Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Thanksgiving blog post

It's been years since I last written a "what I'm thankful for" blog post, and now it's time to get back into the habit of grattitude



So what I shall I be thankful for  these days?


1) Family


This year, I felt I had greatly improved relations with my family


In the past, I held a lot of anger some of the bad decisions my parents have made when I was growing up.  However, in the past few years, I have written them letters on how their bad decisions have hurt me in a negative way. 

This is something I encourage all you adults to do ASAP, before your parents pass away.  Some of the false prophets of wisdom will tell you to "just let it go", but "letting go" without telling your parents how you truly feel is NOT a sign of wisdom, it's a sign of cowardice!

But now that I pretty much told them everything that has been annoying me all these years, my relations with my parents have dramatically improved!

By truly communicating how I felt, my parent got some important feedback. And I have learned that their past bad decisions was more of good intentions gone wrong instead of bad decisions on purpose.

But the main thing now is that I have been getting along with my parents great this year. 

I do recognize that in many ways, my parents have done more to help me than they really needed to.

I also recognize that other people had a worse family upbringing than mine.

I was lucky to have both parents raising me, while others have been abandoned by deadbeat parents way too early in their life.

I was lucky to have parents who were employed, while others had parents who were unemployed (or under-employed) and therefore struggled to provide the life's neccessities.

I was lucky to have parents who understood the importance of education and had books in the home, whereas others had parents who were totally negligent on their kid's education.

I was lucky to have parents who valued cultural diversity, whereas others had parents who are bigots.

I was lucky to have parents who valued spirituality without forcing a religious belief on me, whereas others had parents who are religious fanatics.

I am also lucky that I had parents who learned from their mistakes, whereas others had parents who acted like they did nothing wrong!


I can now say my parents are good people who have "bailed me out" during the times I was struggling to find work. 


And also, my family always have plenty of food for Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings!  :)  :)    :)    :)

I sure can't wait :)    :)   :)   :)   :)


2) Employment

I may not be a millionaire, nor am I even anywhere close to an upper-middle-class lifestyle.

Also, I'm still disappointed that I haven't yet been picked to re-join the Ala Moana Macy's holiday seasonal team this season.

But you know what?  I'm already employed anyways.

My main job is working as a substitute teacher, with both the public and private schools.

I also got a side job this Thanksgiving weekend, doing promotional sign waving for America's Matress. ( I also did so for the 4th of July and Labor Day weekends as well).

I also did a side job helping out with the elections this year. And even more lucky, my polling place (UH Lab School) didn't ran out of ballots, unlike some other polling places.

I also did a side job with Labor Ready this summer, role-playing as a "victim of a terrorist attack". I was a "guinea pig" for the National Guard training at Bellows AFB in Waimanalo.

Some people have a hard time finding a job.  I know people who said they've been unemployed longer than the 99-week limit for unemployment benefits! YIKES!!!

So I'm grateful to have a sub teacher job as well as finding some side jobs.



PS: To Macy's (Ala Moana), you know my contact information, in case you need extra help next month   :)


3) Having basic neccessities

Being employed as allowed me to have basic neccessities such as shelter, running water, working toilets, food, electricity and a bus pass.

Millions of people worldwide (and even some here in Hawaii) don't even have access to basic neccessities.  

Even worse, some people are living in war zones, which makes it even harder for food and other supplies to be shipped and readily available.

Right now, there are wars going on in Congo, Zimbabwe, Afghanistan, Sudan, Gaza and Syria. It is hard for me to imagine living under such conditions.

So anytime I'm feeling stressed and annoyed, I have remind myself that those people would love to trade places with me.


4) Some luxuries

I'm definitely not living the life of  mega-luxury.

However, I'm grateful for having such minor luxuries like a bike, cell phone YMCA membership, a stereo system, a matress and 2 bookshelves.

I also have access to public services like the bus and the libraries.


5)  Living in the Internet Age

And with the Internet Age, I have easy access to information.

And not just with Google and Wikipedia.

I can use YouTube to listen to old speeches and classic songs.

I can use my social network to find some pretty cool information.

I can keep in contact with former classmates, former co-workers and  distant relatives with Facebook.

And of course, I am thankful for Blogger, which has allowed me to express my thoughts to the world.   With my blog, I can tell everyone my side of the story and  share it with my facebook friends :)


6) A second chance

As I mentioned in an earlier blog post, I have changed my long-term goals. Whereas I started this year trying to pursue a master's elementary education at the University of Phoenix, I decided to withdraw from that program.

http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2012/06/change-in-direction.html


So now, my next goal is to enroll in the master's program in the Library and Information Science (LIS) at the University of Hawaii- Manoa.

So now I'm about to get my 2nd chance to re-join the UH student community :)

I'm also about to get my 2nd chance to pursue a master's program in a professional field, but this time, for a field that would be better suited for me.

I'm currently waiting on my financial aid info to be proccessed.

But if all goes well, I will oficially be a graduate student at UH in 2 months    :)


7) This Amazing Year so far

Some great things happened this year.

I got back into subbing with the private schools again, but this time with Kelly Services.


And also  this......

This summer was the greatest summer I had for a very long time.

I did a few side jobs.

I applied for the LIS program at UH

And the biggest factor  making this a great summer  .................................. I also had to time to do an apartment makeover.

http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2012/07/my-apartment-gets-make-over.html

Just thinking about the improvements to my apartment makes a very thankful for a very great summer and a very great year so far:)


----

As for the fall, I had a great time hanging out with my brother and a few friends for karaoke, hung out with another friend a week later. I also had a great Halloween with my clown wig, and my exploring UH, Ala Moana (hello Macy's.... hint, hint) and Waikiki.


8)  Conclusion

I look forward to a great Thanksgiving with my family tomorrow. 

I look forward to good conversations and of course, good food :)

I hope you all have a great Thanksgiving too! :)

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

More national political trends

My previous blog analyzing the 2012 national elections at
http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2012/11/election-analysis-national-edition.html



Here are more thoughts on the political trends of this year



1) Less patience with overseas interventions

In the recent past, there were always pressure for the US to "do something" whenever there is trouble abroad.

It some cases, it meant sending troops on a temporary basis to place like Grenada, Panama, Haiti, Somalia, Bosnia, etc.

But in other cases, when the US was reluctant to send troops (ie. Rwanda 1994), there were shrieks of horror of "how dare we not save those people".

After 9/11, we sent troops to Afghanistan to hunt for Osama bin Laden!

However, there were also cries to "do something" about Saddam Hussein, the horrible dictator who favored Sunnis over Shiites and Kurds, and showed that favoritism via massacres and poison gas. He also tried to takeover Kuwait in 1991, for which the US troops rescued.

But with all that trouble, there was concerns about Saddam Hussein wanting to violently retaliate against the US.

So we went in 2003 to get rid of Saddam Hussein. That was the easy part.

The hard time was keeping order. Whereas the US didn't have much difficulty in occupying extremely homogeneous nations like Germany and Japan after WW2, it was much different in Iraq.

The Sunnis, Shiites and the Kurds had long histories of mistrust and rivalries. Many Americans (myself included) underestimated the level of violence that would occur between such groups after Saddam Hussein was ovethrown.

Plus, even though Collin Powell warned Bush that more troops would be needed to keep order, Bush decided to go along with Donald Rumsfeld "its OK, it wont be that bad" mentality instead ................until 2006, 3 years after the invasion.

Yes, the 2006 US surge calmed things down in Iraq, but the American public was losing patience with the war in Iraq.

After the 2008 elections, Barack Obama kept his promise of withdrawing from Iraq and sending more troops to Afghanistan. However, since killing Osama bin Laden, the American public is losing patience with the US defending a corrupt government in Afghanistan.

So Obama is planning to withdraw troops from Afghanistan in 2014. As Joe Biden said "the Afghans are responsible for their own security".

Contrast that with Mitt Romney, who kept saying Obama was "apologizing for America" and promised a tougher foreign policy.

Yet, when it was getting closer to the general election, Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan started to take a more moderate tone, expressing that using US force would be a last resort.

But it was too late.

People don't have a short memory as some pundits think they do!

The public knows that Romney is a flip-flopper, that he earlier promised a tougher foreign policy when running in the Republican primaries, and he (surprise, surprise) flip-flopped his position when it was getting closer to general election time.

The public wasn't fooled!

The public was getting burned out in having US troops fighting overseas.

The public supports the Obama plan to withdraw from Afghanistan.

The public doesn't want more US intervention in Libya, nor does it want the US to be involved in the Syria mess.

As for Iran, the US public (which was already tired of war in the smaller Iraq) sure as hell not going to want a fight, unless Iran attacks first.

Chances are pretty high that this is it for US troops fighting overseas for a very long time.

With our memories of the hellish fight in Iraq and Afghanistan, the US public will be like "we ain't getting involved" if there some civil war going out somewhere far away.

The rest of the world will have to manage their own affairs on their own. The days of the US bailing them out is over.

2) Flip-Flopping not effective in the YouTube era!


As I mentioned earlier Mitt Romney was promosing a tougher foreign policy in the Republican primaries, then struck a more moderate tone as the general election got closer.

Politicians used to have an easier time getting away with such a strategy in the past.

Republicans would sound more conservative during their primaries, then moderate their tone for the general election.  Democrats would sound more progressive during their primaries, then moderate their tone for the general election.

But now, in this age of YouTube and social networks,  you can't get away with such stuff.

After all, it only takes a few seconds to find a speech from a few months ago!

And it only takes a few seconds for a politically savvy person to remind his/her social network of evidence that the politician has flip-flopped.

And with John Stewart posting clips of politicians saying totally opposite things, AND with people easily re-posting those clips to their social networks, flip-floppers have been cornered.

So from now on, politicians need to be more consistent.

No more of this "sound more conservative/liberal  now, be more moderate a few months later" nonsense.

Just express a belief/policy plan/etc and just stick with it already

3) Libertarians getting more votes this year

Earlier this month, I posted a blog post mentioning how Gary Johnson's campaign showed a sign that the libertarian movement is being more mature
http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2012/11/libertarian-movement-gaining-maturity.html




Guess what? That maturity has good results.

.

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2012/11/08/Libertarian-Party-buoyant-Greens-hopeful/UPI-46151352363400/#axzz2CpZfoW8c



Cravings for less Washington gave the Libertarian presidential entrant a record vote count while a tight Obama-Romney race hurt the Green Party, officials said.

The nearly 1.2 million votes won by Libertarian Party nominee Gary Johnson, a former two-term Republican New Mexico governor, supported public-opinion polls showing "consistently that a majority of Americans want less government than we have today," party Executive Director Carla Howell told United Press International.

Johnson, 59, who initially sought the presidential nomination of the Republican Party, won the Libertarian nod at the party's May national convention.
His nationwide vote count -- the highest count of the minor-party candidates -- represents about 1.2 percent of the total popular presidential vote in the 48 states in which Johnson ran, a UPI analysis of Tuesday's results indicated. Johnson was denied ballot positions in Michigan and Oklahoma.
His vote count also beat the previous Libertarian Party record, set in 1980 by lawyer-politician Ed Clark, of 921,128 votes, or 1 percent of the nationwide total.

So yep, Gary Johnson broke the record for most votes by a Libertarian.

Gary Johnson also got more votes than any other minor-party candidates. (usually, the Green Party usually gets 3rd place.....NOT THIS YEAR)


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And this occured in a year in which the election was expected to be close!


In other words, a year when the rear-kissers of the 2 big parties kept saying "you're wasting your vote, you'd get (Romney or Obama) elected"

Well, SCREW THAT!

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Many of us are tired of out-of-touch religious fanatics in the Republican Party! We're sick of being made to feel that the party of Rick Santorum, Todd Akin, Joe Walsh, Jan Brewer  and other sick, disgusting fanatics  is the so-called "best option". And we're sick and tired of phonies who pander to those folks and flip-flop the other way come general election time (ie. Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan)

As long as the Republican refuse to LOUDLY disown the drug-war fanatics, the homophobes or the anti-immigration fanatics, they WILL NOT get the respect of the Libertarians!

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As for the Democrats, they need to start taking the deficit seriously. The government can't pay for every pet project out there!

And this Democrat attitude of "if you want PBS to be 100% privatized, you're an evil guy who hates Big Bird" is very annoying ! Just because we don't want our taxes to subsidize something, that doesn't mean we're against it! We just prefer certain things to be funded by private sources.

And the Democrats need to start taking the US high corporate tax rate seriously. It is HIGHER than the supposedly "socialist" Canada  as well as "socialist" European nations.  Enough with this crap of "lower corporate taxes just reward the rich" crap!  This anti-rich envy isn't helping our economy at all!

Democrats need to start being more realistic about economics. We can't subsidize everything, we can't tax our way to prosperity, and too much taxes and regulations makes the US a less hospitable place to invest!

Countries like India and China have learned their lesson the hard way. They reversed course, started promoting more market-friendly policies and are now rising economic powers. 

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I'm not sure who will be the next Libertarian running for President. We need to have someone as mature as Gary Johnson to promote the Libertarian. We need someone who picks his/her battles wisely, and continue to point the flaws of the Republican and Democrat policies.


The more we vote for the minor candidates, the more the Republicans and Democrats have to start paying attention to us! After all, if they want us to vote for them again, they have to earn it!

Now that the Republicans and Democrats have to notice the rising Libertarian vote, they have to adjust to that! Let's see how they'll adjust!