#What news I'm reading, podcasts I like and maybe an odd and end or two

I thought it might be interesting to update the blog sometimes with some links to news I've found interesting and maybe a link or two  leading to a podcast or an essay I'm remembering from the past.  

So here goes:
This article gives some context to why oil prices have dropped...and hint, it has to do with the central bank "ending" QE (money printing and bond buy backs) to try and salvage some legitimacy. But even for the layman, there's good stuff in here on a range of things that ACTUALLY matter in your life and how reality is distorted by MSM talking points (as the title suggests):

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-01-16/end-fed-qe-didn%E2%80%99t-start-market-madness-it-ended-it

My good friend Jon Bean has a good article on MLK and the problem with the monopoly on "Civil Rights" in America published today:

http://dailycaller.com/2015/01/16/civil-rights-are-too-important-to-leave-to-special-interest-advocates/

From the "The lady doth protest too much" department (maybe), this is at least an interesting twist given the MSM portrayal of Sen. Warren:

https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2015/01/warren-wealthiest-among-congress-potential-white-house-bidders/

An essay I loved a while back...and just remembered today.  As Nelson on the Simpson's once proclaimed, "It's funny cuz it's true...HAAHAA": "7 things that happen to you when you are completely honest"

http://www.jamesaltucher.com/2011/10/7-things-happen-to-you-when-you-are-completely-honest/

And I really like Altucher's podcasts.  He's a pretty self-deprecating guy.  I mentioned to a friend just yesterday that I think "I'm at my best" when I am too...I'm going to try and be that way (self-depricating) more here.  Here's a couple links to particular podcasts he did where he interviewed some great guests and touch on so many things in life:

You might already be familiar with AJ Jacobs' books...  http://www.stansberryradio.com/Frank-Curzio/Latest-Episodes/Episode/463/Ep-3-A-J-Jacobs-A-Biblical-Experiment

Have a great day or so...until we meet again.

I'm Sorry...that wasn't to hard to say.

"A single lie destroys a whole reputation of integrity."  Baltasar Gracian

I ran across this quote today.  It fit my mood, and it reminded me of a glaring omission in my first entry on the value of self interest.  I encouraged everyone to throw off the shackles of guilt and become self interested...because doing so would serve the interests of your communities and our "shrinking" world.  But reading it over again I realized I had left out a crucial element that hinges the whole idea together: RESPONSIBILITY.  Acting out of self interest will eventually serve us all because we truly share so many interests as humans habitating the whole of this earth.  While this is true, we must still take responsibility for the outcome of our own interests...the promises we make and the actions we take.  Although this omission wasn't a "lie" by definition, I still gladly take responsibility and offer you a genuine, "I'm sorry."  And I try to remind myself regularly that if I can't be honest with the people I love, then I'm not being honest with myself.  Self delusion is the worst possible existence.  It would be my Hell.  

We've all made promises before we couldn't keep.  As my Dad used to remind me, "don't write a check your butt can't cash."  Yet it's inevitable that it's going to happen.  Things happen. Circumstances change.  And we've all watched passions and commitments die a variety of deaths.  But it's how we respond to our inability "to come through" or our simple change of heart that matters.  Take responsibility.  Own up to breaking a promise and have the dignity and self respect to take responsibility for it.  Whether your self interest led you to volunteer for an organization you thought you had time for...but didn't, or it encouraged you to buy something it turned out you couldn't pay for, or if you got caught up "in the moment" and promised your kid or someone else you loved you'd do something that you lost interest in, be honest enough with them and yourself to explain how and why it happened.  In all those instances we served our own interest when you made the commitment in the first place.  We gained the initial reward in some way, but left those who were relying on you hanging.  They will be offended and they will hold grudges, no matter how much they claim "it's no big deal".  And ultimately, what hurts you the most, is that they will lose trust in you.  They won't count on you.  And you will slowly fall out of their sphere of interest.  Do this enough and you drift through life never getting respect and never having anyone else you can count on anymore either.  It's a tired phrase, but it's lasted because it's true: "all you have is your word".  Everything else in life is fleeting.   

This ties directly back in to how we coexist on local, national and global levels.  The Baltasar quote I led with speaks volumes, but for too long we have actually embraced an "official lie" on the larger state, national and global levels.  Hell, in Illinois (where I unfortunately live) we kept saying we weren't bankrupt for how long?  That somehow people living would actually pay off the debt rather than passing it along to the unborn.  That was a lie.  A huge lie.  Calling it anything else today is just continuing that lie.  Our politicians at every level have been doing the same for decades on other issues, yet each election cycle hordes of people join together to join the circus we call elections and buy in to the "identity" of some documented liar to be our new "leader"...for the good of the people of course.  So Baltasar underestimated the power of mass psychology, the power of big media and centralized education and peer pressure in general to prop up the image of "integrity" despite lie after lie after lie.  But that is ending...credibility is vanishing.  Another one of those things we all sort of sense now, you know?  

It's not going to get fixed by electing some new person whose new lies make us feel better.  Lord knows I wish it could.  But that doesn't matter.  Each of us have the power to start changing it all right now by getting our own house in order.  Start being real with ourselves.  Start being honest to the ones we love.  Confucious placed this personal power over the larger "whole" in context when he said, "The strength of a nation derives from the integrity of the home."  That's empowering.  And it's honest.  If we can't be honest and sincere with those we claim to love than how can we ever hope to reconfigure the world and have one that no longer promotes hypocrisy...a world where the "ends" no longer justify the "means"?  But because each of us can decide to take responsibility going forward, things can change.  And if we just start being honest with every special person in our lives, it will.  And while the results of this action may not be obvious in our states, or in our nations, or in our world overnight (or even in our own lifetimes), we will see the fruits of our labor in our own homes and in the most important relationships immediately.  

Blog update...you can follow and share easily now.

Hi everyone.  I did a little updating today...with the help of my great friend Vicki:-)  You can see on the right that you can follow and share much easier now.  And I added a search function thinking ahead. 

I am going to moderate the comments just to keep spam and hackers away.  But that shouldn't matter too much.  Do you like the new template.  I think it looks better and the widgets (as mentioned above) are much easier to find.

Hope you had a great day!!!  Talk more soon...I already got some ideas churning.

Welcome to the Round World View

Welcome to the Round World: We are all "Joe"...Who, What, Where, When and Why?

Hello world...seems polite to start my first blog post off that way.  And welcome.  In this space going forward I hope to offer thoughts about life and our world that are a little different.  How "cliche" I know.  How many times have you heard that?  Too many.  Me too.  But I'm going to try, and I hope that I can actually deliver by just being myself. I also hope to engage with others here, critique the "popular narratives" we all hear, and offer a glimpse in to my day's "thought trail"...allowing myself a much needed cathartic release along the way. :-)  We all need one of those.  I don't want to pigeonhole this blog so I'm going to keep it at that.  I'm going to write about what I feel like writing about.  And hopefully someone else likes reading it.  

So why the name "Round World View"?  First of all...it was available (and only my third choice, jajjajajja ;-).  But I like it.  In a nutshell it describes my approach to life and my approach to thinking about my experiences and life's challenges.   And also it speaks to the broader fact that we live in a rapidly "shrinking" world.   The world is changing fast, and every day we are changing rapidly along with it.  Or we better be.  We have the largest library in human history at our fingertips, RIGHT NOW!  You're connected to the Internet via some sort of device...and in the time you read this sentence that "largest library" just got bigger.  And now bigger again.  It's a situation that is hard to wrap our minds around, and it's transformational.  Enlightenment kind of transformational. It's changing how we see ourselves on every level as it changes the dynamics of all our world systems symbiotically. 

For instance (and this is just one), being "American" in the U.S. sense of the word isn't what it used to be.  It's not even what we want it to be, and if you're like me, now you're not sure it ever was.  We're just beginning to realize it and this "library" at our fingertips is causing this identity crisis to grow, much like the printing press did to "Christians" centuries ago when the Church split forever.  Being "American" was always imagined...romantically, and to serve a variety of interests...mostly our self-interest, and that's not a bad thing.  We've been taught to think that being self-interested is a bad thing.  I'm here to tell you it's not!  And the reason you've been encouraged to think self-interest is bad, is because believing it's bad serves the interests of others who don't usually have your "interests" at heart.  All of us are starting to sense this...beginning to know this...I think.  And I would argue that recognizing that is somewhat liberating.  At least it is for me.  Challenging this manipulated identity that isn't serving your interests...and designed by advertisers on Madison Avenue and the DC Beltway to manipulate you...is necessary for survival now.

The people around you, especially "authority figures", who claim to have only your best interests at heart are lying to you...and to me of course.  I don't think this is a big revelation.  Others have said it before, and said it better.  Because even if these wannabe saints get satisfaction out of really helping others, that satisfaction serves their own self interests.  That's just simple logic.  And when they get on their soapbox self-righteously demanding you act out of your own self interest and go along with whatever "plan" they have "to just help others" (that they would run of course)...know that you are being patronized.  Know that they take you for a fool and a chump.  Guard your freedoms and pocketbook with all your might.  It is in our interest to have our neighbors be free and self sufficient...to have our communities work.  We don't need a bunch of self-proclaimed "do-gooders" managing that for us.  They aren't even good at it.  All the corruption, all the incompetence, creating all the crisis around us, prove that.  We are all adults living in an imperfect world having to make choices between imperfect options every day.  There is no magic bullet.  There is no "leader" coming to save us all.  And when you're asked, and often times being told, to give up your freedom and your earnings for some pie in the sky promise, remember that the freedom and earned wealth in question extends to all those around you and to all our future kin.  You are being coerced...conned...into taking their money and freedom away too.  Again, anyone claiming that your own interests aren't "good for you"...is lying to you, and to me. And when they claim you're too dumb to take care of yourself and your family ask yourself what they've accomplished...really?  Not what some newspaper or TV news anchor claims they've accomplished.  What they've really accomplished.  Nothing worth anything.  Just look at their resumes of failure.  I get offended...no, I get pissed when I'm being lied to and patronized.  Why others aren't, baffles me. 


And if we're starting to question what being "American" today is, then what about what we've been told about those people who aren't US...who aren't "Americans"...the "others"?  You know, those people in every other corner of the planet.  They don't all seem to be who we were told they were either.  Each of us who are the least bit inquisitive are starting to notice we have a lot in common with the "average Joe...or Jose...or Josef...or Yusop...or Yosef, or whatever word is used for 'Joseph' wherever", than we do with the "experts" and "leaders" claiming to share our interests...our "nationality"...and claiming to be in charge of our lives because they know better than we do how to live them.  This is a situation that will drive this blog.  Its scope is limitless.  We might think ignoring it makes us feel better, but it doesn't.  If you do, you're just "kicking the can down the road" clinging to a past that doesn't exist and working against your own self interest.  It's the reality of these "interesting times"...and it's a good thing, providing some peace of mind if you recognize it.   As Darwin noted so long ago...it's not the strongest or the smartest that will "survive".  It's the one that adapts the quickest and most efficiently.  Most people everywhere want the same things.  They want a little peace.  They want a little comfort. They want to find love and they want the most basic security of knowing they can put bread on the table for their families if they put a little work in to it.  We all want dignity.  Having to rely on someone else for our basic needs steals our dignity...while serving the self interest of someone else who wants to control you while claiming to be your savior.   

All of us feel the pressures of our day to day responsibilities.  That's nothing new.  This isn't a particularly unique time in that regard.  And it's not unique to the "average Joe" in the U.S either.  But more and more, if you're like me, we feel less and less in control of our lives. The systems that surround us want more and more of our time and money, while offering us less and less in return.  On any given day we try to balance the increasing pressures from our governments that "govern (I mean serve) us", our workplaces that "demand from us", our schools that claim to want to "educate" us, and our families who truly need us (and usually getting the short end of the stick).  The world is changing fast, and every day we are changing rapidly along with it.  Or we better be. 

It all seems random and chaotic.  I know.  But it's not really.  There are patterns happening, plans unfolding, and interests being served.  Shouldn't some of those interests be yours?  I'd be thrilled if it is...and I'll know the world will be a better place if we can make that happen.  In my job I talk to people every day who are confounded by the challenge of making sense out of their place in this time in which we live.  Sometimes I can help bring context.  And sometimes I can't.  But I do think I help just by listening and talking to them.  I had a friend, just today, do me wonders by just doing the same for me.  I like to talk and listen...and more and more I've had to accept that when they tell me they feel better because I've offered them some different way of considering their situation, the political system they feel cheated by or the economic system that seems designed to crush them...or even just life in general, they mean it.  People are good...well most people, the "average Joes" in this world.  As much as we're encouraged by the "smart people" running things to believe the opposite, they're wrong again...but convincing you that neighbors in your town and around the world are bad is doing what again?  Serving their interests.  There's a surprise, huh?  And we all know it when we pay attention to all the things that go right every day instead of the few things that went wrong.  We know who is helping us.  And we know who is causing usso much stress and pain.  

I appreciate you looking at my blog and hope you found something here in your self interest.  It won't always be heavy...but it's not going to just be fluff either.  And I'll probably annoy some people sometimes too.  I won't promise any kind of timeline of publishing either.  But it will be consistent.  It's what I want...it's in my interest to do so after all. ;-)

Leave a comment if you want.  I get ideas from you.