Counting my vote

I'll be voting on Tuesday, like millions of others. I'm lucky because I don't live in a "swing" State so I'm not subjected to partisan political presidential propaganda 24/7 which is a big relief. I think it is important to vote, even though I think the system should be reformed so I really feel like my vote counts. Some of the things I am in favor of:

• Full Representation - I don't like the idea that you get all of the electoral votes for a State if you beat the other candidates. You can get less than a majority, if there happened to be three strong candidates, and still walk away with 100% of the electoral votes. In that case, my vote for candidate number 2 or 3 didn't count for anything, except possibly to elect candidate number 1. We saw those kind of things if you accept that Nader voters would have voted for Gore, thereby giving Bush the State. Either get rid of the electoral college or make it more representative of the people's sentiments.
• Ditching the electoral college altogether - It has outlived its usefulness. As heretical as it sounds, our founding fathers were not infallible. The electoral college makes it a strategy game that would be played differently if every vote did count. Perhaps if electoral votes where apportioned like Senators (an equal number for each State) instead of like Representatives (according to population) then we'd have different results and not ignore those less populous States for the California and Texas votes. (Maybe coming from Maine makes me biased.) Or maybe a bicameral electoral college. Hmmm... I think I'm on to something.
• Instant run off voting - It is very difficult to get to a multi-party system of more than two parties when a vote for a third party can result in a vote for the party you don't favor. You end up voting against a candidate rather than for a candidate. A third party probably won't rise to power unless we change something. Being able to vote for your first choice, and also a second choice if that person isn't in the top two, ensure that we will elect presidents with a majority of the vote and therefore the mandate of the people. We will also learn a lot about what people really want by the popularity of third party candidates instead of stifling progressive voices.
• Candidates that are worth voting for - Speaking of stifling progressive voices, why is it everybody (at least everybody I've talked to) feels we could have done better than the candidates we have a choice between. Are these really the two best people in America for the job of president? It is always exciting when the presidential fever starts and there are so many candidates and you hope that this will be the year that a woman or an African American or a Native American breaks through, or at least someone that is different, has convictions, and that makes you think "wow, what a great candidate." It doesn't seem to be about how has the best ideas, but about who has the best chance of beating the person in office. They aren't necessarily the same. Why don't we have Martin Sheen's presidential character, or Mr. Sterling (I loved that show) instead of someone that has to be sold to us through marketing.
• Candidate that stand for something - What do these guys really stand for? You can't come out and say "I stand for the right to choose" because you have to soft-sell your stance to get as many voters as you can. You can't come out and say "I believe in the right to bear arms" because you want to attract gun-control advocates. So you end up giving blathering, pandering responses that don't say anything. "Mr. Candidate, do you believe in the color blue?" "Well, Mr. Debate Moderator, I believe that America is strong, and blue is strong, but not too strong. Red is strong too, and I believe that with strong colors, we can be strong together. I also believe that Iraq is spelled with a 'Q' and that if I am elected, it should still be spelled with a 'Q', which rhymes with blue."
• Voter education in ways that don't involve biased mass media - I haven't figured out how to pull this off, but when the most of what we learn about candidates comes from partisan media outlets, it obviously obfuscates the rheological mien of the nonrepresentational actuality represented by the conciliatory essentia of the largely totemic aspirants as implements of opulence. We need unbiased, popularly available, mainstream sources of information because a democracy relies on educated voters and as long as political parties aspire to control voters rather than inform them, we will not have a democracy "of the people, by the people, for the people." Television and radio networks, newspapers, and magazines should all have disclaimers of their "subjective point of inquiry" as a way of disclosing potential bias. Instead, they have catch phrases like "Fair and Balanced" which mock democracy and critical thinking.

Anyway, that would be a good start. Maybe there should be more radical solutions, too. Vote from home, election week, and voter receipts so would be a start towards enfranchising everyone. Perhaps voting should be a requirement. No vote, no access to government services (like roads, schools, etc). Let's shake it up a bit. If it is unconstitutional, we'll just slap another amendment on there. Whaddyasay?

My Mom - World Series MVP

I'll admit that I am a Yankees fan. That is the result of growing up with a step-brother who worshipped Carlton Fisk and Yaz and talked non-stop about Rico Petrocelli, Fred Lynn and Jim Rice. I started rooting for the Yanks just for spite, and I'm not even a big baseball fan. I loved seeing the Red Sox fail miserably year after year, and I can honestly say it is the only team I really dislike. If the Colts beat the Patriots in the playoffs, I'd probably root for the Colts in the Superbowl with a kind of AFC pride.

So this year is especially disgruntling for me. I don't care that the Yankees didn't get to the World Series. Like I said, I'm not a big baseball fan. The only major sport I care less about is hockey. But for the Red Sox to be so dominating, for them to be the first team to come from a 3-0 deficit, and worst of all to be living in Massachusetts at the time where everyone you run into is talking about "breaking the curse" is just too much.

Not only that, but my wife, who has never really been the biggest sports fan in the world, is getting interested in sports through my enthusiasm. As she learns more, she finds it more interesting. Now SHE is a Red Sox fan. And look at my mother, who never paid any attention to sports when I was growing up. She is now a Personal Care Assistant, so she goes to people's homes to take care of them when they need assistance, sort of like a nurse who makes house calls. She has this one client who she really likes, and he is a Red Sox fan. She would watch the Red Sox while she was at his house, and became a big fan. My mom, the Red Sox fan? I should have known hell was about to freeze over.

So that is why I nominate my mother for MVP, or at least MVF, Most Valuable Fan. They couldn't win a World Series in 86 years. My mother becomes a fan and BAM! They make the St. Louis Cardinals look like a Little League team. I knew she was a powerful woman.

Becoming a Baha'i

How does a man get to be spiritual? It certainly doesn’t seem to come naturally. I think one reason is that we (American society) accentuate and emphasize the material aspect of life. To succeed is to be rich and famous. Another reason is that we (men) are taught to value things like strength, intelligence, and athletic prowess. The idea of submitting your will to God, of admitting your weakness and His strength, is tantamount to admitting that you are not a successful man. It is also because we (scientific people) are supposed to see religion and science as mutually exclusive choices. Evolution or Creation. Pick one. I think the deck is stacked against men, even though men hold most positions of authority in churches.

I have meandered the spiritual path slowly, like a glacier advances during the ice age. I mentioned before that I am married, and in that I have had a lot of practice. This is my third marriage. While going through the process of the first divorce, I accepted God. The emotional trauma of my wife leaving me was so great that the only thing that worked was praying. I had eschewed God to that point, but when she was leaving I was desperate and tried to bargain with Him. “I’ll do anything if you’ll make her stay. I’ll go to church, read the Bible.” It didn’t work. Then I changed my approach. “Please help me have the strength to get through this and the ability to accept whatever happens.” Bingo!!

My counselor at the time said that whatever I was using to deal with this I should bottle it. I was so uplifted, I did the only thing I knew how to do when it comes to religion. I was, after all, raised in the United States. I accepted Christ. I called a friend who was a minister and asked him to come over. He explained the Bible to me, told me about the “Romans Road” and left me a bit more enlightened than I had been to begin with.

Then it hit me. How do I decide which church to go to? Do I go to every one and fill out a little scorecard, choosing the one with the highest score? Hey, wait! What if Christianity wasn’t even the right path? What is up with millions of Muslims, Buddhists, Hindu’s, Jews? If Jews were the chosen ones, why wasn’t I becoming Jewish? I had to figure this out because it was my salvation I was talking about now and I was serious. If each religion believed it was right, how was I to figure this out?

A sixteen year old girl told me how.

During the course of our first conversation, she talked about the idea of “progressive revelation” and how each religion comes from the same God, and each one is a progressive lesson as mankind matures. Abraham taught about belief in one God. Moses taught about obedience to God. Jesus taught about love of God. Muhammad taught about submission to God. And that she was a Baha’i, which meant that she believed that Baha’u’llah, the newest messenger from God, taught about the oneness of humanity.

Not only that, she explained that science and religion should be in harmony, and that there had to be one ultimate Truth, and science and religion should agree about it. Evolution and Creation were not mutually exclusive, but that Creation was a symbolic, not literal, description of what happened. She also talked about “independent investigation of the truth” and the idea that we all had our own responsibility to find our path to God. We shouldn’t just choose our parent’s religion, or blindly accept what someone else, including her, said about a religion.

After six months of investigation, and lots of prayer to God to “guide me to this if it is right and away from this if it is wrong,” I became a Baha’i. Besides, I figured that if I became a Baha’i and found something that made more sense, I’d just become a member of whatever that religion was.

So that was the beginning of my spiritual path. It was like the process of choosing a college. Once I got in, the real work began.

But that is another story.

Separation of Morals and State

I suppose that since the name of this blog is “A Spiritual Man’s Eyes” I should write about an overtly spiritual subject or two. There are so many to choose from. Here are some topics I will be addressing:

• Separation of church and state
• Why people like to say "I'm spiritual, but not religious."
• How so many religions can be fighting about who is right
• Is religion to blame for the world's woes?
• Evolution or Creation?

Let’s start with some separation of steak and eggs for breakfast. Oops, I mean Church and State. The first amendment to the Constitution, in its entirety, states:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

That is all the Constitution says about religion. I totally agree that Congress should not tell us what religion we should choose. I believe in freedom of religion. The Baha’i Faith espouses the idea of “independent investigation of truth” and I understand that to mean that we are all responsible to choose our relationship, or lack thereof, with whatever vision of a Greater Power we have. Not having the government choose it for us is a good thing.

Congress shouldn’t prohibit the free exercise of religion. I totally agree with that; I just don’t agree with the way it is commonly interpreted. Isn’t my ability to exercise my chosen religion inhibited when I can’t pray in school? Taking the first amendment to its extreme like we have, where we prohibit any mention or worship of God, or anything that smacks of spirituality, has the unfortunate side effect of eliminating such essential or beneficial elements of education as morals, virtues, contemplation and meditation.

Why can’t we teach morals in school? I had a conversation about this with a criminology professor. I was saying that the writer we were discussing was basically saying that moral education would help to prevent crime and I thought schools should focus on moral education more than they do. She said she didn’t want anyone imposing their morals on her children. I asked if she thought we could all come up with a common set of morals we could agree on. After all, doesn’t everyone want their child to learn honesty, for example? She said no. There are some times you have to lie. Sigh. People are so afraid that teaching morals is teaching religion. (Why are we so afraid of religion? Tune in next week.) It is the same with meditation. I guess we associate meditation with cults and drugs and hippies or something, but even the Bible uses the word “meditate” fourteen times. And it doesn’t say “Thou shalt not meditate.”

So rather than having everyone running around terrified that they are going to be unknowingly converted to some strange cult, let’s encourage dialog about religion and respect others who believe differently. We can stop fearing that our children are going to hell because someone will convince them to meditate. They are going to hell for entirely different reasons, like sex and drugs and rock and roll.

When separation of church and state turns into separation of morals from government, we end up with corruption, greed, school shootings, rampant crime, and Enron.

Can we all at least agree on respect?

Saving the Children and Corporate Guilt

You know something that really burns my butt? I hate it when people use guilt as a weapon. I also hate the fact that otherwise wonderful people are put in the position of needing to use guilt to get their basic needs met. Let me give you two examples.

The other day I was watching television when an advertisement for the Christian Children’s Fund came on. Now, don’t get me wrong. I believe they are doing important work for exceedingly needy children and families, and a few years ago I came really close to sponsoring a child. It rips my heart out to see the plight of these children. I’m also not the kind that says “go suffer as long as I don’t have to watch it.” Those are my brothers and sisters, my cousins and fellow human beings in that commercial. We are all in this together and if they are suffering, I am suffering.

What gets me is that they have to rely on pictures of crying, destitute babies and children. They have to use pictures of streets with sewage running down it. They have to show a malnourished and sick and suffering child held in a malnourished mother’s arms.

Why are these children suffering? Because much of society believes that dollars are almighty and profits are valued over humanity. Why are farmers paid to let fields lie fallow, pour milk on the ground, and otherwise receive subsidies to not grow crops? Because it would drive the price down to overproduce and there would be no profit. A spiritual solution, one that valued human rights and dignity above dollars, would say grow as much as you can. Don’t worry about market price and growing yourself out of a living wage. You will get the money you need to live, and any excess food and crops will be put to good use. There could be a worldwide clearinghouse of foods and we could treat the human family as one big family. Farmers could take pride in producing to the best of their ability rather than being rewarded for mediocrity and producing only enough to keep a small but profitable supply.

Yes, I think everyone in the world should be guaranteed a living wage, including farmers in the United States and rural inhabitants of Guatemala, where six year old Maria is crying and in need of vaccination and food because her parents can’t find work. The Christian Children’s Fund commercials should be played on BNN, the Billionaires News Network. If the bottom 80% of the US population has only 7.8% of the wealth (as of 1992) then why are we (I’m certainly in the bottom 80%) the ones that are being appealed to? We are the ones that can least afford it.

Another example of this economic injustice is the letter I got from my niece. Their school is selling magazine subscriptions to raise money. The appeal is a little pink and white form that is addressed in her handwriting. It is very well crafted so that all young school-children can fill it out for maximum chance at tugging heartstrings and helping us feel the need to give to a good cause. It is addressed in her handwriting. It also says that the school or group can keep 40 cents of every subscription dollar. I’d rather send the school a check for $20 than have to buy $50 worth of magazines for them to get that $20. Besides, I think most magazines are ill-disguised collections of advertisements.

Don't you think it is ridiculous that one of the most vital aspects of our society, education, is in such dire need of funding that we need to have our children use guilt as a tactic to raise money, much of which goes to increase circulation of magazines that use that increased circulation to demand higher prices for running ads. We should be paid for being subjected to advertisements. If it said that they schools kept 80 cents on the dollar, maybe you'd have me writing a check because I'd feel it was more than a feeble marketing attempt with child labor.

I guess a third example would be the advertisement from Wal-Mart that showed these hard-working school kids doing odd jobs to earn money so they could buy things to donate to those in need. Of course they were expected to go to Wal-Mart to spend this hard earned money. That means more profits for Wal-Mart. Why doesn’t Wal-Mart just donate the goods?

Ultimately the reason they try to use guilt on us is that we are still capable of feeling guilt. ‘Nuff said.

Let's talk about Stuff

Well, a little hope on the job-hunting front and a desire to add something that readers may have an opinion about prompts this little foray into politics and economics.

I've been looking for a job since roughly March. I have a background in computer consulting, and back a few years ago I could get so many job offers simply by posting on Monster.com that I used to do it just for the shot in the ego I'd get. Now, I not only don’t get job offers, I'm not even getting calls to do phone interviews. At this point I enjoy getting "thanks but no thanks" letters because success is relative and it tells me that they at least read enough of my resume to get the return address from it. I don't have a degree so I'm sure my resume is being tossed out and not even getting to those that would be duly impressed with what I've done. Can you say "screening?"

What we have is a glut of over-educated, over-certified computer geeks competing for an increasingly small number of jobs. It is a buyer's market. Why is it a buyer's market? Well, we had the dot.com bust, spilling programmers into the streets where you could buy one, get two free. We have an economy that is stagnant despite the spin on Fox News. For example, look at the unemployment rate. Why is the unemployment rate so low? Because of the way they don't count it. :-) I am not counted in unemployment figures since I am not collecting unemployment benefits. I am not eligible. I am unemployed. I don’t count.

I am also not eligible for food stamps (yet) since I had retirement accounts from my previous life as a fairly-well-paid software engineer type. Well, that will be over soon since I've had to cash in those 401K's despite hefty penalties just to pay bills. It sucks staring into the abyss of poverty feeling like your ticket is punched and you are strapped in, ready to return to the land of your childhood fears. (Remind me to tell about that at a future date.)

Why is this all happening? Believe me, I'm not whining. There are people in a lot worse situations than I am. I am not yet limited to going to the public library to write this blog. I haven't had to sell my computer for food yet. Give me a couple of months, though...

Anyway, what we do have is rich white guys getting richer. If you think Stephen King is scary, you should read Harold R. Kerbo. Read Social Stratification and Inequality and you'll not see the world the same way again. I'm sure there are tons of tomes that cover the subject, but I have this one and it is well-written, fact-filled, and comprehensive.

A little illustration will show what I’m saying. (I’ll be creating the child’s pop-up book soon.)

The Story of Stuff

There was a little letter called G. He was born to a letter family that had lots of “stuff,” lived in a “stuffy” area, and went to private schools with other stuffy letters of the alphabet. He had no idea that most people did not have stuff. He was taught that his family worked hard for their stuff, and if everyone else worked hard, they too would collect stuff. We'll call that the American Dream.

G’s private schools prepared him for life at elite colleges. Does this mean that he learned all the hardest subjects, excelled at his studies? No, it means he learned the important things, like networking, and privilege, and entitlement, and belief in The System of Stuff Gathering. Now he met other stuffy letters, and when one of them got a chance to collect stuff, they’d be sure to call their friends and connect them with Opportunity to Gather Stuff. Of course, he understood that if others had that opportunity they could do as well, or even better, than G. It never occurred to G that others didn’t have that opportunity.

Some of these letters went on to be Politicians. Some went on to be Lawyers. Some went on to be CEO’s and COO’s and other combinations of letters. Some did all three. You can collectively consider them Stuffers. Then the Stuffers said “Boy, we had to work hard to collect this stuff. Why don’t we just make it easier to do this, so our stuff won’t go away?” So they started using The System to their advantage, and fine-tuning it to include a secret fast-track to success. All you had to know was the code words to get in, and you too could be a multi-millionaire. (By the way, the code words were “interlocking directorate” and “hegemony” and “the term ‘class warfare’ is a big stick to beat malcontents with.”) After all, the people that created The System were just like G. Rich white guys with stuff who now have streets and towns and states named after them. You know, you see them all the time when you buy and sell your micro-stuff. They knew exactly what they meant when they said “All men are created equal.” First of all, women aren’t men. Second of all, if you don’t own stuff, you can’t be a man. Third of all, if you are owned by someone else, you can’t be a man.

G agreed with this, in a newer, more enlightened sort of way. Women can be men. And nobody owns anybody anymore. So that means stuff, especially macro-stuff (which is bigger than a breadbox), is everything. The haves and the have-mores. Those that understood this veered The System in that direction, since they were steering it, so that those that owned stuff could collect more stuff and had more say about how stuff was distributed and how much control over stuff the government could have. Meanwhile, they told everyone that if you worked hard, all this stuff could be yours. Just look at that person that won the lottery, or came from nowhere to write that best-seller, or sang the song that everyone liked, or starred in the movie that everyone saw, or shot a basketball like nobody else. They made it, you can too. America is the land of the free and the home of the stuff. We are free to collect the stuff and so are you.
People agreed, because they heard everywhere that stuff was the goal. Schools taught it. Not elite schools. They taught how to get the stuff. These were public schools. The media also taught it. Never mind that the media is stuff that is owned by the Stuffers.
Let’s recap. We are in a race to get stuff, where there is very little stuff floating around that we might latch onto. We are taught that success means becoming a Stuffer. Those with the best stuff-catching ability are the Stuffers. Stuff catching then becomes a competition among stuffers for market-share, but that is a gentlemen’s game where they all work together to make sure nobody else becomes a stuffer because even being a little stuffer is better than not being a stuffer at all. Besides, competing against a stuffer is honorable. Competing against someone that doesn't respect stuffing isn't. Once you get stuff, the goal is to hide it so others don’t know how much stuff you have. (The best place to hide it is overseas or in a tax shelter or behind Bill Gates’ stuff.)

That is the story of stuff, whose moral is: If you find something, stuff it.

House 2: The Second Story

If that isn't one of the most clever names for a movie, I don't know what is.

Since today is blog day and I'm tired and have some time on my hands, I'm going to share "a few of my favorite things." This is more of my personal backstory so that people will be impressed by my appreciation for wit and feel like they've known me all their lives.

Top websites:

1. Internet Movie Database http://www.imdb.com - If I could only ever visit one website again for the rest of my life...
2. Gibraltar Encyclopedia of Progressive Rock http://www.gepr.net - This would be a very close second. It isn't as all-inclusive as IMDB, though.
3. Amazon http://www.amazon.com - Not just a commercial site, I use it for research (what books has Philip K. Dick written) and it is my free version of Consumer Reports.
4. An Introductory Baha'i Faith page http://www.us.bahai.org/ - A good introduction if you've never heard of it.
5. CBS Sportsline http://cbs.sportsline.com - As a passionate New England Patriots fan (I was there when they went 1-15) and a New York Yankees fan and general fan of good sportsmanship, I check this site nearly every morning with my glass of OJ.

Favorite movie quote - "Dyin' ain't much of a livin'." From The Outlaw Josey Wales.

Some favorite movies

• Les Miserables (with Richard Jordan and Anthony Hopkins)
• Citizen Kane and Dr. Zhivago
• Children of Heaven and Colour of Paradise
• Supercop, Fist of Legend, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and Hero
• Butterfly Effect, 12 Monkeys, and Pi
• Whale Rider
• Big Trouble in Little China
• The World According to Garp and The Dead Poet's Society
• The Lord of the Rings trilogy (Peter Jackson's vision is awesome!)

Favorite musical groups

• Savatage and Dream Theater
• Spock's Beard and Flower Kings
• Evanescence
• Barrage (original Canadian cast)
• Tangerine Dream
• Gentle Giant and Echolyn

And I'll end this before it gets too crazy. Just a few things I'd like to do before I shuffle off to the next world.

• Travel on the Trans-Siberian Railway (actually the one that goes through Mongolia)
• Meet Steve Grogan
• Visit the Baha'i temple in India http://bahaindia.org/temple/bahapur.html
• Figure out what I want to be when I grow up

In the Beginning...

So here it is. Day one. Hello blogworld.

Gosh, in two lines I've already included literary allusions to programming and religion. That should give you a hint of where we are going to go with this.

Why am I blogging? Because I have things to say that I can't keep to myself. Because I can't be the only one that looks at the world the way I do and I'm looking for those kindred spirits. Or at least those willing to entertain alternative views of this world we share. To practice writing creatively, wittily, and insightfully.

And to become famous, like Wil Wheaton. :-) http://www.wilwheaton.net/

I guess the best place to start this endeavor is with my "subjective point of inquiry" so y'all know where I'm coming from.

I'm a pretty smart guy, married with no children (yet) and I'm a Baha'i. The journey from intellectual to spiritual has been fraught with lessons, pitfalls, and amazing moments of clarity and wonder. I'm sure I'll share many of them because I am a very open person who loves connecting to people on more than superficial levels.

I love progressive, world, new age and some classical music and never listen to commercial radio and popular music. Love independent, Chinese and Iranian films, dislike Hollywood blockbusters and formulaic movies.

I think the world is getting to be better, if you look in the right places. That is what I'll be trying to do. I have been a computer geek for most of my life and still have a passion for programming, but I'm looking to move away from computers to more people-centered work. That is why I want to lock myself in a room alone and write for a living, right? :-)

I believe, honestly, that everyone is my equal and that everyone is a valuable human being. I also know that I live in a racist society and I have baggage that I have collected from family, society and media. I am trying to eradicate and acknowledge anything that keeps me from acknowledging my spiritual identity and my ability to show love and acceptance to others. Things like white privilege and a hegemonic education that tells us that Columbus discovered the "New World."

So I hope to shine the light in places others may not have looked. I hope to show that you can be spiritual AND religious and still be fun to hang around with. I hope to show that men don't have it all and that what they do have keeps them from fulfillment as spiritual beings.

Ultimately, I hope once in a while to get emails from people that say "Hey, I never thought of that."

To leave you with one observation, I was having lunch with my wife at that cafeteria where she is attending grad school. She got a bottled water, the kind with the Yada Yada College Natural Spring Water label on it. Since I am a big Poland Spring water fan (nothing I've tasted comes close) I wanted to see where it came from.

Spring source: PO Box 16, Willington CT 06279.

Honest, that is what it said. Don't say I didn't warn you.