So I might get to live through Great Depression II. Kind of scary. I seriously wake up every morning and check to see if it has happened yet. I guess this is what people experienced early on in the Cold War with the threat of nuclear attack. Not that a severe financial catastrophe would kill that many people, though I am sure it would kill some people. We don’t have any major investments that I am worried about, but I do worry about being evicted because our landlord can’t make the mortgage, the cost of food and gas, and the other consequences that could effect daily life. Bottom line times are kind of scary, throw in that it is a presidential election year and it makes it all the more interesting.

I have always thought of myself to be fairly conservative and “republican” when it comes to fiscal policy and liberal and “democrat” when it comes to social policy. I think that the two have recently merged for me in a strange way and swung me abruptly to the left. The reason is the $700 billion bailout proposed by President Bush, which is supported by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke.

I know that Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke are brilliant men who know what they are doing and do their jobs well.  This being said, I do believe that this bailout fits well with their (and President Bush’s) interests and shows what they think is important.  They think that preserving the “American Dream” way of life is so important that they should throw $700 billion dollars at it. I think this is wrong. I can only begin to imagine what the consequences would be if this bailout didn’t happen, but maybe people should suffer these consequences. We got ourselves into this mess. What changed the my whole viewpoint was a quote from an interview with Senator Bernie Sanders, a Democrat from Vermont. He says,

“For years now, they’ve (Republicans) told us what we can’t afford—that the government providing healthcare to all people is just unimaginable; it can’t be done. We don’t have the money to rebuild our infrastructure. We don’t have the money to wipe out poverty. We can’t do it. But all of a sudden, yeah, we do have $700 billion for a bailout of Wall Street.”

This statement makes it clear to me. The current administration cares more about people’s financial well being rather than their physical well being or the financial well being to the extremely poor demographic. It is becoming clearer to me how I think I will be voting in November. This stuff has got to change.

Check out this interview on CNN with Sen. Chris Dodd about the repercussions of the bailout.

So I am in the middle of watching “Thirteen Days” for the second time for a paper that I have to write for my history class. Yes, I said in the middle of, because I tend to watch movies like people read books, I don’t have the ability to stay awake through an entire movie. It is a great film, but it has really got me thinking about the upcoming election.

The movie is about the Kennedy Administration’s response to the Cuban Missile Crisis and if you haven’t seen it and are worried about spoilers in this post…shame on your US history teacher!  I have been trying to predict what either Obama or McCain would do in a situation like the Cuban Missile Crisis and it has confused my deciding who to vote for or even the desire to vote even more.  Here are my conclusions/predictions:

Disclaimer: I am speculating about Obama/McCain and realize I could be completely wrong.

Let’s start with McCain.  I know his a hero for being a Veteran and POW, great, however that doesn’t qualify you to be a president, so maybe find a different platform during your speeches. If he were in JFK’s shoes during the Cuban Missile Crisis I am afraid he would be a bit too trigger happy and would have bombed the heck out of Cuba, most likely ushering in WW3.  I can respect his decisions about staying in Iraq as much as I disagree with them, but I think that his POW experience might even hurt his ability to be President, rather than help it.

On to Obama.  My problem with this guy is that I can’t imagine him even being able to deal with this type of a situation, so I have no idea what he would really do.  This sums up my overall opinion of him.  I think he is very vague, which isn’t always bad, he could really surprise us for the positive, however, not to jump on the lack of experience bandwagon, but when it comes to foreign policy and protecting American citizens what would he really do?  I don’t know…can I vote for someone that I don’t know how would respond to these situations?

Conclusion, I still have no idea what to do. I wish Hillary was still an option, I am more convinced she would have been the best choice, but that ship has sailed. I am ready for someone with the guts to do what he or she thinks is right (like George W. Bush) and have it be what is actually right (unlike George W. Bush).  I want a candidate that is bold. One that stands for human right’s, whether that be for the unborn, women, the poor, the foreign, or sick.  I want someone who can acknowledge things like poverty, AIDs, torture, healthcare, and education. But mostly I want someone who isn’t afraid to depart from party lines to do the right thing.  So here it is:

Lieberman 2008

P.S. Just kidding, I do like Lieberman, though not for President.  I am hoping that either Obama or McCain can shine in someway by November so I can feel comfortable in voting.

Yesterday at church we took communion (as us good protestant evangelicals call it) or the Eucharist as other Christian tradition refer to it. Each time before the congregation partakes in communion someone (usually an Elder) speak a bit about what communion is. Yesterday the speaker spoke from the book of John which doesn’t include the Last Supper (where Christians get the communion tradition from) at all in the text. He said this is because that communion is only a memorial and no one recieves any special blessing from it. Now I was a bit shocked that he would make this claim seem so firm and public, because I know that many in our church believe that communion is more than just a memorial. I myself am not sure where I fall in the debate, but tend to think there is more to it. Not sure what that is excatly, but can’t say that it is just memorial. I am curious to hear what others views are on communion or the Eucharist. If you are not a Christian I would even more love to hear what you think about the practice. I must admit it seems kinda wacky, but I think that most religious things are and I guess that is what makes it faith for me, because if I was just to use my mind Christianity and all other faiths and religions for that matter are crazy with a capital C.

I am tired of having to settle. Yet I have to. I have to settle with what is popular. I know that sounds lame, like I am in high school and I have to do what it takes to hang out with the jocks (never did figure that out, but that is a whole other post). Cereal is a good example, and one I have written about before. When my wife and I were in Europe we delighted in chocolate cereal. Just to clarify that is NOT chocolate flavored cereal, but cereal with massive chocolaty chunks. Now in the United States we don’t have this morning goodness, we have cheap substitutes. Does this mean that I don’t eat cereal for breakfast almost ever morning? No, I settle.

Settling in the geeky techno-world is a big pet peeve of mine. Why do I have to settle for a service like Twitter, that goes down and removes key features just to stay afloat? Because everyone uses it. Yes, there are many better services out there, but you got to go with what the masses use, that is the curse of the social network. Facebook is another service I have to settle with. I have to settle with a clunky interface and a bombardment of spam (both email and on the site). I am sorry as much as I do find it vaguely interesting that you are “Addicted to Latin American Midget Snowboarding”. I am not interested in being a part of that group. I, myself am even part of the problem. I joined the “Addicted to Heroes” group/application more than a year ago and would love to take it off. But I don’t know how. I’ve looked and tried. So I am eternally “Addicted to Heroes”. I have a theory that soon someone will come along and eat these lame services up. It appears that FriendFeed is already on the heels of Twitter. I am just waiting for the cool new social network that gets it right to replace Facebook, and no it is not MySpace (I won’t even go there).

Until then, I guess I will settle.

Bottom line…Mr. Dobson you are not the Pope of the Evangelical church, please go back to being a psychologist and a professional in family issues.

Click here to read Barak Obama’s original speech. Click here to hear it.

Click here to read a really good article by the “liberal” Christian Jim Wallis (please note that my use of quotation marks is a poor replacement for my sarcastic voice inflextions, Jim Wallis is far from liberal).

Check out this article on Gizmodo, but especially check out the video.

Lego Secret Vault Contains All Sets In History