New Year, anything new?

  I am reading Crisis of Empire: Britain and America in the Eighteenth Century, by Jeremy Black an Englishman. Very well done look at the subject from a world viewpoint. In our self-centered approach, it should only be important if America is the big player - the movement of populations, clashes of commerce and culture, the struggles for dominance in Europe - the need for controllable labor - supplied by poor folks, slaves and indentured servants, the assumption that nobles and wealth mean superiority - and the swimming against the currents.  All fascinating stuff. Especially when comparing and contrasting to today - it is the same with different names for the why.

  Started on taxes today, sigh. Don't have enough paperwork yet but I have one. I also have a new improved income number - increase of 1 percent or 1.7 percent or none. So the tithe check has changed. I am still happy that gasoline prices have come down, although Sunday Morning wants me to worry about fracking in public near Teddy Roosevelt's Ranch. Get real, if you are a trust baby and think that you know what is best for the world, go to fix Africa and then return to make America truly perfect.

  Fixing my world, I am the tall guy that opens the curtains in the bedroom (and closes them, come to think on it). No one else is reaching that high. Need to write more checks and get them in the mail after church today, there is a combined service - which means it is given in two languages. The cultural orientation will be that New Year is an opportunity to celebrate again, and be even more generous. I am of the opinion that more time in Sunday School study and stirring sermons in our native tongues would be better - but I am not in charge. Converting American Protestants to Korean Wannabes isn't going to happen, but the Korean elders need the sound of salvation and success in their own language - they understand it better than English.

  So in the last week, I have exercised, virtuously and virtually, 117.4 miles, in 10 hours and forty-two minutes, for a calorie burn of 11,209, in six sessions (one per day - resting on Sunday).  My question then becomes why am I such a fat old man, but it doesn't need an answer from me - I am the fellow that eats, and I can open all the doors to opportunity in this home.

  Saw my grandchildren on Skype.com, and laugh at knowing once one has conquered self and the local world - I have run out of time to really enjoy it - so I will take it as I can. In the end they will do well, but not because of any PROGRAM from several government agencies love of them. Mostly because they have parents, and community that do love them. The government is more problem than solution to competent people, so sad. I could say that the competent people would like the government to control those less able than themselves - but I would be repeating what I have been reading about why the King of England was a great thing, or the Khan, or the Tsar, or the Pope --- someone has to do it. Control the unwashed masses.

   Don't you ever wonder why if most of the humans in your country are not as intelligent as you are, nor as capable, why they have any vote that counts the same as your own? Maybe that is why those special elite folks will use every advantage to maintain position on top of the heap.... they are afraid, very afraid.