A cute article from Monique Fields at TheRoot.com called Waking Simone.

Seeing Obama, “the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas,” on television, giving a speech about where he plans to take this nation would be a memorable moment. I’d like to give my daughter, whose mother is black and whose father is white, the opportunity to tell others she was awake that night when history was made.

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If Obama wins, it may take years, decades even to see the effect it will have on the generation that has yet to be bestowed a name. Simone may remember the evening of Nov. 4, 2008, or maybe she won’t, but she won’t have the opportunity if I let her sleep through it.

We approach January 2009 and a new Presidential adminstration in the United States.  Soon it will be time to look back at the last eight years of government and evaluate it.  Here is a view from the movie “The U.S. vs. John Lennon” (2006):

“Lennon was somebody who was a born enemy of those who govern the United States.  He was everything they hated.  So I just say he represented life and was admirable.  And Mr. Nixon… and Mr. Bush represent death.  And that is a bad thing.”

- Gore Vidal, Author/Historian

From http://67.192.60.212/node/1064

Obama and the Palin Effect

In the book “Tales From Q School” author John Feinstein tells the story of disabled pro golfer Casey Martin. Casey filed a lawsuit against the PGA Tour in order to allow him to use a golf cart during golf tournaments under the Americans With Disabilities Act. Casey has a degenerative disease in his leg called Klippel-Trenaunay-Weber syndrome that makes it impossible for him to walk a golf course. The case PGA Tour v. Martin ended up in front of the US Supreme Court.

Here are some Casey Martin quotes from the book:

“I grew up a dyed-in-the wool conservative Republican.”

“To tell the truth, the Republicans really disappointed me. I’ll be completely honest and tell you I was appalled by the positions taken by Justice [Antonin] Scalia and Justice [Clarence] Thomas. I just think they’re completely heartless. Bob Dole was the exception, but his experience was like mine-he’d been through it, knew what it felt like to be handicapped. I remember going on Bill O’Reillys show and walking away thinking, ‘This guy is a complete schmuck.’ It pains me to say it, but most of the people who showed compassion for me, who seemed to want to help out the downtrodden, were Democrats. I came away from the experience with a lot of different feelings on a lot of different subjects.”

“Heck, if it had been someone else in my shoes and I was just an observer, I’d probably have been one of the those guys saying, ‘He can’t have a cart. If he can’t walk, get him out of there.’ But I wasn’t. I was the guy living it. That made me rethink a lot of things, like just as an example, how I thought about welfare. I couldn’t help but wonder if I was the one living that life, I might feel differently on that subject, too. I found myself looking at things through a different lens.”

The Spiritual Importance

Compassion for others is a prime element in developing our own consciousness.  Without increased cooperation and compassion for others, the human race is going to have a very difficult time in the very near future.

The Man in the Arena

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.

Shame on the man of cultivated taste who permits refinement to develop into a fastidiousness that unfits him for doing the rough work of a workaday world. Among the free peoples who govern themselves there is but a small field of usefulness open for the men of cloistered life who shrink from contact with their fellows. Still less room is there for those who deride or slight what is done by those who actually bear the brunt of the day; nor yet for those others who always profess that they would like to take action, if only the conditions of life were not what they actually are. The man who does nothing cuts the same sordid figure in the pages of history, whether he by cynic, or fop, or voluptuary. There is little use for the being whose tepid soul knows nothing of the great and generous emotion, of the high pride, the stern belief, the lofty enthusiasm, of the men who quell the storm and ride the thunder. Well for these men if they succeed; well also, though not so well, if they fail, given only that they have nobly ventured, and have put forth all their heart and strength. It is war-worn Hotspur, spent with hard fighting, he of the many errors and the valiant end, over whose memory we love to linger, not over the memory of the young lord who “but for the vile guns would have been a soldier…”

To say that the thriftless, the lazy, the vicious, the incapable, ought to have the reward given to those who are far-sighted, capable, and upright, is to say what is not true and can not be true. Let us try to level up, but let us beware of the evil of leveling down. If a man stumbles, it is a good thing to help him to his feet. Every one of us needs a helping hand now and then. But if a man lies down, it is a waste of time to try to carry him; and it is a very bad thing for every one if we make men feel that the same reward will come to those who shirk their work and to those who do it.

New Jersey Mom Changes Yemin with Blog

The internet has the ability to profoundly affect the world in a positive way when a lot of people tune in. Thoughts affect the consciousness. And consciousness affects reality. See “A Living-Room Crusade via Blogging” By Robert Worth.

BEIRUT, Lebanon — Jane Novak, a 46-year-old stay-at-home mother of two in New Jersey, has never been to Yemen. She speaks no Arabic, and freely admits that until a few years ago, she knew nothing about that strife-torn south Arabian country.

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And yet Ms. Novak has become so well known in Yemen that newspaper editors say they sell more copies if her photograph — blond and smiling — is on the cover. Her blog, an outspoken news bulletin on Yemeni affairs, is banned there. The government’s allies routinely vilify her in print as an American agent, a Shiite monarchist, a member of Al Qaeda, or “the Zionist Novak.

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Also read or listen to the On the Media report about Jane Novak from June 15, 2008. On the Media called Jane “Erin Brokovitch meets Lawrence of Arabia.” Jane’s website is armiesofliberation.com and her blog is janenovak.wordpress.com (Check out the theme. Does it look familiar?)

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Another way to direct consciousness to affect the world is to use celebrity status. See “Jenny McCarthy uses her celebrity to promote autism awarness” from Heath Beat 2008. She has a son diagnosed with autism that is no longer considered autistic and has written a book and planning a march to raise awareness. Unfortunately there already is a pseudo-religious group getting jacked into celebrities and taking all the good ones to promote a different agenda.

Senator Suggests Need for New Party

…the Iraq war might be remembered as one of the five biggest blunders in history.

“a reckless foreign policy … that is divorced from a strategic context.”

“the triumph of the so-called neoconservative ideology, as well as Bush administration arrogance and incompetence.”

Hagel said Vice President Dick Cheney and others “cherry-picked intelligence” and used fear to intensify “war sloganeering.”

During visits to the Middle East in December 2002, Hagel said, Israel’s top security officials asked, “Do you really understand what you are getting yourselves into?”

An idea whose time has come?

 From Digging In the Right Place by David Sirota.

In a move making health care lobbyists quiver, Washington state Sen. Karen Keiser (D), chairwoman of her legislature’s powerful health committee, this week introduced the nation’s most far-reaching universal health care proposal. Her legislation is the American West’s version of a parallel Wisconsin initiative, and the replication suggests this model may begin building the universal health care system our country wants.

The plan is simple: Employers and employees pay a modest payroll tax in exchange for full medical benefits, with no premiums. Patients never lose coverage and pick the doctors they prefer. And for the spendthrifts, here’s the best part: According to an analysis of the Wisconsin proposal by the nonpartisan Lewin Group, the plan would save middle-class families an annual average of $750 on their existing health care bills. In all, the state would save almost $14 billion over the next decade.

The New Year in the United States brings another Presidential election. Significant because three of the last four Presidents have served the two term limit maximum of eight years. I see two problems that prevent us from selecting the best possible government. I believe the current format of head-to-head debates used in Presidential elections highlights memorized arguments and showmanship instead of service record, voting record, stated positions, and follow through on stated positions. Secondly, I believe many voters suffer from a lack of knowledge about the individual candidate’s resume, history, voting records and stated positions.

I will my contribution to the fray to floating two simple ideas derived from the out of print and little known Marc Steigler book David’s Sling (Baen Books, 1988). I recommend you purchase a used copy and read the book.

My first idea is to use a process similar to the book to find answers to problems the government faces, and to help us find the best possible person to lead the administrative branch of the next government.

The book David’s Sling is about living in the information age. The main social force in the book is a humanitarian institute appropriately named The Zetetic Institute.

From The Free Dictionary - Zetetic

a. 1. Seeking; proceeding by inquiry.
Zetetic method
(Math.) the method used for finding the value of unknown quantities by direct search, in investigation, or in the solution of problems.
- Hutton.
n. 1. A seeker; - a name adopted by some of the Pyrrhonists.

In the book, the fictional Zetetic Institute trains people to make the best possible decisions; and they also teach a successful class but also fictional on quitting smoking.

To see a longer quote from the book, see windsofchange.net

The Institute recognized three broad classes of decisions, and three broad methods of decision-making: engineering decisions, political decisions, and unresolvable decisions….

Zeteticism had recognized an important truth: the choice between politics and engineering is always an engineering decision. The decision duel technique made its most important contributions on issues that looked and tasted political, but were actually engineering decisions at heart.

The information decision duel is a fascinating literary device that I haven’t found in the real world. Basically it is a moderated, open book, high school debate on computers. Each duel seeks to find the best answer to an important question. An appropriate person (duelist) is selected to champion each of the two points of view. The duels are broadcast in real time to the country (I assume on the internet). The viewing public sees their screen divided into three sections. One section for each of the two duelists, and one section for the moderator, in the center. Each duelist lists there arguments on the their side of the screen.

Moderators are trained by the institute to recognize the types of arguments and decision making. The moderator uses a colored light pen to point out the arguments. Each argument is circled with a color. The specific color indicates the specific type of argument.

See Evaluating Arguments: Two Helpful Concepts for more information.

An arrow indicated where the other duelist refutes an argument. Also the duels are open book. Anyone watching can send a message (an email I presume) to either duelist adding information or arguments that may prove useful to finding the best possible answer.

My second idea is the creation of an information era page to sort, hold, summarize and detail the pertinent information about each elected official in our government and each candidate for elected office. A large task, no doubt; perhaps Google could handle it.

So when you sit down at there computer and decide to check on your government or the next election, you can, with a few clicks of the mouse. You go to www.somewherenotyethere.gov and enter your zip code. Up pops a tree that starts with your local city council and mayor and leads all the way up to the President of the United States. During election years, elections are highlighted. All candidates get equal space. There is a bio, resume, voting record and position papers for each candidate, along with an executive summary for people who just want the highlights.

The site is moderated so that it is not just propaganda. Each candidate is allowed a link to their own personal website where they can publish anything they desire.

The cornerstone of the web site is position papers; a sort of Monroe Doctrine for each of preselected set of issues (e.g. immigration, health care, taxation, size of government, the war in Iraq, etc.). Each candidate can submit their position paper on each issue. Over time, Moderators grade each candidate on how closely their actual performance in office matches their stated positions. Candidates are allowed to change their positions but each change is noted and highlighted.