Friday, October 19, 2012

A molded blue plastic Lincoln for my collection from Chicago.


This is the plastic molded Abraham Lincoln in blue.  It was two dollars and so reminded me of the plastic molding machines at the worlds fair in New York. Those machines made plastic dinosaurs for ten cents and I remember I bought one. So while at the former Sear's Tower in Chicago I saw one of those machines and had to have a molded Lincoln in blue.  


The special Lincoln molding machine at the former Sear's Tower. Which is just like the machines at the world's fair of 1965.


Thursday, October 18, 2012

My rant of my time, thoughts of life, government, national and world politics and the presidential election Oct 2012


I have have at times enjoyed ranting or bantering about at things and enjoying at times and perhaps belaboring it as well. But I wanted to talk about my philosophy of my time and thoughts of history as I see it in the month of Oct of 2012.


 I am not one to speak to please, I like to speak as I see things, be it popular or not. If one writes to please while stating what they see, they are really not honest. They are doing their best to be everything which will really amount to nothing.

  I can see that there is great dissatisfaction in the country with its government and its lack of honesty to begin with and its lack of being everything that it was promised to be. Remember change? Well it got lost and the open presidency is very hidden, and all that was to be removed and government red tape was to change. Well it has not. In fact it is much like an extension of the Bush White House in many ways. 
  

I am not sure where this election will go?  I am of the belief that it will be very close. As you have a rather poor president and running against him is another who is not exactly sure what he stands for. Somewhat like a    "Chameleon with Amnesia"    So we stand at a rather bad area of time. I fear if Romney wins there may be riots and political unrest, if Obama wins there will be financial panics due to the bad actions of the last 4 years. So we are between a rock and hard place in this country.

 Neither of the two running is much to speak of. 



As we are progressing through the second decade of the 21st century the world is in rapid change. Change that is not good, change that may cause a massive void between peoples and countries. What is happening in Europe is frightening. The Euro is in trouble. Some countries in Europe are in very bad condition. The Middle East looks like it wants to explode.  What will 2013 bring to that region if not before?  Iran, Iraq, Israel, Egypt, Pakistan, India, and a few more countries are very tense right now. 

 The United States and its prison in Cuba is still there, the lack of and weakening of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights in our society is worrisome. The craziness of the battle over the 2nd Amendment is also troublesome and what to do to educate much of the public what "well regulated" means. 

What about the massive amount of money being printed by the Federal Reserve ?  Being printed to boost the economy, but in its haste is the government reversing the end result? 

 Will money provided by a country in severe debt, be worth that much after a time? One should always remember the term "hyper inflation".  This has happened to other countries and while I am not saying it will happen here, we are very much on a downward spiral economically and will be far further in trouble by the years end. It does not matter who the president is by that point, the current one has done little to help and a new one will not be able to right away.

Historically we are in a rough period of time. The world is wound as tight as an over wound clock. The people of this country are lazier than they have ever been. The economic situation is far worse than anyone wants to admit and it will not be long before the Stock Market goes into a massive correction.  

Where does it all lead?


I often like to ask people about what they read. What I hear is shocking quite often. I would say that 60% of the people I ask have not read a book in years. Nor are they interested in the country or the world around them. I find that perhaps 30% have read a few books here and there and the remaining 10% reads everything they can and looks at the world and the country with questions and comments. 

I have a my list of things that need special attention in this country and should be funded or ways found to fund them, fix them, restore them, or get rid of them.

1. Revamp our education system.

 We are becoming the laughing stock of the world as we drop lower and lower in our scores, our understandings, and how we are taught. I think we should be far harsher in school. Flunk kids who do not pass, expel kids who cause problems, stop this hand holding and other nonsense and trim the budgets on many of the unproductive schools. There are massive amounts of money put into many city schools and the end result is half the kids cannot read or write at a 6th grade level? If kids want to learn, give them the chance, if they could care less put them in a military school and force them to behave and study. It is time we stop being wimps in education and use a few kicks in the ass. Maybe a draft and a 2 year stint in the army is not bad thing. many other countries have it. 

2 MassTransit??????

Where has our mass transit gone?  Why are tons of monies put into special interests, more highways and other useless billion dollars projects?  A good deal of money should be used on improving and restoring our mass transit systems as they were before GM worked hard on destroying them. In fact I think GM should be fined just like any other company that has hurt the public or damaged our infrastructure for what they did in the past. As far as I am concerned GM is as guilty as the tobacco companies, the companies that used hazardous chemicals in the past and now are fined for it, companies that damaged our rivers and lakes and those who knowingly hurt our infrastructure.  Remember it was GM that knowingly destroyed all of the trolley and rail lines that connected all of the towns and cites and replaced them with buses. (made by GM of course) It is shocking but it is still harder to use Mass Transit than it was in 1920!


 Fine them..If they go out of business...some company will buy them and if not unemployment is cheaper than billions for the GM. If we had a decent mass transit system and competing companies we would not need so many cars anyway.  Besides aren't we trying to cut back on cars anyway?  Well screw many other projects and fix the infrastructure and the what we call now "Light Rail Systems"  That is our new word for Trolley. Perhaps everyone is embarrassed by what was done to this country by big business and the creation of the H'way system lobby which amazingly was powered by GM.  Let's think green? or is that just a hollow statement?  Where is the Mass Transportation Lobby ??  Far more important than most others I would say.


If we wish to do as we preach, and use mass transit. There should be a decent mass transit system to be used. I have no problem with using prison labor, unemployed, Welfare, or others and give them work to do and give them a wage while doing it. Lets get this country going again, rather than sitting on our rapidly enlarging asses while Rome burns.

  Fix the problems with labor and mass transit now before it is too late. Remember during the depression we have WPA camps and projects. Why not start that again and give people who are not working a job building up America like they did in the 1930's. It will give them pride in what they do and for the lazy ones, it would get them off their ass.


3. Religion in Government

It is a stupid thing to begin with and has nothing to do with Government at all. If you want trouble put religion in something and it will be more nasty, screwed up, and vicious than most government programs.  Jefferson and Madison were right, a wall of separation is between government and religion. If you need examples, visit the middle east.

4. TERM LIMITS

This is most necessary as we have some of the most useless pieces of humanity in Congress. 2 terms for Senate, 4 for the House of Representatives. If I see another useless old derelict celebrating their 50th year in  the Senate or the House I will scream.

 12 years max for any of them.


  Time to stop the madness of complete power in Washington.  I am also tired of seeing the Senate and much of the house looking like a retirement home. I have nothing against being older, I am.  But I do not want the country run by a bunch of old fogies in their 70's. Countries and ideas deserve new blood, ideas, and the chance to take risks. Old people don't take risks.  Time to go away and write your book about all you didn't do. I think we should have age limits for the Congress and the Senate.  I do not want to see another 100 years old useless Senator who spends most of his time in a hospital keeping him alive.  That is obscene, and derelict of the duties of a public servant.   75 years of age is old enough and time to leave. That is fair and makes sense.

   The average age of the Senate is 63 years.  There are 15 aged 75 and older and the list of 70 up is another big chunk.

The average age of the House is 58 years.  There are a mess of over 75's in there. In fact there is one member who has been in the house for near 50 years.  Good lord time to go home.

5 Supreme Court

I feel that just like the cardinals in Rome there is an age in which you can no longer vote.  I am against the life time appointments of the justice system. Talk about a country club...There you have it. A small group of old men and women (save for a few) who look like they should be playing checkers at the home.  I want a test to see if a justice is still in complete control of their faculties I am also a fan of term limits for them  15 years at max. then get a new one. Otherwise it will stay as it is and not embrace new ideas by young people of 60 years of age. What is  the average age of the Supreme Court?   66 years. That means there are quite a few over that.


6.   POT     

Did we not learn something with prohibition? (1919-1933)  We made liquor illegal and there were all kinds of organized crime figures crossing the borders with booze. The borders were the shores of America. Rum runners like Joe Kennedy who made much of his loot as a drug runner, (the drug was boose) not much different from who is crossing the border now with drugs. So have we not learned anything?  Make it legal and it will kill off the drug runners and the USA can tax it.  Who could ask for more?  Just think a little. That is why we have to get rid of the class of 1935 out of the Congress.  Get more people born after 1960 or later. If we have fresh minds we will have new ideas.  Think  think




These are just a few for my rant right now.  I will write more and annoy some, please others and most probably confuse the rest. 

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

A visit to the William McKinley Tomb and Museum

Here I stand at the entrance to the William McKinley Tomb.  I had been planning to go there for the last 30 years and finally as I was helping a friend move I got the chance.  It was cool to see and it is an amazing structure. It was completed in 1907 and McKinley and his recently deceased wife was moved into it that year. McKinley is a often forgotten President. Yet, he was perhaps one of the more important Presidents in American history. Followed by a near madman who changed the course of human history.

Sadly Theodore Roosevelt took credit for much of what McKinley started or did. It is fitting to see that this monument to McKinley was something that Roosevelt could not steal. It is fitting for the first modern President to be honored so. Remember McKinley was the first President to ride in a car, ride in a subway, use the press on a massive scale, have a press briefing room, pose and use motion pictures and other new technologies for the effect and growth of the office.  He became the first imperial President, started plans for the Panama Canal, acquired vast holdings around the world, made the United States a world power.   To put it bluntly, he made it easy for Theodore Roosevelt to look good. 

It was an honor to see the tomb of this great man.

The view from the entrance to the tomb