Songs from the Fabulous 80s New Wave--My Favorite Musical Genre

Hold Me Now--Thompson Twins

 

Everyone Wants to Rule the World--Tears for Fears

Welcome to My Blog.

                                 

COGNITION

PERSISTENCE

READING

These photos symbolize the road to achieving your goals.
Think about what you want to achieve.
Do the research and the reading that will help get you closer to your goal. Read profiles and biographies of people who are successful in your area of interest. 

I love to write, and I love the writing of the late John Updike, so I read books by him and about him. 

Apply this idea to what or whom you like.

Most importantly, don't give up!
Just because Sisyphus could not roll the stone over the hill doesn't mean you can't.







My guiding quote is from the great Stephen King 

Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work.”

So, whatever your goal may be, don't sit around daydreaming and waiting for inspiration. Think of a plan of action and do it. 

 One of My Favorite Songs by the Police. The Final Refrain is Very Philosophical. 

 One of the Best Canadian imports in addition to Maple Syrup and the Montreal Canadiens. 

 Response to Gov. Ron DeSantis Mandate (not the “don’t say gay” one)

 Recently, Governor Ron DeSantis (R. Fla.) issued a mandate which requires all public schools to teach students about communism. I wholeheartedly support the idea that every student should know about the evils of communism, and I thank the governor for his service in the United States military (He was deployed to Iraq in 2007) However, I would suggest that he issue another mandate requiring students to be taught about the societal decay resulting from ultra-radical free-market capitalism, which is the philosophy that is embraced by the far right of the Republican party, such as the so-called freedom caucus in the House of Representatives.

 If you want to know what societal damage complete, untrammeled capitalism can do, you should read Charles Dickens, who perfectly described the degradation of the nineteenth-century English working class. He best describes this in Oliver Twist and Hard Times (my favorite). Not to be outdone by the Brits, we had our own lopsided version of capitalism at the same time. (See Mark Twain’s masterful work about the excesses of great wealth in The Gilded Age. During the great depression in the 1930s, President Franklyn Roosevelt and congress instituted a range of social programs called the New Deal, to lessen the blow to the suffering population (25% of who were unemployed). The most important of these was the Social Security Act, which lifted roughly 37% of the elderly population out of poverty.  

 Unfortunately, conservatives have been trying to dismantle it for nearly a century. Thank God they haven’t succeeded

 Don’t be alarmed by my suggestion. I am not a provocateur and I realize that comparing communism to capitalism is a faulty analogy. In communist countries speech is severely curtailed and dissidents are put in forced labor camps or killed. In the United States, ordinary citizens are given the blessing of free speech. However, their voices will pale in comparison to those of huge corporations, who can buy elections, since Chief Justice John Roberts, “in his wisdom,” declared money as speech (Citizens United vs. the Federal Election Commission). Social justice in the United States is best described by the nineteenth-century French journalist, Anatole France, who said: “The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread.

 Do I favor a socialist government for the U.S.? absolutely not. But I would like to see us adopt a system of capitalism that has a heart, like the Scandinavian countries. There is a popular myth that Denmark, Sweden, and Finland are socialist countries. They are not. Each of these countries has a market economy but with a much stronger safety net for those who fall through the holes in capitalism.

 Let students hear about the evils of communism, the abuses of some forms of capitalism, and as many relevant topics that can be taught.

 Teachers should be allowed to exercise their First Amendment rights, too. 

 

Lately, I’ve been listening to Chicago, and I focused on what I think was their biggest hit: 25 or 6 to 4. I was always curious about the meaning of the song’s title, so I Googled it and this is what I found: While sharing a house on Sunset strip, LA, with a bunch of hippies, Robert Lamm, who sang and played keyboards for Chicago, was trying to write a song and was in deep concentration, being awake into the wee hours of the morning. When he noticed that the time was 3:35 a.m. or was it 3:36 a.m. Lamm wasn’t sure. So, you see, if it was 3:35, then it would be 25 minutes to 4:00 a.m., But if it were 3:34 then it would be 26 minutes to 4:00 a.m. So, it’s either 25 or ‘6 to four. Pretty neat. Ha. 

Today is Mayday (May 1, 2022)

Although we in America honor the working class and unions on Labor Day, which occurs on the first Monday in September, May 1, Mayday, is a celebration of workers around the world and is celebrated in over seventy countries. I’ve listed several books related to workers struggles and the origins of the union movement in the United States:

Number one is a history of Mayday.

Number Two is Mark Twain's masterful telling of the excesses of the late nineteenth century in America. (See note at the bottom of the page)

Number Three is about the formations of some famous strikes of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. 

Number Four covers the same topics and number 3, but more comprehensively. 

Number Five is about a sad historic event. A group of anarchists and terrorists crashed an otherwise peaceful protest, which resulted in a dozen deaths, including three police officers. Unfortunately, as is often the case, many people had no concept of critical thinking and lumped all union sympathizers with the anarchists, This setback to union movement.

Note: Gilded: Definition—a thin covering of gold on any object. Mark Twain named the historical period of his book The Gilded Age to indicate that the excessive wealth of “Old Money” and the excessive wealth of industrial capitalists (Carnegie, J.P. Morgan, Rockefeller, and Vanderbilt) as a “thin gold covering” of late nineteenth century America. However, under it lay poverty, sickness, and hunger of most of the working class. 

Books about the struggles of the working class

Mayday History

May Day, also known as International Workers' Day, is celebrated in over 80 countries across the world on May 1. The purpose of the day is to commemorate the efforts and victories of the workers' class and the labor movement (Wiki)

1)  https://amzn.to/3vXVXcE

2) The Gilded Age by Mark Twain

https://amzn.to/3kxEVg9

3) Bread and Roses

https://amzn.to/3F2bRa5

4) There is Power in a Union

https://amzn.to/3LLCe6o

5) Haymarket Affair

https://amzn.to/3MZUPMD