OMG

OMG!

Listen or read this!

A television comedian who is best known for dimwitted characters on a television show has won the presidency in Guatemala.

Jimmy Morales won with over 67 percent of the vote.

Here’s the skinny. He’s a political newbie. No experience. His message attacked the political establishment as an outsider. His political slogan was: “Not corrupt, nor a thief.”

Maybe I should be happy for this kind of trend in the world of politics, but I’m not.

Donald Trump!

Maybe you know?

Maybe you know!

What is it about the American electorate that brings obstructionists to Congress? I’m not opposed to differing viewpoints and divergent governmental philosophy as long as one argues their points with facts and courtesy, not with demands, disdain and demagoguery.

What is it about about American’s leadership, local, state and national, that has so much trouble telling the truth?

Distortion is rampant.  The truth is there in facts and experience for all to see, to read, to view, to discover and to ascertain if the self can get rid of believing only what you want to believe?

What it is about so many Americans who refuse to even consider another viewpoint and staunchly defend false statements as true.

What is it about America that a fan of one team can beat up a fan of another team because somebody won or lost a game.

What it is about America that road rage is rampant and killing in a fit of anger is common place.

America is no longer the shining amalgam of cultures, a meld and beacon of intrinsic core values, or a people of compassion and compromise. We are a prejudicial nation with factions seeking to dominate the opposite rank and file seemingly at any cost.

Benghazi is an example. Legislative bickering and governmental inaction is an example. Obama care is an example. The evangelical associations in presidential campaigns are an example. The iconoclastic and fact distortion and maverick campaigns are an example. Super PAC’s pouring money to buy elections are examples. Media distortion is an example. Political self-aggrandizements are examples

If anyone wants to “take back America” to the proverbial “good old days” or even to better days in the future, do so with dignity, compassion, compromise, courtesy, and kindness to the less fortunate and courtesy to the viewpoint of others. Do so with the haunting and echoing words of Emma Lazarus on the State of Liberty. Do so by embracing the benevolent source within each of us that continues the clarion throb of each heartbeat that validates un-conditional love is the only essence of what we are. We just need to remember to be it.

That is AMERICA.

Unintended life lessons

I often ask myself a question at the end of my day. “What did I learn today?”

Sometimes I can’t come up with anything of substance, but that’s because I haven’t been self-observant.

Yesterday I learned two things. One, that a dog’s ability to smell is one-hundred thousand times greater that the human olfactory system. That was an interesting fact from a PBS program.

The other thing I learned came from a story I read about a son having lunch with his aging and infirm father. It was one of those poignant and profound Facebook submissions.

The story tells about the fact that the father was spastic and spilled his food all over himself while seated at a local restaurant. The other patrons were either disgusted or sympathetic. The son ignored the stares and kindly looked after his father. After lunch, the son walked the father to the restroom and cleaned him up, gently straightened his clothes and calmly helped him walk out of the lunchroom.

At the door the father stopped and said loudly, “Did you leave anything behind?”

“No sir.” Replied the son.

“Yes, you did,” the father said as he turned to go out the door.”

“You left a lesson of how a son loves his father.”

The lesson, in this story, whether it’s true on not, is profound. The infirm and the elderly need consideration, compassion and comfort in social situations. For some their inability to function normally is a condition of age or disease, not desire. All of us, family, friends and even public observers need to be aware and realize we are all only a few years away from the same possibility.