upon millions of dollars in bogus government contracts or $4 a gallon gas prices by letting OPEC and Big Oil run amok. or who heal the sick, like Frist, or who immerse themselves in history, like Gingrich.

The Lawyers' Party sees these sorts of people, who provide goods and services that people want, as the enemies of America Business has never been an enemy of America. Not paying fair wages and sending jobs overseas because they can make a product cheaper at the detriment of the American working public and American economy is the enemy. . And, so we have seen the procession of official enemies, in the eyes of the Lawyers' Party, grow. I'm just curious, is this saying that there are no republican lawyers, because I worked for County government in a republican county in NJ, and let me tell you, I know for an absolute FACT that there are PLENTY of republican lawyers.

Against whom do Hillary and Obama rail? Pharmaceutical companies for the inhumane treatement of animals and overpricing medications, oil companies for increasing the price of a barrel of oil by more than 50% over the last year without any good reason but to line their own pockets , hospitals for overcharging for medical care, manufacturers for sending American jobs overseas, fast food restaurant chains for contributing to the obesity problem in this country and telling us that their products are healthy and safe , large retail businesses for requiring 12 hour work days with less than the required amount of breaks and also requiring workers to work extra hours for straight pay as opposed to giving them overtime, as well as doing away with food breaks , bankers for charging extreme interest rates and targeting the groups that they know can't pay them, and anyone producing anything of value in our nation. Problem is our nation has stopped producing anything. We've sent the jobs to Mexico, Indonesia, India, and China

This is the natural consequence of viewing everything through the eyes of lawyers. Really? Looks more to me like whoever wrote this is trying to skew others views by leading with only facts that support his demented point of view. Lawyers solve problems by successfully representing their clients, in this case the American people. Yes, they sure do. Wether that lawyer is representing Big Tobacco, Big Oil (because I'm sure that Big Oil has one or 2 republican lawyers) or Joe Average. Lawyers seek to have new laws passed, they seek to win lawsuits, they press appellate courts to overturn precedent, when they feel that a precedent was set in the wrong... kind of like the Supreme Court passing a law, a branch of our government that was created solely to INTERPRET law. Oh, and last time I checked, that was predominately REPUBLICAN lawyers... hmmm funny how that works. and lawyers always parse language to favor their side. Kind of like the jackass who wrote this argument did to favor his side?

Confined to the narrow practice of law, that is fine. But it is an awful way to govern a great nation. Really? By passing laws to protect the innocent and standing up against wrongs?? What is this world coming to?! When politicians, as lawyers, begin to view some Americans as clients and other Americans as opposing parties, then the role of the legal system in our life becomes all-consuming. So, this guy is trying to convince us that only democrat lawyers choose sides of some Americans vs. some other Americans? What then, do republican lawyers do? Stand up for the American people only against foreign threats? Some Americans become 'adverse parties' of our very government. We are not all litigants in some vast social class-action suit. Your're right, because if we were, the popular majority would have in office the president we elected 8 years ago, namely Al Gore. We are citizens of a republic that promises us a great deal of freedom from laws, from courts, and from lawyers. freedom from laws courts and lawyers, huh? Isn't that the definition of anarchy? Oh, wait, that's right, it's what we have now. A government that is spending out of control amounts of money on a war we never wanted (and was never approved by congress), selling our debt to China so that we can eventually become a communist nation under the rule of a dictator (oh, wait, again, we're there), gas prices are higher than they've ever been, people can't find jobs and are losing their homes at an alarming rate, and many that can find jobs are taking sub standard positions for what they were trained because their company sent their jobs overseas to be done for less money an hour while they increase the rates they charge Americans.... Somebody's getting rich off the pain and suffering of the average American... I'm thinking it's not democratic lawyers.

Today, we are drowning in laws; we are contorted by judicial decisions; we are driven to distraction by omnipresent lawyers in all parts of our once private lives. I'm just curious, what lawyer is ominpresent in your life and world? America has a place for laws and lawyers, but that place is modest and reasonable, not vast and unchecked. Does the guy who wrote this even have a clue what Bush and Cheney have done to this country over the last 8 years? It's those twits who have run unchecked, not lawyers. When the most important decision for our next president is whom he will appoint to the Supreme Court, the role of lawyers and the law in America is too big. When lawyers use criminal prosecution as a continuation of politics by other means, as happened in the lynching of Scooter Libby and Tom Delay, Scooter Libby lied to the American public on the orders of Bush and Cheney and resigned when caught, that was a lynching all right. And Tom Delay was single handedly responsible for thousands dying in New Orleans when he delayed in DOING THE JOB HE WAS GETTING PAID FOR--NAMELY TO RUN FEMA, and if you're not sure that means FEDERAL EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AGENCY... the only thing that man managed was to fuck up even more a devestated area that could have been saved had the federal government taken seriously the reports that the levees would fail. Naaah, he was lynched. then the power of lawyers in America is too great. Meanwhile, Cheney and Carl Rove out an undercover CIA operative, destroying her career and putting her and her family's lives in jeopardy because her husband told the world that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Yet that man not only walks free, but continues to be second (really first) in command of this country. Yup, lawyers are just too damn powerful. When House Democrats sue America in order to hamstring our efforts to learn what our enemies are planning to do to us, then the role of litigation in America has become crushing. Are you talking about illegal wiretapping? It's illegal because it gave the government the right to listen in on any phone call it felt like without cause. That means you or me. For no reason. Last time I checked, that was an invasion of civil rights.

We cannot expect the Lawyers' Party to provide real change, real reform, or real hope in America ... Mostly because the republican party has done so much to destroy the fabric of America over the last 8 years that it may be virtually impossible to recover from the damage. Most Americans know that a republic in which every major government action must be blessed by nine unelected judges is not what Washington intended in 1789. And Bush made the supreme court a republican majority by filling the last vacant seat with a man that wasn't qualified either (kind of a trend for his appointments) but he was most definitely a republican. Most Americans grasp that we cannot fight a war when ACLU lawsuits snap at the heels of our defenders. The ACLU does not say "DO NOT DETAIN PRISONERS!" they just say "It's wrong to electrocute for fun any prisoners... and they must be fed 3 times a day, so as not to kill them by starvation, a form of torture" Most Americans intuit that more lawyers and judges will not restore declining moral values or spark the spirit of enterprise in our economy. They're right. Getting someone in the White House that doesn't rape the American economy for their own good is what will restore declining moral values and spark the spirit of enterprise in our economy. Also, while they're at it, maybe they could work on bringing back some jobs from places like India and China.

Perhaps Americans will understand that change cannot be brought to our nation by those lawyers who already largely dictate American society and business. Wait, didn't you just spend the last 5 minutes telling me that lawyers do not have anything to do with business other than putting it down and regulating it to the point of destruction? If they don't have anything to do with business, how can they possibly destroy business? Perhaps Americans will see that hope does not come from the mouths of lawyers but from personal dreams nourished by hard work. Hard work like the average person that has to work 2+ jobs in order to pay rent? Perhaps Americans will embrace the truth What's your definition of truth? Mine is not the same as this guy's. I'm pretty sure that in his mind "Truth" is a shitty substitute for "My skewed and terribly backed opinion" that more lawyers with more power will only make our problems worse. In my case, TRUTH would be that the only thing making our problems worse is people that read shit like this and back it, and send it around to others without knowing or caring to find out if any of it is truth, bullshit, or somewhere in between.

DO PASS THIS ON! Only if you have the balls to do so with my comments added to give it the justice it deserves.