Moorhead City Election
Mood:  not sure
Topic: Moorhead
He claims that he is the "candidate who believes in protecting your tax dollars" and that"who believes in limiting the size of government". Jim Soncrant. He believes it enough to have stuffed his name and his claims in my mailbox and my door.

Who is he? Why, he is the man who believes in limiting the size of government and protecting tax dollars. Who is he running against?
Well, if you read between the lines, he is running against a person who believes in giving away tax dollars through bloated government.

Wow, this is a guy who I have to vote for! Ideas! This is an idea man.

But what is he going to do? Like most candidates, Jim must want to keep it a secret, or, perhaps he doesn't want his secret plan to get out!

Let's see, limited government, low taxes. Hum, is he going to fire cops? Is he going to ask the chief of police to take a 20% cut in wages? How about the fire department, perhaps we can cut there. Roads, why we could do without snow removal. (Or are we merely going to freeze employee pay and cut benefits?)

Yes, this is a man we have to vote for. Imagine what he can do for us, for the City of Moor head. (And we have to imagine since he has not told us what he is going to do.)

Or is a conservative mantra enough? Tell people what they want to hear, tell them several times, and they will believe.

We certainly would not want Jim to tell the truth: that he has no real ideas, and that he will do the best he can (which is all he can do). No, the Jim's of the world don't get elected that way. They have to tell us about how American they are, or that they are loyal to a certain section of the community, or that they wear red white and blue socks.

There are people who really have ideas, and they have the ability to think. (Jim probably isn't one.) They are not afraid to talk about issues, and they trust the public enough to include the public in their discussions. Yes, there are. (They also make enemies with those who don't want anyone to think.)

Personally, I am not fond of government, nor do I like unfair taxation; but I realize that government and taxation are the cost of civilization. I would be happy to entertain the notion that we need less civilization and that we can find an enlightened tax formula.

A free zone: no cops, no firemen, no doctors, no ambulences, no schools, no jails. Yes, we could significantly cut local taxation if we just cut out a 15 block area and let anyone who lives there do whatever they want to whoever they want, as long as they stay within the neighborhood. Perhaps we could tax them, a city tax, for the privilege of living in the "free-zone". Hum, that might save us 15% and bring in another 10%.

But Jim, you have not sugested a "free zone" and I believe in civilization. All you have suggested is protecting tax dollars and limiting government.

Jim, if you want to modify my perception of an acceptable level of civilization I expect a debate on how and when. If not, don't ask for my vote.

Moorhead Hockey
Mood:  suave
Topic: sports
It starts with a glaze of ice on the windshield and visible exhaust fumes from automobiles. The short sleeve shirts are stored. Friends call to tell you of Arizona and Mexico plans. Winter is coming! Snow shovels, gloves, ten pound coats, a Northwest wind from a Grey Sky, and trees without leaves.

And there is Moorhead hockey. It starts young in Moorhead, as does the high school team. The five year olds are being groomed for the 2017 season. They are not on the ice yet, but the blades are sharpened and the sticks are in the entry way.

The high school team has been attending captains practice all summer. The seniors know that seniors are cut in Moorhead. If skills are similar the senior will be gone. Youth must be served.

The seniors have been threatened with termination since the 2004-2005 season ended. Really, no-one had to tell them. They have fond memories of the seniors who were cut from last years team. One day they were just gone. There was no explanation; their names were just not mentioned. No-one thanked them for thirteen years of participation. They were just gone.

This years seniors have worried their way into weight rooms and onto tracks for six months.

Their "old man" dads have spent their summers worrying too. "What if??" They try not thinking about it, but, "What if?" It has been thirteen years of investing, plotting, celebrating. Thirteen years of making the right friends and attending the right Christmas parties. But, "What is he isn't quite good enough?"

And it all starts in a few days.

"Do you have a back-up stick?" The dad's ask. "Remember, the coach wants to see you back checking. When you shoot concentrate on the net not the goalie."

Football has ended in Moorhead, an ignominious ending to an ignominious season. How can a Moorhead team loss to Fergus Falls, to St. Cloud, and Cambridge--but mostly to Fergus Falls? Over coffee the answer is easy, not enough kids playing football. No depth.

But kids in Moorhead play hockey, forty-nine five year olds start every year. Mom and dad hand them skates and sticks, drive them rink to rink, and cheer every time they touch the puck. Those that started in 1992 are now seniors. And the pressure is on. The pressure is on the parents; the pressure is on the young men. Which will stay, and which will disappear into the waste basket of players and parents who were just not good enough?

The game is about to begin again, the game that began 13 years ago.

The Role of Government
Mood:  party time!
Topic: Our Nation
Are you pro union? Do you want larger union representation? How about government? Do you want more laws, more government employees with more bureaucracies? More taxes to support them?

Angel Johnson works for Wal-Mart. She makes more than minimum wage, a little more. She was hired after she took a personality test that determined that she was no threat to management. If she feels that she is being underpaid she goes to her manager and asks for more money, and if they really want to keep her she gets a raise. NO WAY.

Wal-Mart, like many other companies, doesn't negotiate with employees. The employee is paid what other similarly situated employees are paid, period. Her choices are either to work for Wal-Mart and take what they offer, or go elsewhere.

NO UNION. NO Collective bargaining. The profits go up the pyramid, and those on top, decide what should come down.

But Angel cannot pay her bills. Her rent is $600 a month. (She has a roommate who gets drunk, brings home men, and pays a couple hundred dollars if she has extra.) She has to eat. Even though she drives a $1,200 car that her parents donated to her, the State says she has to have insurance. The car uses a tank of gas a week, then there is the brake problem and the transmission is loose. There is no money for cable television, or Internet access. She does have a cell phone. She has a weakness for shoes.

Angel is looking for a man, any man her age, any man who can help pay the bills. Thoughts of savings, medical expenses, balanced diets don't pass through her head. Escape, entertainment, is a house party with lots of cheap wine and beer.

If sick, if unemployed, if pregnant our government comes to Angel's aid. There is no Union to negotiate with Wal-Mart, all there is is Angel and the government.

There was a time when many in government encouraged the union movement, and they occasionally stood up to the business lobby. Many citizens didn't feel that government should be on the side of either labor, or business.

Angel does not have the ability to negotiate for herself. And the union movement has failed Angel. When profits go up, they do not come down. (And up creates pockets of wealth in corporate and banking centers, leaving the rest of the Country to take care of the Angels.)

Angel has power, but, because of the union movement's failure, it is not through unionization, it is through government. When will Angel wake up? When will Angel look at the clock and realize that time is all she has? When will she decide that she has the right to a living wage, to health insurance, to live in the 21st century? When will her parents vote for their child's right to a lower middle class lifestyle? Perhaps NEVER. NEVER if they keep listening to the voices of wealth, the well financed voices of business think tanks. NEVER.

Success in America
Mood:  blue
Topic: Our Nation
My moods are very Dependant on success, and success is very Dependant on money. I have owned shares of stock, and I still do. When the market is up, I am up, and when the market is down I am down. I know that I am not my money, but "knowing" is not enough.

Failure sat better with me when I was younger, there was time to fail...decades to turn failure into success. Now time has passed. And failure has not been replaced with success.

Does there come a time when we redefine "success"?

There used to be a term in play, "pyramid power". Success was defined as your position on the pyramids you are part of.

When I was young, a 21 year old college graduate, I was on the bottom of every pyramid. At 50 a few men and women are on top of mammoth pyramids: they are governors, they are presidents of national corporations, they are Bishops. Other men and women, at 50, are in the middle of their life pyramids. Then there are people like me, on the bottom...Every morning of every day of my life I have opened my life picture and there I was, living in the bottom tier of the every pyramid I was involved in.

It is not particularly comforting to know that 70-80% of the nations citizens are on the bottom tiers of the pyramids they are involved in. It is not particularly comforting to know that I have enough food to eat, today, or that I am mostly healthy.
No, there is no comfort in knowing.

If I were on top of a pyramid I would believe I deserved all of my success, that I deserved a seven digit yearly salary. I am sure that I would not want to be taxed. "It is all mine. They have no right to my money." And I would not understand why anyone would want a union, or medical benefits. I am the one who made it to the top. I worked for it, and it is mine.

But I am not. And I have worked hard, since I was ten. I delivered newspapers, door to door, and spent my Saturday mornings trying to collect. I worked my way through college. I have unloaded trucks and dug graves. And I want a fair share, not the whole pie, just a piece.

The sun will set this afternoon, and I will go home from work in the dark. I will be sitting at this desk tomorrow morning, before the sun creates a shadow. I am only one of millions of Americans who live on the bottom of pyramids. We are real Americans, collectively we have power, the power to tip the pyramids over. But we don't. Why?