Take that frown off your face

Everyone strives their whole life to find happiness. What makes people happy? Is it sensory pleasure, satisfied desires. freedom from sorrow and pain, employment, a life of leisure, luck, money, goodness or is it a accident of biology? I think I was born with it. I've been happy my whole life, nothing ever rattles my cage very much. I'll even be willing to bet that as a baby I was happy and cheerful before I could crawl or walk and never got mad when I was passed from one adult to another.
The Declaration of Independence staked out the pursuit of happiness as an unalienable right. Even with that sacred right to happiness some people seem crabby all the time. The crabby ones always feel their pursuit of happiness is somehow thwarted, never realizing the Declaration of Independence only gives the right to pursue happiness. You have to catch it yourself.
People who are born with happiness know that happiness is not about feeling good, it's about being good. If I were to base my happiness on a few trinkets or the desire to have what my neighbors have, my happiness would have to be postponed until I got to heaven. I wonder if I knew that fact as I lay in my crib? I must have decided to skip the crabby thing and just get on with happiness as soon as possible.
I am biological lucky when it comes to happiness, never thinking of the things I have not gotten. Most people work so hard at achieving happiness they become crabby then death steps in and stops them before they complete their futile pursuit of happiness. Working harder to make more money to buy more things produces only temporary happiness.
I am happy today because I never tried to control it and realized long ago I would never be able to will it. I take the good with the bad without much fan fair for either. That sure sounds like a gift from God, a biological event for sure.

I want a raise

Many Democrats and Republicans are pushing to raise the minimum wage from it's current $5.15 a hour. What is the right minimum wage? Will raising the minimum wage by a substantial amount price the working poor people out of the job market?
Some will argue that the minimum wage is an ideal whose time has passed, while others see it as a must. A big increase will cause everyone to pay higher prices on goods and services. Is that a worthwhile price to pay? The increase in the minimum wage will help only a few of the people it is thought to help and will help them only a little while hurting some of them a lot.
When the government raises wages it does not guarantee jobs, it only guarantees that jobs will be paid at least a set minimum. Employers might see a $2.15 raise as a reason for judging each employee on his or her productivity, are they really worth $2.15 an hour more? If a $5.15 an hour employee is producing the same amount of work as he would be at $7.25 an hour the employer might try to get the production from three $5.15 a hour employees out of two $7.25 a hour employees ,thus one person would lose his or her job. The minimum wage does not make employees automatically more productive. Employers who must pay higher wages always look for other ways to be compensated. The cutting of non wage benefits, working labor harder or by cutting training all come into play.
The doing more with less will cost some to lose their jobs.
I can not agree that raising the minimum wage is a targeted policy for reducing poverty. The proposed raise translates to around $300 gross a month, such an amount will not raise a family of four out of poverty. If all the do gooders of the world think it will they need to wake up! This is not the do gooders benevolence at work, it's only their greed to fill their self worth. I just want all you do gooders to remember that everything you you do, everything you buy, everyplace you go is going to cost you more when and if the government raises the minimum wage. The cost of your self worth is going up!

My Way

There are two themes that underline the current crisis in Lebanon. One is the tendency of the military mind to set policy both in Israel and in militant Islamic organizations and the other is the danger of fundamentalism. Islamic fundamentalism, which views the Middle East as a region for Muslims only. That view threatens to convert the Israeli-Arab conflict into a religious one with no room for compromise. Jewish fundamentalism, which views their victory in 1967 as miraculous allowing the belief their cause is preordained in the march to salvation. Christian fundamentalism, the simplistic view of the world which divides everything and everyone into good and evil with very little room for nonviolent resolution or compromise. All three fundamentalism have one view in common,"It's my way or die"
An international brokered cease fire would be the first step to stabilizing the situation. A cease fire would lead to political steps that would insert a credible international force on the Israeli-Lebanese border. Only when both of these events happen will the world be able to return to dealing with the region's real problem that of the Israeli-Palestinian vision of a two state solution

It's a personal thing

A couple of years ago I started blogging as a means of selfexpression. It has always been a hobby not once considering it to be journalism. Never owning or using a computer until my late 40's you sure can't call me a digital native. Even today I am not addicted to instant messaging or social networks. I am more apt to write about the President's policies than the drama at last night's party. The things I write about don't tend to have a lot of impact. The motivation comes from within, it tends to be very personal never implying I can change the world. Most of what I write is for my own benefit not for an audience. Posting to a blog helps me stay in touch with friends and family by documenting life experiences and thoughts through creative expression. I write about different subjects but mostly about myself just as most bloggers do. Bloggers trend to be a creative bunch and blogs are as individual as the people who write them. A hard core geek I am not but I don't need to be. Today everybody's got a printing press enabling a variety of people to write about a variety of subjects and that's a good thing for our culture.