I don’t understand all the fuss that Catholic universities and hospitals are raising over providing health care for women that includes mandatory birth control provisions. Why not let “Practicing Catholics” follow the teachings of their church to “opt out” for the coverage, while permitting non-Catholics what doctors and women’s groups say is a health benefit?  Continue reading
Tag Archives: Occupy Wall Street
We the People, not We the Corporations
“Corporations are People, my Friend”
Well, if you trace the history of something called corporate “personhood,” you can blame this inglorious recognition on an unelected clerk writing a summary of a court decision that never actually decided this issue.  Continue reading
Newt, a big-headed, brain-bloated bully
Newton Le Roy Gingrich is a big-headed, brain-bloated bully who is best understood if you picture what kind of kid he might have been and remember why you disliked him and his sophomoric antics while growing up. Continue reading
My life is dependent on the rest of you
I am as dependent on you as you are on me, as we all are on the kindness and labor of others we too often take for granted.
As I look around, I see that my fortune is dependent on the cooperation and contributions of others. Continue reading
‘Right to Work’ — now a State of our Union
I’m a union man. Even though I held but one adult job as a dues-paying member, I will always be a union man. Why? Because I believe it’s the truly right path for the working man to walk.
A noble banker needs to occupy here
Is there a noble banker in the world? Only someone in the lending business who sees his calling as a “service for the people,” I believe, could correct past abuses and recommend changes for, and in the best interests of, us “99 percenters.”
A Message to all of the ’99 Percenters’
“This is what you shall do; Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families,
“Let’s Occupy a Vital Earth” — (L.O.V.E.)
Let’s Occupy a Vital Earth!
Try it on.
See if it fits and whether you’d be comfortable in adopting it when the Occupation of Wall Street and the protest at a thousand other locations worldwide come to an end.
And end it will, with nothing to commemorate it save historians remembering in their books the greatest mass demonstration since Abraham protested the Tower of Babel. 
And just like Babel, this rising up will fall into ashes, unless we harness the spirit from this “cry in the wilderness” and put it into action. An action that is both “for” and “against” the economic system we work in, if we’re lucky enough to have a decent job to work.
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How Can We Do This?
- — Simply by creating a group of conscientious citizens to recommend improving the economic lot of mankind. Form a committee from a variety of backgrounds whose principal task would be to monitor human affairs from a perspective of ethics and morality. Join religious, political, and scientific people together with bankers, artists, lawyers, and environmentalists. Recruit poets, academics, and writers and set their task to devise a system of commerce that encourages profits but inhibits the destructive competitiveness that places the pursuit of money above all other desires, above all other values.
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The wealthiest and most powerful nations understand that you cannot neglect basic human values. The Ninety-Nine Percenters are reminding them they need to change. They should accept a universal responsibility for the common good and the social contract they have with not only the less fortunate, but those of us with some economic security, who know deep inside what the One Percent is doing must end.
Like-Minded People Coud Benefit Humanity
Once recommendations are made, the Committee would send its ideas to splinter groups of like-minded persons in each city, state, and country whose citizens could benefit from implementations. Publicize the names of banks, savings and loans and institutions that begin to comply with the voluntary suggestions. Let those with capital decide where to put their investments to perhaps take in less profit but give much more back to those who helped us with our gains.
L.O.V.E. — that and good old-fashioned compassion will help in the pursuit of happiness, while relieving suffering for others.
Try it. It may Grow on You.
Advice to any & all Wall Street operatives
- “We all dream of a kinder, happier world. But if we wish to make it a reality, we have to ensure that compassion inspires all our actions. This is especially true with regard to our political and economic policies. Given that probably half the world’s population lacks the basic necessities of adequate food, shelter, medical care, and education, I believe we need to question whether we are really pursuing the wisest course in this regard.  Continue reading
Wall Street never profits anyone’s soul
The phone rang, and Henry Rushing answered it, hoping the call would not delay his weekly trip to church services Sunday morning. The pastor of his Presbyterian Church was on the line. “Henry, you’ve got to prepare yourself,” the cleric said in his most comforting voice. “There are demonstrators outside our building protesting. Their signs have your name on them, and they’re not too charitable with what they’re alleging.” Continue reading
These are the True Signs of Our Times!
When I read the Occupy Wall Street demonstrators were unfocused and without a coherent message, I took a closer look at them in Philadelphia, and discovered some were disheveled street persons looking for handouts, and one was a graduate school political science major spouting Marxist teaching.
They Represented Only One Percent.
The remaining 99 percent of the other protestors were mostly young, highly educated, unemployed or underemployed men and women who got tired of the debt-ceiling fiasco and took to the streets to mobilize against the Tea Party followers.  Continue reading
“For the Signs, they are a ‘Changing'”
(From Part I, These are true signs of our Times/)
The greatest protest of our generation is seeking change in all shapes and sizes. You can see it in the signs the demonstrators carry, writing the letters out really big with magic markers so that passersby need not squint to get the messages.
There is not just one message, but many, which all have one thing in common: a belief that our world can do better for all and not just the few, the ninety-nine percent making $55,000 a year (per family) or less, as opposed to the one percent controlling some 40 percent of the wealth in the United States of America.
They don’t want your money, Mr. Entrepreneur, only your attention for a moral and ethical way of life that takes into consideration more than the Almighty Dollar.  Continue reading
End needless suffering in US debates
Tone it down, America. You are cutting off your nose to spite your face. The face of the body politic, that is, we are creating needless hurt for the countrymen we’d like to lead to our mutual goal: the pursuit of happiness.  Continue reading
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