Memoirs from Mid-Town

For the People

2009-10-16T12:27:00.000-07:00

I was listening to the radio and a tax break for pets came up similar to tax breaks for human dependents. I love it when I hear politicians and pundits talking about tax breaks and the politician or pundit asks the question, "How are we going to afford this?" or "Where is the money going to come from for this?". Isn't that my problem, not yours? I have a simple answer, it comes from MY paycheck that I worked at MY job by waking up to an alarm clock every morning at 6am. YOU don't have to pay for anything when I keep more of MY money.

In the Wednesday Wall Street Journal there was a story about eminent domain and the new Nets stadium. Apparently a developer is asking a city government to use it's eminent domain authority to take home owner's land and give it to the investors to use for stadiums and parking lots. This is not for a highway, railroad tracks, airports, or even a hospital. It is a sports arena. This is going to the supreme court for appeals I believe. Why were the land owners not allowed to ask their own price, or better yet lease their property to the investors? Those same land owners will have to pay for tickets to get into a stadium that was built on property that was taken by the government for the "public good" where the public will have to pay to use it. Where are the original owner's rights to lease their own property or sell their property for whatever they feel like selling it for. There are those who will argue that this will bring in more taxes for the city and that equates to public good. Well, if the owner of the original property pays taxes and the new owner will pay more taxes and thus the right to take the land from the lower taxed person and give to the higher taxed individual we now have arrived at the essence of the problem of government today...the public exists to provide for the government and those who run it. This is the opposite of the government existing to serve the people who are created equal, therefore the current philosophy that we take from one class to give to another class based on preference versus what should be the philosophy of taking from people to provide for all people equally according to justice, truth, and righteousness. This is OK for those resigned to believe that our government is unjust and that we are no different from the rest of the world. For those who believe that America is an OASIS of freedom and civility in the world, the transformation of the US government from servant to a subjugator of masses is a tragedy to the whole world, not just Americans. Where is there left to go now?

Pwr2People
Good Day

Nobel Peace Prizes (AKA: Democrat President of the Year Award)

2009-10-09T08:42:00.000-07:00

Congratulations President Obama. You have now joined the ranks of Jimmy Carter and Yasser Arafat. I suspect President Clinton would have gotten one too if it wasn't for that whole impeachment fiasco. They committee learned it's lesson I suspect and got it out of the way early for this president so they can claim ignorance when the inevitable scandals come to light for Obama. What scandals? He's a democrat president from Chicago with two years at best of Senate history and worked as a lawyer for Acorn, just wait.
Has this further diminished the importance of a Nobel Peace Prize? I can remember as a youth when it seemed these were a pretty big deal. Now, the underlying political pedigree required to obtain a Nobel Peace Prize has cheapened the significance of receiving one of these.
He is the first black president of the USA. It was bound to happen, but so soon? I am not trying to make this about race, though the writers of history are. He is the first black president; he has high expectations to live up to. I suspect much of this script was written years ago, maybe before anyone even knew who Obama was.

It is saddening to see such a historical opportunity fall prey to political opportunism of biblical proportions. There were so many genuine accomplishments that could have been fulfilled by this president given the times we live in. So many true and noble paths that could have been taken, and arguably still could be if he has any sovereignty left. Unfortunately our current president refuses to take hard stands for truly righteous solutions to our real problems. Instead he has chosen to spend his once vast political capital frivolously on the most leftist wish list he could find coming from the House of Representatives that under ordinary circumstances would stand a ice cube's chance in hell of passing. Is there still a chance for him to become a real leader to us? Or is he too far gone; bought and paid for.

His ability to distract from the true nature of his agenda which is the true pandering to special interests that it really is, and in monumental proportions (just take a look at what GE and insurance companies stands to gain from his agenda, enter NBC stage left) is artistic in capacity, but only to those without the ability to apply critical thinking. To the rest of the public that is more well informed of where the strings really are, it becomes both truly disgraceful to watch as well as a disillusioning wonder to behold. Do some homework looking into the efforts of the behemoth GE and what they stand to gain from health care, cap and trade, and better relations with Iran. Then ask yourself who owns NBC and MSNBC, arguably the most pro-Obama networks. To have an entire network such as the NBC group to endorse your efforts, to have the presidency and half the congress working for you. That's real power and special interests. That is the true strings that animate the figure that is our current president.

Pwr2People
Good Day

The British are Coming!

2009-10-05T18:36:00.000-07:00

Oklahoma State Trooper Daniel Martin is back in the news this week for "allegedly" using excessive force against someone who was at a buddy's house helping him/her renovate their home. From what I understand, the trooper was in front of the house for a traffic stop. Somewhere during or after the stop, Trooper Daniel Martin ordered Kristopher Douglas to come to him. When Douglas asked asked if he could instead go inside where he would be safe he was again ordered and apparently complied. It was at that point that the alleged beatings began. Trooper Martin has been placed on 5 day paid leave, aka : vacation. Release of the dash camera video from the troopers patrol car is pending.

America used to have a group of government troops that tended to to beat people or otherwise abuse their authority over citizens; they were the King's Army. Please understand ahead of time here, I am pro-police. I want more of them on my block and more on the force in general. I speak to them occasionally on neighborhood related matters and I feel that I have a decent repoire with the police officers on my local beat. However, it is ultimately by our collective authority as a citizenry that state troopers derive their authority and no where else. Once an officer steps beyond the roll of protecting and serving and into the roll of uniformed and armed person committing a crime in front of or against the public then it would seem logical that we the citizenry could be within our rights to take appropriate actions as if anyone else around us were committing the same crime.
When those put in charge of our state troopers don't do what is needed to protect the public from police who abuse their position over the public then they themselves have become complicit in creating a culture where rogue police officers, though few in number, steal the rights of the citizenry on a periodic basis. It then becomes the duty of those over the state trooper's boss, the governor ultimately I presume, to replace the trooper's leadership in place of someone willing to maintain an culture law abiding law enforcement officers where the few rogue officers who mistreat citizens face real consequences. If the governor fails then we have a state that is in full violation of the social contract and is time for replacement of the leadership as a whole.

Pwr2People
Good Day

Vancouver Green Zone

2009-10-02T10:49:00.000-07:00

Vancouver is ready to start a deal with California creating new "Green Zones", where the city would implement green technologies and green ideology for experimentation purposes. The city could generate green credits by cutting pollution. These "credits' can be sold to polluters who need the credits to be able to pollute. How is the pollution or lack thereof measured? Would they allow accounting lower pollution the way politicians measure spending cuts by calling increases below somewhat arbitrary projections to be a decrease? If that is the case then I want in. What about my reductions in pollution? Why can't I sell credits to this newly created carbon trading infrastructure of carbon accounts and carbon banks? I want in!! I should be able to sell credits for the Hummer that I planned on buying. Also, my plan for electric heating in my backyard shed was called off for green purposes, more green credit. I pick up trash while walking, more green credits. Why do business and governments get to profit from selling credits and not me.

Jesus and I both like parables:
My neighborhood association recently implemented a similar plan. It's about time we got progressive and started doing something about the environment. I am greener than most of my neighbors by square foot. With 3 people in a 2,200 square foot home, my carbon foot print per square foot is way low compared to my neighbors a block over in their 900 and 1,000 square foot homes. Good thing that I have serious pull with the neighborhood association, I help the the neighborhood association president craft the green-rules so we're sure that the green system makes sense for the "environment". After the carbon credit system was implemented I informed all of my neighbors that they are more than welcome to buy my credits that I recieved for the extra house plants that I have as compared to the original numbers of house plants planned in 2008. That's good for some green credits with the neighborhood association I think. When I tell my other neighbors that they're only allowed 400 watts of power consumption at any point in time with their alloted credit allowance and that amounts to about 2 light bulbs, and a TV, they can buy my extra credits that I have banked when they need to microwave a frozen dinner. Susan across the street has a 1,100 watt microwave, I am really going to clean up on selling credits to her! Bob down the street uses a gas powered yard edger. I don't bother weed eating my lawn so Bob can buy from my abundance of credits. I can't tell you how happy I am that my wife's brother is president of the neighborhood association. I don't know if it would be better to be neighborhood association president handing out green credits to everyone or Jerry next door who's in charge of the neighborhood green credit bank. He gets fees just for handling the credits, don't even get me started on what he makes on green credit loans!!! He has a pretty good size house as well, so he has plenty of room to store all those credits. It's funny how his brother can afford to keep his yard so well groomed and his house so warm when we visit with the price of green credits these days (supply and demand you see). I don't know how he does it! Then there's Tom, business has really picked up for him since he sells carbon metering equipment. Everyone in our half square mile neighborhood had to buy one of his meters so the neighborhood association can keep track of how many credits the neighbors use. It's simple, it just ties into our power, sewer and gas lines. At the end of the month we get a bill for our carbon foot print. Tom's cool, for a fee he showed me how to rig my meter so that it only read about half of what I use. That means more credits that I can sell Sharon who just had a baby (more carbon). It's amazing how good it feels being green!

http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Robertson+eyes+carbon+growth+zones/2057878/story.html

Pwr2People
Good Day

Post 80's Mentality

2009-09-29T06:57:00.000-07:00

I have come to realize why President Obama has such a huge following among the youngsters. I think the primary reason is that so few of them recall anything from the cold war. I grew up mostly during the 80's and remember the cold war vividly and was taught the evils of communism and socialism. Those coming up to voting age now don't remember the constant barrage of movies like Red Dawn and War Games. They don't remember the duck-and-cover drills, they don't remember photos of the bread lines from the soviet run countries or stories of blue jean shortages in Russia. Standing in line for toilet paper and blue jeans is no more acceptable than standing in a similar line for health care. If you don't understand what I mean, ask your Native American friends about their waits and the quality of care at Claremore hospital. They don't remember what it was like to wonder when we were going to hear the air raid sirens letting us know society had 30 minutes left before the big one hit. Hence the don't see communism and socialism for what it really is. So when a handsome young hipster stands up to the microphone and teleprompter, the don't make the connection between his Marxist words and our old Soviet nemesis of the past half century.
The youngsters today were not taught to recognize socialism when they see it and to instinctively resist it. Therefore they will need to learn from their own mistakes rather than those of others. This will be their most costly lesson in life and by the nature of democratic society, the rest of ours as well.

Pwr2people
Good Day!

Dist 4 City Councilor Eric Gomez - Time to Move On

2009-09-27T06:48:00.000-07:00

Eric Gomez is Tulsa's district 4 city councilor. Aside from his inability or unwillingness to respond to my legitimate and civil inquiries, he has proved himself to lack basic credibility necessary to build a degree of public trust in it's governing entities. Some of these matters can be articulated at a web site put forth by some people active in my district. That web site is http://defeatgomez.com. I gave Eric Gomez the benefit of the doubt when I first began to become familiar with him and his activities. He has completely let me and others in my area down. It is time to move on.

Pwr2people
Good Day!

Introduction

2009-09-26T17:53:00.000-07:00

I am going to start by saying a little about this blog and myself so you know where I am coming from in my writings.

I was born in Milwaukee in 1974 during the height of what I would consider stereotypical pure 70's;what most people think of when they think of the 70's. I moved to Tulsa in 1981 and have been here ever since. My family up north are your typical rust belt democrats with union and pro-government leanings. I grew up in Tulsa and have developed a more centrist-libertarian-republican political outlook though I vote for and support people, not parties.

I have been poor, upper middle class, poor again, and upper middle class again. I have worked for most of what I have as have my parents. I am a high school graduate with two years of vocational school at Tulsa Technology Center for hydraulics, pneumatics, and mechanics and also electrical and electronics. Later I earned an associate degree in Electrical Engineering Technologies from OSU Okmulgee Technical branch. I have worked full time since I was 15 when I lied about my age to get a job at McDonalds in the 10th or 11th grade. I had excellent grades in high school and college, with subsequent 3.6, 3.8, and 4.0 GPA's while taking 15 hours per semester and working full-time the last three semesters I was in college.

I met my wife when I was eight years old. She lived one street over from me and her brother and I became best friends while growing up. My wife and I kissed for the first time when I was eight and she was seven years old. She later moved away and we lost touch for a time. I then moved to the small town of Glenpool, about 25 miles from where we met. A year after moving to Glenpool, my wife and her brother moved to Glenpool, about half a block from where I was living in Glenpool. We became friends again and grew up together. We started dating during my senior year in high school. During my first year in college, my wife and I moved in together and got married in 1993. We got our apartment when I was 18 and she was 17. Her mother had to sign a notarized note saying that I had "custody" of her daughter in order for Jennifer to be on the apartment lease. We are still married after more than 16 years of marriage and over a year of dating.

I graduated from college expecting a break, hoping for a joe six-pack 40 or 50 hour work week for a while. I was wrong, I got an $8/hr job working 80 hours my first week out of school. I got a job as a test technician checking out emergency generator controls and power distribution equipment known as switchgear. I commonly worked with control systems and power distribution systems with low level milliamp signals up to 27,000 volt power distribution switchgear. I did that for 2 years until my wife became pregnant one year after buying our first 2-bedroom home in Tulsa. I left my 80 hour a week technician job for a 40-50 hour a week job where they taught me to design electrical systems for full flight FAA certified flight simulators. I went there so that I could spend more time with my new family. I continued learning skills to use in my career of electrical design and engineering. After almost 4 years designing flight simulators for new and existing models of aircraft, I decided to take another job designing switchgear and power houses, similar to the equipment that I worked on at my first post-college job. I spent nearly 5 years designing power distribution and control systems destined primarily to the petro-chemical industry. A slow down at the company resulted in the layoff of nearly all electrical designers at that company which resulted in me ultimately finding work where I am now. I engineer and design power and control systems for petro-chemical companies.

After years of waiting, I finally started my first official business. I have enjoyed investing in the stock market in stocks and options using varying strategies. In 2009 I finally started an LLC with several co-investors setup to invest in various instruments and assets for the purpose of making money for the company's investors. Investing is something that I thoroughly enjoy doing and finding a business doing it is as good as it gets for me.

I enjoy working with my local community and take an active roll in local neighborhood association projects, Alert neighbor programs, and other community oriented matters. I consider myself conservative in nature but as most people are, I take different views on different issues and I don't ask myself what my party thinks in order to determine what I think or believe. In fact, I find myself preparing to vote against my registered party for one or two races coming up in Tulsa simply because I can't stand the republican incumbent for his past voting transgressions and I know the democrat incumbent of another office and find him to be a reasonable and likable person. So, though I may tend to express more conservative views, I am very open minded and am able to see past the smoke screen that is partisanship of either brand.

Pwr2people
Good Day!