At what point?

For the past 8 years my main issue with republicans was their unwavering support of George W. Bush. Torture, wars, economy, stupidity... the list goes on, but there was a large group of people that never batted an eye. He could have burned their houses down and sacrificed their first born child and they wouldn't have cared because he was THEIR guy.

So the question I pose is when do democrats become guilty of the same thing? Imagine if George W. Bush had sent 4,000 more troops into Afghanistan? Or spent TRILLIONS bailing out companies that donated money to his campaign?

Now I like Barack, but I vowed many moons ago to stick to my beliefs and support ideas and not people. Republicans drove me crazy because they supported people and not ideas, hence the current state of the republican part. But I can only imagine the outrage that people would have if Bush were doing some (not all!) of the things Obama is now.

I support the vast majority of Obama's moves, but fear that too many people don't care, and would support him if he left a bag of flaming dog-poop on your doorstep. If that happens, democrats will be no different when Obama is out of office than the republicans are now. They will be lost and trying to find out 'who they are.'

Narcissism

As anyone who knows me understands, I have a huge fear of where our culture is going. I think we are creating, and nurturing a culture of victims and wimps. Until yesterday, I really failed to wrap my arms around my feels, but then it was brought to me by an article about narcissistic people.

I love hyperlinks.

I love the idea from the Slate Article to make birthday cards that say "I can't believe your birthday is so close to mine" because that sums up SO MANY people that I know. Everything has to be about them. You know the people I am talking about. The people that want you to come to their party (and bring a gift), but when it comes to your party they have 'something else going on.' Crap like that drives me crazy. I have seen a lot of this with my wedding. I have gone to and been in many weddings over the past half-decade. Now that it is my turn, people are remarkably absent. Why? Well what is in it for them?

This also true when you drive. People have become (not sure if they always have been) the most narcissistic drivers. They drive to get where they are going-- to hell with everyone else on the road.

With Twitter(which I just joined) and Facebook, we have sites now to route our narcissistic ways through. Part of me loves it, and part of me wants to cry.

I fear we cannot overcome any major obstacles in our world anymore because we always need to know what is in it for me first. If World War II happened with this generation, I fear that we wouldn't win because we wouldn't have enough people that would sacrifice to win.

I don't disclude (is that a word?) myself from this, so don't think that. I feel that one difference is that I understand that I am pretty narcissistic. That being said, I think we need to fix it. We need people to do things even if they don't benefit personally from it.

Birth Rate Out of Control

Alright, time for me to become even more unpopular than I already am (which is saying something).

There are a few topics that we do not discuss in this country. Sex and race are two of them, and those are topics I don't touch (at least not publicly). But I want to talk about the birth rate in this country.

For 14 years the number of teenagers having kids went down. You didn't hear much about it either way, so I guess that it something. But now it has gone up again for two years in a row. That is bad. What is also bad is that even at the best of time we have had the highest percentage of teen mothers than any civilized country.

This is a topic that is a huge issue and needs to be solved because so many of the issues facing this country are intertwined. We have taken the challenge of attacking and trying to end poverty. I know one great way to get out of poverty is to avoid having children until you are financially ready. Obviously that alone isn't going to solve the problem, hence me saying they are intertwined.

We need to discuss this and get control over a few areas.

First, we need people to have children when they want to have kids. Half of all kids born now in the United States are born out of wedlock. I won't get into a religious rant (although maybe I should). That statistics jumps out at me and screams 'unwanted pregnancy.' I know that isn't the case for them all, but more and more I bet.

Second, regardless of your marital status, we need more parents to have financial security before having kids. People in the lower economic statuses have, on average, more children than those in the higher statuses. I am not saying that you should need to be rich to have children, but at least plan better.

Third, we need less children having children. Too many teen mothers. That puts you in a tough situation moving forward. Sure, there are people who have had children early in life and gone onto wonderful things, but lets not bank on being the exception.

My call to action is to educate and challenge people to plan better. Not having kids isn't difficult. There are drugs, accessories, and lifestyle choices you can make to basically eliminate that risk.

I know this is a conversation we cannot have, but maybe we should.

Work Life Balance

I have always been a fan of having a good work-life balance, who isn't? I do not know many people that admit to living to work, instead of working to love, but sadly, this isn't the case for many.

With the economy in the toilet finding a solid balance between work and your personal life is more difficult than ever because you are supposed to be thankful that you even have a job, who cares how they treat you. What is that, you won't work Saturday? Well we can let you go and find someone else that will. Three weeks vacation? Sorry, we have a stack of resumes from people that will work and only take two.

I cannot even imagine what job interviews are like. Even better is the behind the scenes conversations. I can only imagine what final interviews for some positions must be like with so many qualified people unemployed.

The scene I am excited to see is what happens next. What happens when the tide changes? When the economy grows (I know it seems like it never will) and jobs start being created. Will we see an exodus? I would imagine that we will. Sure many people just love to job hop because they believe that the grass is always greener, when in fact you are risking entering a worse or equal situation; however, companies will be able to woo away some quality talent I bet. Some talent that is waiting for a less risky market to change jobs within.

My advice to employers would be to make sure that you are still taking some time to invest (maybe not financially) in your valuable talent because you don't want to use the recession as your best retention tool because it won't last forever (hopefully).

Legislate against stupidity

My next step in my plan to world domination is to legislate against stupidity. I don't know if that is the right term, but basically I want to make not being stupid more desirable. People respond to incentives, and since I cannot think of a good reward system, I want to basically start to fine and/or arrest people for stupidity. And for instances that are already illegal (read on), I want to make the punishment more severe.

This isn't a new train of thought for me, but after hearing about the woman that called 911 three times because of an issue with her McDonald's order, I have finally reached the end of my rope. People need more of a deterrent from acting like complete idiots. I believe that one of the root, most severe problems facing our country is that we believe we are better than everyone else. Not just other countries (although that is an issue), but each other. Here is a list of things I would like to start fining/pulling more people over for (in no order).

Leaving your cart in the middle of the parking lot, or not in the designated spot. You cannot be that lazy that you can't walk 50 feet to the cart carrel (not sure if I spelled that right). How many times have we all gone to pull into a parking spot and found an abandoned cart in the spot because someone was too good to follow the rules? I say that if they are too good to put their cart away, they are too good to get a cart next time (carry everything in your arms chump).

Using the car pool lane when you aren't carpooling. This is something I really hate because all it says is that you think you are too good to follow the rules and that your time is more variable. I am willing to make an exception if you are going to give birth within the next 2 hours, otherwise get in line like everyone else.

Leaving things randomly around stores. You don't want the chicken breasts anymore? Or that pair of pants? That is fine, but please put them back where you found them.

Driving around a line of traffic only to merge at the last second. You think everyone else is waiting in line for the fun of it? If you are the Pope, I might give you a pass (although I am not Catholic so don't count on it).

Taking your child to the ER because they have a fever or are throwing up. Guess what, kids get sick. Just because their fever is 99.7 doesn't mean require emergency treatment. Imagine how much health care costs could go down if we all didn't panic immediately (and took something resembling care of ourselves).

Using 'gay' or other derogatory terms as adjectives. Totally unacceptable.

Littering, including throwing cigarettes on the ground. If ran the world, and you threw a cigarette on the ground, I would make you eat it (beats some bird eating it because they are too stupid to know better).

Ok, so this is the beginning of a list. I can go on for days, and I probably even forgot a few that really bother me. I know that most things on here already are illegal, but the penalty isn't working, so lets up it. It would make America a better place, and the fines would help pay for the deficit!