Miscellaneous Posts

Time moves faster as one gets older. It's a phenomena that physicists can't explain...even when using string theory.

When you were a kid it seemed liked forever before Santa Claus showed up at your house again...but as an adult, when you're wrapping gifts for your own kids, it seemed liked only yesterday.

When you're in your 20's, you think that being 50 years old is eons away...but I plainly remember in great detail when I was once 21.

I also once thought that if I showed up to work every day, was on time, and worked real hard, I would never be without a job. That's what my dad always told me while I was growing up.

30 years later I learned differently.

My dad was a lifer in the military and was raised on a farm during the Great Depression, so he didn't tolerate laziness or wasteful spending. He taught me that too. I could never quite fill my father's shoes, but I never considered myself lazy either.

But 30 years later I'm being accused of just that. Tell THAT to my aching back, from busting it all my life in factories and laying bricks! Some mornings it's a struggle just to get out of bed!

Today most of the long-term unemployed are 50 years and older, and they have been unemployed the longest during this Second Great Depression.

My advise to those that are young and think they'll never be without a job...

...save your money now while you're young and employed. Don't buy that fancy sports car just because these days you can share the rent with a friend. When you're 50 years old your "friend" might be married with children and won't want you as a roommate any longer.

After the stock market crash of 1929 and the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl of the 1930's, America thought her worst years were behind her...but those days have returned, and I fear things will only get worse before they get any better.

If you're old enough to collect Social Security (and only have that to rely on), you're living in poverty. The young people today (who think they will ALWAYS have a job) won't even have Social Security when they reach "oldness". They would be wise to plan ahead and expect the worse, and hope for the best...rather than looking at the "old folks" as useless fossils who don't deserve an extention for their unemployment insurance (Tier V).

One day they too will be "old" (or "over qualified" or "lazy"), and they will also be told to "live within their means" after they are laid off from a job that they busted their butts at for 30 years.

It's not like in Europe where society cares for their elderly. Here in America, we either put the old people in "homes" or kick them to the curb.

I was once "young, hip and cool"; so remember that the next time you throw rocks at me, insult me, call me lazy, or tell me I don't need extended unemployment insurance. You could be wishing that for yourself in your own future...

...unless you marry well or inherit a lot of money from your "old" parents.

Related Post:

50 Years Old and Unemployed? You're a Dead Man Walking
http://tobuds.com/blogs/blog3.php/2010/04/19/50-years-old-and-unemployed-you-re-a-dea

Too Old for the Workforce in 2010 - Unemployed Because of Age
http://tobuds.com/blogs/blog3.php/2010/03/06/too-old-for-the-workforce-in-2010-unempl

To Be A Homeless Man
http://tobuds.com/blogs/blog5.php/2010/05/09/to-be-a-homeless-man

Never take away someone's hope...it might be all they have.

You don't have to be a wino, drug addict, or an alcoholic to be homeless. You don't have to be mentally or physically challenged to be homeless. You just have to be a day late or a dollar short to pay the rent...and that usually happens when you lose your job.

...and if you've exhausted all your unemployment insurance income.

Once you had a good job where you worked for 14 years, and you drove a pretty nice car - nothing too fancy, but only 5 years old - and it ran well. You had a nice CD player installed last year and very cool rims. The paint still looked new...hardly any dings.

You also had a pretty girlfriend that you loved and even considered marrying one day. You sometimes played your guitar for her.

Your 1-bedroom apartment was located in a nice neighborhood, and after a hard day at work you'd go home to have dinner and relax on the couch with the remote to your wide-screen TV.

Or sometimes you'd meet up with your co-workers after work and have a couple of cold beers at the local bar, before you went home to make love to your sweetheart.

You used to take in an occasional movie, or go shopping at the mall; or enjoy a nice steak and lobster dinner with your girl on special occasions, such as on her birthday.

Those were the good ole days, when you had pride in yourself and a future to look forward to...but then one day, you were laid off from your job.

And after a few months of looking for work (and being rejected) you depleted your life savings trying to maintain the status quo. Eventually your car was repossessed by the bank.

Then one day it happened. The landlord started knocking on your front door, and finally left an eviction notice on the door.

Then a few days later the sheriff showed up, and you could only leave with whatever you could carry to the street. You have no friends anymore or relatives to help you. Your girlfriend broke up with you a long time ago when you were first laid off. So much for love. Now you're alone...

...and you're also homeless.

When one becomes homeless, their physical appearance rapidly deteriorates. They don't have facilities for basic hygiene such as showering and shaving...no toiletries such as razors, deodorant, cologne, toothpaste, and mouthwash.

It's odd...it's as though a small room with running water (called the "bath room") is what defines the difference between civilization and savagery.

Hunger is constant, and exposure to the outside elements (heat or cold) is taxing on the body. Humiliation and shame gives way to simple desperation. Their hair and beard grows, their clothes become filthy, and sores on their skin prevail. Lice and mites feed on them. They have no access to a dentist and must suffer with toothaches and other health-related maladies.

An old pair of shoes found in a dumpster becomes a prized possession. Almost anything becomes editable...you find yourself in back alleys near fast-food restaurants late at night, hoping no one you've ever known will see you.

Some days you aimlessly roam the streets, lost in your thoughts, wondering how you ever ended up this way. You might be deep in your thoughts when a car full of teenagers passes you on the street, throwing garbage out the window at you while they're laughing.

Or a young woman will drive by and hollar at you: "Get a job!"

Other days you hole up in a nook or cranny somewhere and just endlessly sleep, escaping your predicament. You sometimes dream of your ex-girlfriend...and a few times, your departed father. You wake up ashamed at yourself, but thankful that they don't see you like this.

People you pass on the sidewalk are fearful of looking at you, as though you're some deranged mass murderer. You almost chuckle to yourself at the thought of that, remembering that you too once felt that way...and you'd cross the street to avoid the homeless and "invisible man".

You find friendship with abandoned and stray dogs...you have a commonality.

...and sometimes with wild birds...other living beings that don't judge you.

Some days you felt enraged at the government for allowing this all to happen - and some days you're enraged at yourself. But anger never made you feel any better.

Wait! Someone just tossed a lit cigarette in the gutter - only half smoked - a good find! A simple pleasure in an otherwise hellish life. You inhale with satisfaction, but try to make the moment linger as long as possible.

One night you woke up shivering on a sidewalk - dirty and smelly and hungry - it's cold and raining. You ask yourself, "Is this really worth living for?"

You look up, and almost in a haze, you see the nearby bridge.

You slowly get up and begin walking, leaving all your "prized" possessions behind. You have answered your own question.

It seems like years since you once signed that petition, but the suffering will soon be over - you have finally found some peace of mind.

He wasn't alone...

Recession May Be Increasing Suicide Rates, But We Won't Know For Years
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/02/recession-may-be-increasi_n_208534.html

ABC Predicts Suicide Rates Will Go Up, Just Like During Great Depression
http://www.businessandmedia.org/articles/2008/20080610143517.aspx

The director of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention: "There are data to substantiate a relationship between unemployment and suicide."
http://www.newsweek.com/id/179422

Suicide rate on the rise, figures show
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/jan/28/suicide-rate-on-rise

Elkhart Coroner Blames High Suicide Rate On Recession
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/10/elkhart-coroner-blames-hi_n_352806.html

Mike Murphy, coroner Las Vegas: "The increase in suicide among seniors could be because of economic conditions."
http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/feb2009/bw20090226_526384.htm

Suicides: Watching for a Recession Spike - Suicide experts say there is a strong correlation between acute financial strains and depression, often a prelude to substance abuse and suicides
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1878044,00.html

Subject:
Congressional Millionaires Out of Touch with Reality, Add Tier V

To:
President Barack Obama
Sen. Dianne Feinstein
Sen. Barbara Boxer
Rep. Jane Harman

May 5, 2010

It is apparent the American public will no longer continue to believe the false numbers the congressional millionaires are generating, falsely maintaining unemployment numbers below 10%. Congress, which is comprised of 44% millionaires has never bothered to concern themselves with those of us who aren't millionaires and therefore, have gone too far. The American people no longer believe in the congressional millionaires' ability to work on, or contain the unemployment crisis. The thought processes of these millionaires, who know nothing of the people they "supposedly" represent are along the lines of Marie Antoinette. Congressional millionaires have no qualm generating funds for their fellow millionaires in Banking, Big Business or Wall Street to ensure the continuity of unnecessarily excessive and exorbitant bonuses, salaries and lifestyles of the affluent, which, as of yet, has not generated any significant new jobs to offset all the jobs lost in this catastrophic national economic disaster... all those millionaires are "kickin' it" at the expense of the American taxpayer, made possible by the courtesy of their millionaire "friends" in congress. Congressional millionaires must back track their efforts, join the rest of us on planet Earth and immediately support the necessity to immediately implement Tier V UI benefits for all those who have exhausted, and continue to exhaust Tier IV benefits.

We've always had the means to cover the cost of the continuation and maintenance of sustained UI Benefits for the duration of the fiasco created by millionaires. Congress must now focus our national energies and resources to that avail. It's common knowledge that UI benefits are the only lifeline for many American households and constitute the smallest portion, 2.5%, of the annual debt. Americans aren't buying that congressional millionaires can't divert 2.5 cents of every $1 to aid those who have reached the "congressionally imposed" 99 week UI limit. The following paragraph addresses how congress can implement the redistribution of government resources to facilitate the immediate addition of Tier V benefits to initiate aid to longest term, unemployed middle-class Americans and their families:

Congress has always been able to appropriate UI funding by reducing the annual budgets of other annual budget programs and can immediately facilitate an infusion into the UI program by diverting .50% from the top 5 expenditures (half a cent out of every dollar our government collects in taxes, or by .625% from the top 4 expenditures, excluding defense (a little over a half cent for each tax dollar the government receives). It amazes me how congressional millionaires attack the smallest budget as if this is the cause of overspending, or government waste adding to the deficit. Extending UI benefits is a vital, stabilizing economic factor. Congressional millionaires can no longer blame Americans for not being able to find jobs, as there are no jobs to alleviate the vast and growing number of unemployed and underemployed Americans and their families. As well, congress must stop referring to the long-term unemployed as being lazy - the American public realizes this is not the case, contrary to the rhetoric and propaganda being generated by all the millionaires in congress, who are not representative of, or representing, the plight of the long-term unemployed and underemployed.

San Pedro , CA

Original Source:
http://www.congress.org/congressorg/bio/userletter/?letter_id=5147955176&content_dir=congressorg

(NOTE: I would have also reminded them that taxpayers - even those receiving unemployment insurance income - pay members of congress a $174,000 annual salary PLUS healthcare and a generous pension.)

Why does the GOP and Fox News want the general public to think that for the last 2 years the jobless have all been relaxing by the side of the pool drinking Marquitas?
http://tobuds.com/blogs/blog1.php/2010/07/19/jobless-tired-of-being-a-political-ping

Karl Dinse and Fox News Wages War on the unemployed
http://acompanyofone.org/post-article-2010-fox-news-and-karl-dinse.html

Other Links:

Our Good Senators
http://acompanyofone.org/post-article-2010_our-good-senators.html

Are the Unemployed being Buried Alive?
http://acompanyofone.org/post-article-2010_jobless-buried-alive.html

Can The Terminator Save America?
http://acompanyofone.org/post-article-2010_arnold-schwarzenegger.html

The Unemployment rate fell? The BIG Lie
http://acompanyofone.org/post-article-2010_unemployment-rate.html

Stuart Varney "There are no jobs!"
http://acompanyofone.org/post-article-2010_varney.html

Who Are the 99ers? Where did they come from? What to they want?
http://acompanyofone.org/the-99ers-get-slammed-again.html

Casino Welfare
http://acompanyofone.org/post-article-2010_casino-welfare.html

The Numbers - Update
http://acompanyofone.org/post-article-2010_update.html

Public Service Announcement - New Strain of Virus

Information about "Gonorrhea Lectim"

The Center for Disease Control has issued a warning about a new virulent strain of this old disease. The disease is called Gonorrhea Lectim. It's pronounced "Gonna re-elect-em" and it is a terrible obamanation.

The disease is contracted through dangerous and high risk behavior involving putting your cranium up your rectum. Many victims contracted it in 2008, but now most people (after having been infected for the past 1-2 years) are starting to realize how destructive this sickness really is.

It's unfortunate because Gonorrhea Lectim is easily cured with a new drug just coming out on the market called Votemout (pronounced "vote-em-out"). You take the first dose in 2010 and the second dose in 2012 - then simply don't engage in such dangerous and reckless behavior again; otherwise, it could become a permanent affliction and eventually wipe out all life in this country as we know it.

Several states are already on top of this, like Virginia and New Jersey, and now Massachusetts, with many more seeing the writing on the wall.

Please protect you and your family from this dreaded disease and sign the petition on the link below:

http://www.change.org/petitions/view/the_99ers_need_a_tier_v_added_to_unemployment_benefits

You will be glad you did.