If you've been listening to Bernie Sanders recently, you've probably heard him talk about redistribution of wealth. According to Sanders, twenty people own more wealth than half of America and that's fundamentally wrong. He says that this situation should be corrected. Maybe he's right, but I think the solution is more complicated than anyone could possibly fit into a sound bite at a political rally.
I'll tell you up front that I like Bernie Sanders and I probably would have voted for him if he had made it through the primaries. I think the things he says are basically right, but I don't think the sweeping reforms he proposes can be achieved in a short period of time. You can't just turn 200 years of history upside down in one generation and certainly not in one or two presidential terms.
The whole idea of redistribution of wealth poses some interesting questions. Yes, it would be nice if everyone had basically the same amount of wealth and the power that comes with it, but what about the whole concept of free enterprise and "the land of opportunity?" Those ideas tell us that if you work hard you'll be successful. If you work harder then you'll be more successful. If you work harder than anyone else then you'll be more successful than anyone else.
Maybe that's what some of those 20 super rich people did. Maybe they have all that money because they worked harder or worked smarter than the rest of us. Maybe when they had a great idea they pursued it vigorously instead of just filing it away somewhere in the back of their brains like the rest of us do all the time.
Or maybe not. Maybe they made all that money because they didn't pay their employees a living wage. Or maybe they knew someone in a position of power who helped them gain an unfair advantage over their competitors. Or maybe they used a political office to advance their own businesses. Who knows.
I guess I'll conditionally agree with Bernie Sanders. If rich people gain their wealth by taking advantage of others, then I don't think they deserve it. If they gain their wealth because the playing field isn't level, then they don't deserve it. If they earn their wealth through hard work and they don't hurt anyone in the process, then I think they deserve to have what they earned.
I think the best course of action is for us all to make sure that everyone has the same opportunities available to them. Level the playing field. If they choose to take advantage of those opportunities, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too. They get to make that choice themselves. Politicians don't get to make it for them.
Tuesday, February 28, 2017
Are Immigrants Really Taking Our Jobs?
During the presidential campaign there was a lot of talk from Donald Trump about how immigrants are taking our jobs. Let's think about this for a minute. Trump's statements conjured up images of hoards of Mexicans overrunning our boarders and snatching our jobs away from us, putting millions of Americans out of work and plunging us into poverty. Is this really happening? I don't think so.
Unemployment in the United States is very low, especially compared to other countries. The last figure I heard was about 4.8 percent. While that number equates to a lot of unemployed Americans, it's a lot lower than the 7.8 percent unemployment number that Barack Obama faced when he became President. And it's certainly lower than Spain's 26 percent. So what about Trump's claims that immigrants are keeping 4.8 percent of hard working Americans from finding jobs?
I can't tell you about what's happening in every job sector, but I can tell you what's happening in the two sectors I've been in: Foodservice and Technology. Let's start with Foodservice.
Foodservice doesn't pay very much, especially for kitchen workers. The dozens of reality shows about restaurants make it sound glamorous and lucrative, but it just isn't. You work a lot of long hours in an unhealthy environment for very little money. For someone with a deep passion for food it's a way to express creativity by making beautiful things, but for the other 99% of Foodservice workers it's just really hard work for very little pay. Sorry to burst your bubble. That's just the way it is.
If you go into any restaurant kitchen in the Unites States, you'll probably find Mexicans back there. Why is that? Well, to put it simply, Mexicans are willing to work very hard for less money than Americans. They turn out a lot of quality product quickly for less pay and then they either go home or go to their other jobs. The majority of Mexicans I've worked with in Foodservice have more than one full time job. They work a lot of hours in order to make enough money to support their families. Americans prefer one job that pays enough for us to live on. Mexicans are indeed taking jobs that could be filled by Americans, but they get those jobs because we won't do them ourselves. They are not taking our jobs. They're taking jobs that Americans refuse to do. How is that wrong? My point here is that there are a lot of jobs available and, if we're going to complain that immigrants are taking them from us, then we have to be willing to take those jobs ourselves. If we're not, then immigrants who take those jobs are not harming us. They're doing us a favor.
The situation in technology is a little different. In the technology sector we see more and more workers from other countries competing for jobs. The difference is that they work harder to get those jobs. They educate themselves better, they work longer hours, and they produce. Americans see those jobs as an entitlement. Immigrants see them as a reward for hard work.
So the next time you see Donald Trump on TV whining about immigrants taking our jobs, know that it's not their fault. It's ours. We need to change our own attitudes and behaviors if we want to be more competitive in the job market.
Unemployment in the United States is very low, especially compared to other countries. The last figure I heard was about 4.8 percent. While that number equates to a lot of unemployed Americans, it's a lot lower than the 7.8 percent unemployment number that Barack Obama faced when he became President. And it's certainly lower than Spain's 26 percent. So what about Trump's claims that immigrants are keeping 4.8 percent of hard working Americans from finding jobs?
I can't tell you about what's happening in every job sector, but I can tell you what's happening in the two sectors I've been in: Foodservice and Technology. Let's start with Foodservice.
Foodservice doesn't pay very much, especially for kitchen workers. The dozens of reality shows about restaurants make it sound glamorous and lucrative, but it just isn't. You work a lot of long hours in an unhealthy environment for very little money. For someone with a deep passion for food it's a way to express creativity by making beautiful things, but for the other 99% of Foodservice workers it's just really hard work for very little pay. Sorry to burst your bubble. That's just the way it is.
If you go into any restaurant kitchen in the Unites States, you'll probably find Mexicans back there. Why is that? Well, to put it simply, Mexicans are willing to work very hard for less money than Americans. They turn out a lot of quality product quickly for less pay and then they either go home or go to their other jobs. The majority of Mexicans I've worked with in Foodservice have more than one full time job. They work a lot of hours in order to make enough money to support their families. Americans prefer one job that pays enough for us to live on. Mexicans are indeed taking jobs that could be filled by Americans, but they get those jobs because we won't do them ourselves. They are not taking our jobs. They're taking jobs that Americans refuse to do. How is that wrong? My point here is that there are a lot of jobs available and, if we're going to complain that immigrants are taking them from us, then we have to be willing to take those jobs ourselves. If we're not, then immigrants who take those jobs are not harming us. They're doing us a favor.
The situation in technology is a little different. In the technology sector we see more and more workers from other countries competing for jobs. The difference is that they work harder to get those jobs. They educate themselves better, they work longer hours, and they produce. Americans see those jobs as an entitlement. Immigrants see them as a reward for hard work.
So the next time you see Donald Trump on TV whining about immigrants taking our jobs, know that it's not their fault. It's ours. We need to change our own attitudes and behaviors if we want to be more competitive in the job market.
Saturday, February 25, 2017
The Republican Plan to Replace Obamacare
This week I had my first glimpse of the long awaited Republican plan to replace Obamacare. They've been talking about it for a long time and everyone's been waiting for it. This week someone leaked an early draft and the news media picked it up right away. All the information I used to write this post was from an NBC story on their web site. You can read it for yourself by following this link:
GOP Obamacare Replacement
Before I get too far into this I want you to understand my perspective. It might help explain why I say the things I'm about to say. And if you really don't give a crap about my perspective, then you can either move on or continue reading. There. You've been warned.
I want to say that I don't think Obamacare is perfect. In fact, I think there are a lot of problems with it. But, on the other hand, it's better than what we had before. The intent of Obamacare is to make sure everyone has better access to health insurance. It doesn't intend to provide some kind of perfect utopian solution to our healthcare dilemma. It just tries to offer something better than what we had before. And that's all.
Realistically, if you want health insurance then it's going to cost you. You're going to pay for it one way or another. You're either going to pay for it voluntarily each month or you're going to be forced into it. America is not a welfare state. The government doesn't provide everything for us. There is no provision in the Constitution that guarantees us free healthcare like you see in other countries. It would be nice if it did, but the reality is that it just doesn't.
One of the provisions of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) says that everyone is required to have insurance or face a fine. The fine comes when you file your income tax return every year. If you don't have insurance, your tax refund will be reduced. That's the incentive for us to make sure we're insured. If you happen to owe some taxes and you didn't have insurance the previous year, then you'll owe even more. If the IRS owes you money, then your refund will reduced by the amount of the fine. That's the way it works.
There are benefits to making sure everyone has insurance. Most hospitals are required by law to provide healthcare to anyone who walks in the door. This might mean sending them to a different hospital, but in America if you are sick then you will be able to get some kind of treatment for your problem somewhere. If you can't pay for it, then they have to write it off and it hits them right in the bottom line. When a hospital writes off an unpaid medical bill it doesn't relieve them from paying for all the supplies and labor that was required to treat you. They have to make that up somewhere. That "somewhere" is in the cost your health insurance company pays for your healthcare. Uninsured people who need healthcare are one of the things that makes healthcare so expensive today. It's not the only thing, but it's one of them.
I'll mention Medicaid at this point because it's also discussed in the NBC story I referenced earlier. Medicaid is intended to provide assistance with healthcare costs for low income Americans. Being a low income American isn't automatically a bad thing. It's just a fact of life. The reality is that some people just don't make as much money as other people. It doesn't mean they're bad people. It just means they don't make as much money as some other people.
Medicaid is supposed to help provide healthcare for low income Americans. we all pay for it and it's worth it, both from a moral and also from a financial perspective. From a moral perspective, it's the right thing for a civilized society to do. No one would argue that an American should die of cancer or diabetes just because his/her passion was cooking in a restaurant or working on cars. From a financial perspective, someone will have to pay for their healthcare, so it's better for us to pay a little out of each paycheck to fund Medicaid than to pay a lot more for our own healthcare. Classic social theory stuff.
All that being said, let's get back to the Republican plan to replace Obamacare. The Republican plan will favor tax breaks, health savings accounts, eliminates funding for Planned Parenthood, and practically eliminates the requirement for employers with over 50 full time employees to provide access to health insurance. It doesn't mandate that insurance companies have to accept people with pre-existing conditions. I'm not sure where to start.
Health insurance premiums are already tax free. The Republican plan does nothing for us here. Nothing at all.
Health savings accounts can be a good thing, but not for everyone. They basically say that any money you earn and deposit in a health savings account is tax free. When you need healthcare, you pay for it out of that account without having to pay any income tax on it. That sounds good, but in the end you're still paying for everything yourself. You have to save money yourself to pay for your healthcare. If you haven't saved enough money in your HSA, you have to pay the rest out of pocket. I wrote about this in detail in another blog post and you can read that for yourself if you like, but for me that means that my $25,000 hospital visit two years ago would have taken me 16 years to save for. If I had been contributing for 16 years I could have paid for it out of my HSA. And then my balance would have been zero and if I needed another visit it would have taken me another 16 years to save enough money in my HSA to pay for it. I don't know about you, but I don't schedule emergency room visits ahead of time. This wouldn't work for me.
Planned Parenthood is another story entirely. Planned parenthood provides health services to women that they wouldn't be able to afford otherwise. Republicans keep replaying some video of a Planned Parenthood employee sitting in a restaurant and discussing selling aborted fetuses. Seriously, how can you think this is an approved Planned Parenthood policy? Access to basic women's healthcare is an issue that we need to address and the answer isn't to defund the agency that provides healthcare to women who can't afford it on their own. The right answer is to figure out exactly what women need and find the best way to make sure they have it. Today that way is Planned Parenthood. This is not a question to be answered by a bunch of men sitting in a legislative chamber in Washington. This question has to be answered by women and their doctors. And we can't let our opposition to the idea of abortion supersede everything else. That would be like cutting off your whole arm if you had a paper cut on your finger.
So far the issue of pre-existing conditions hasn't been addressed by the Republican plan. Today if you enroll in Obamacare and you have a medical condition like diabetes or multiple sclerosis or even cancer, they have to accept you into the plan. You are covered. This is an important benefit that Obamacare provides. If you have an illness that you've had for a long time, the insurance company has to accept you and they have to cover you. Without that provision, they could reject you and you would have to pay for it yourself. Imagine if you had lung cancer and had to change insurance companies and the insurance company rejected you. You might be liable for hundreds of thousands of dollars for your treatment. Or worse, you might be denied the treatment you need to survive because you simply don't have enough money to pay for it.
So there you have it. It will be interesting to see what the Republicans have to offer and whether it favors the average American or the insurance companies. Hopefully it will be some reasonable compromise that we can all live with.
The one thing I would ask of you is that, if you disagree with the plan for replacing Obamacare, then please call your congressman and tell them so. And if you agree with it and think it's a good deal for America, please call them and tell them so. Your participation in the process is what guarantees your representation. If you don't participate, then you lose your voice in our future.
GOP Obamacare Replacement
Before I get too far into this I want you to understand my perspective. It might help explain why I say the things I'm about to say. And if you really don't give a crap about my perspective, then you can either move on or continue reading. There. You've been warned.
I want to say that I don't think Obamacare is perfect. In fact, I think there are a lot of problems with it. But, on the other hand, it's better than what we had before. The intent of Obamacare is to make sure everyone has better access to health insurance. It doesn't intend to provide some kind of perfect utopian solution to our healthcare dilemma. It just tries to offer something better than what we had before. And that's all.
Realistically, if you want health insurance then it's going to cost you. You're going to pay for it one way or another. You're either going to pay for it voluntarily each month or you're going to be forced into it. America is not a welfare state. The government doesn't provide everything for us. There is no provision in the Constitution that guarantees us free healthcare like you see in other countries. It would be nice if it did, but the reality is that it just doesn't.
One of the provisions of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) says that everyone is required to have insurance or face a fine. The fine comes when you file your income tax return every year. If you don't have insurance, your tax refund will be reduced. That's the incentive for us to make sure we're insured. If you happen to owe some taxes and you didn't have insurance the previous year, then you'll owe even more. If the IRS owes you money, then your refund will reduced by the amount of the fine. That's the way it works.
There are benefits to making sure everyone has insurance. Most hospitals are required by law to provide healthcare to anyone who walks in the door. This might mean sending them to a different hospital, but in America if you are sick then you will be able to get some kind of treatment for your problem somewhere. If you can't pay for it, then they have to write it off and it hits them right in the bottom line. When a hospital writes off an unpaid medical bill it doesn't relieve them from paying for all the supplies and labor that was required to treat you. They have to make that up somewhere. That "somewhere" is in the cost your health insurance company pays for your healthcare. Uninsured people who need healthcare are one of the things that makes healthcare so expensive today. It's not the only thing, but it's one of them.
I'll mention Medicaid at this point because it's also discussed in the NBC story I referenced earlier. Medicaid is intended to provide assistance with healthcare costs for low income Americans. Being a low income American isn't automatically a bad thing. It's just a fact of life. The reality is that some people just don't make as much money as other people. It doesn't mean they're bad people. It just means they don't make as much money as some other people.
Medicaid is supposed to help provide healthcare for low income Americans. we all pay for it and it's worth it, both from a moral and also from a financial perspective. From a moral perspective, it's the right thing for a civilized society to do. No one would argue that an American should die of cancer or diabetes just because his/her passion was cooking in a restaurant or working on cars. From a financial perspective, someone will have to pay for their healthcare, so it's better for us to pay a little out of each paycheck to fund Medicaid than to pay a lot more for our own healthcare. Classic social theory stuff.
All that being said, let's get back to the Republican plan to replace Obamacare. The Republican plan will favor tax breaks, health savings accounts, eliminates funding for Planned Parenthood, and practically eliminates the requirement for employers with over 50 full time employees to provide access to health insurance. It doesn't mandate that insurance companies have to accept people with pre-existing conditions. I'm not sure where to start.
Health insurance premiums are already tax free. The Republican plan does nothing for us here. Nothing at all.
Health savings accounts can be a good thing, but not for everyone. They basically say that any money you earn and deposit in a health savings account is tax free. When you need healthcare, you pay for it out of that account without having to pay any income tax on it. That sounds good, but in the end you're still paying for everything yourself. You have to save money yourself to pay for your healthcare. If you haven't saved enough money in your HSA, you have to pay the rest out of pocket. I wrote about this in detail in another blog post and you can read that for yourself if you like, but for me that means that my $25,000 hospital visit two years ago would have taken me 16 years to save for. If I had been contributing for 16 years I could have paid for it out of my HSA. And then my balance would have been zero and if I needed another visit it would have taken me another 16 years to save enough money in my HSA to pay for it. I don't know about you, but I don't schedule emergency room visits ahead of time. This wouldn't work for me.
Planned Parenthood is another story entirely. Planned parenthood provides health services to women that they wouldn't be able to afford otherwise. Republicans keep replaying some video of a Planned Parenthood employee sitting in a restaurant and discussing selling aborted fetuses. Seriously, how can you think this is an approved Planned Parenthood policy? Access to basic women's healthcare is an issue that we need to address and the answer isn't to defund the agency that provides healthcare to women who can't afford it on their own. The right answer is to figure out exactly what women need and find the best way to make sure they have it. Today that way is Planned Parenthood. This is not a question to be answered by a bunch of men sitting in a legislative chamber in Washington. This question has to be answered by women and their doctors. And we can't let our opposition to the idea of abortion supersede everything else. That would be like cutting off your whole arm if you had a paper cut on your finger.
So far the issue of pre-existing conditions hasn't been addressed by the Republican plan. Today if you enroll in Obamacare and you have a medical condition like diabetes or multiple sclerosis or even cancer, they have to accept you into the plan. You are covered. This is an important benefit that Obamacare provides. If you have an illness that you've had for a long time, the insurance company has to accept you and they have to cover you. Without that provision, they could reject you and you would have to pay for it yourself. Imagine if you had lung cancer and had to change insurance companies and the insurance company rejected you. You might be liable for hundreds of thousands of dollars for your treatment. Or worse, you might be denied the treatment you need to survive because you simply don't have enough money to pay for it.
So there you have it. It will be interesting to see what the Republicans have to offer and whether it favors the average American or the insurance companies. Hopefully it will be some reasonable compromise that we can all live with.
The one thing I would ask of you is that, if you disagree with the plan for replacing Obamacare, then please call your congressman and tell them so. And if you agree with it and think it's a good deal for America, please call them and tell them so. Your participation in the process is what guarantees your representation. If you don't participate, then you lose your voice in our future.
Don't Become What You Are Fighting Against
There have been a lot of stories in the news recently questioning Donald Trump's credibility. Time after time he says things that simply aren't true. Does he know they aren't true and then just says them anyway? Does he think he's telling the truth? Or maybe he doesn't know the difference between a lie and the truth. Maybe his mouth functions faster than his brain and this stuff just slips out before his brain can put the brakes on. I just don't know what the problem is.
What's more troubling than our president's obvious lack of credibility is that, when questioned about it later, he either denies saying it or attempts to discredit the person challenging him. Fake news. Dishonest media. Paid liberal protesters. This is particularly troubling when we see video of him making some outrageous claim, yet the next day he denies making it. Figure that one out.
This post isn't about Donald Trump's credibility. If it were, then it would be pretty short because there's not much question in anyone's mind that he lies and distorts facts on a regular basis. This post is about his detractors who exaggerate his actions to make him look even worse than he already appears. I want them to stop it. Donald Trump loses a little credibility with the American public every time he opens his mouth. Eventually he will be the cause of his own demise.
I'm talking about people and organizations who only tell part of the story in order to make his words and actions seem even more heinous. I usually wouldn't do this, but I'm going to pick on one group -- Occupy Democrats. I started following them on social media because I was excited about the whole Occupy thing a few years ago. I thought Occupy Democrats was a grass roots organization formed to take our country back from the do-nothing congress and get things back on track. It may have started out that way, but it isn't like that anymore.
For several years now I've been reading their posts with outrage. Crazy stuff. In fact, it got crazier and crazier over time. At first I thought that they were really skilled at rooting out corruption and mismanagement in our government, but their posts became more and more outrageous over time. I started to question the things they posted.
The real turning point was when I watched a Republican Senator on the evening news during a press conference. I think it was Mitch McConnell, but I don't remember for sure. I listened to what he was saying and, as usual, I disagreed with most of it. Now I can't even remember what he was talking about.
The next morning I was perusing Facebook while I had my coffee and I noticed a post from Occupy Democrats that appeared to be about what I had seen on the evening news the night before. As I read through it I realized that, although what they were saying was technically true, they were spinning the information to make you draw a completely different conclusion from the intent of his words. Parts of his speech were omitted and the Occupy Democrats editors had mixed his remaining words with their own opinions to make it sound like it was something much worse than what I heard coming right out of his mouth the night before. That was it. The credibility of Occupy Democrats went right into the crapper for me at that moment. I knew they were trying to manipulate my opinion in a way that I really didn't appreciate at all. They were trying to play me like some kind of fool.
What I'm trying to get at here is that it does no good to point out things you disagree with if you don't do it truthfully. If you're trying to make a point about someone else's credibility, then don't damage your own in the process. Eventually no one will listen to you. If you have an opinion about something and you want to tell others about it, just make sure you say that it's an opinion. And tell the whole story. Don't say that you're telling the whole story if you're really just telling the parts of it that support your opinion.
I think the Donald Trump credibility problem will eventually take care of itself. He'll either do something illegal and get in trouble for it or we'll all just get tired of listening to him and ignore him. We should be much more concerned right now about the things he's doing rather than the things he's saying.
Note to the reader: This would be a good time for me to say that anything you read on my blog is my opinion and nothing more. If you agree with me, well that's great, but it's also great if you don't. It's a free country (at least for now).
What's more troubling than our president's obvious lack of credibility is that, when questioned about it later, he either denies saying it or attempts to discredit the person challenging him. Fake news. Dishonest media. Paid liberal protesters. This is particularly troubling when we see video of him making some outrageous claim, yet the next day he denies making it. Figure that one out.
This post isn't about Donald Trump's credibility. If it were, then it would be pretty short because there's not much question in anyone's mind that he lies and distorts facts on a regular basis. This post is about his detractors who exaggerate his actions to make him look even worse than he already appears. I want them to stop it. Donald Trump loses a little credibility with the American public every time he opens his mouth. Eventually he will be the cause of his own demise.
I'm talking about people and organizations who only tell part of the story in order to make his words and actions seem even more heinous. I usually wouldn't do this, but I'm going to pick on one group -- Occupy Democrats. I started following them on social media because I was excited about the whole Occupy thing a few years ago. I thought Occupy Democrats was a grass roots organization formed to take our country back from the do-nothing congress and get things back on track. It may have started out that way, but it isn't like that anymore.
For several years now I've been reading their posts with outrage. Crazy stuff. In fact, it got crazier and crazier over time. At first I thought that they were really skilled at rooting out corruption and mismanagement in our government, but their posts became more and more outrageous over time. I started to question the things they posted.
The real turning point was when I watched a Republican Senator on the evening news during a press conference. I think it was Mitch McConnell, but I don't remember for sure. I listened to what he was saying and, as usual, I disagreed with most of it. Now I can't even remember what he was talking about.
The next morning I was perusing Facebook while I had my coffee and I noticed a post from Occupy Democrats that appeared to be about what I had seen on the evening news the night before. As I read through it I realized that, although what they were saying was technically true, they were spinning the information to make you draw a completely different conclusion from the intent of his words. Parts of his speech were omitted and the Occupy Democrats editors had mixed his remaining words with their own opinions to make it sound like it was something much worse than what I heard coming right out of his mouth the night before. That was it. The credibility of Occupy Democrats went right into the crapper for me at that moment. I knew they were trying to manipulate my opinion in a way that I really didn't appreciate at all. They were trying to play me like some kind of fool.
What I'm trying to get at here is that it does no good to point out things you disagree with if you don't do it truthfully. If you're trying to make a point about someone else's credibility, then don't damage your own in the process. Eventually no one will listen to you. If you have an opinion about something and you want to tell others about it, just make sure you say that it's an opinion. And tell the whole story. Don't say that you're telling the whole story if you're really just telling the parts of it that support your opinion.
I think the Donald Trump credibility problem will eventually take care of itself. He'll either do something illegal and get in trouble for it or we'll all just get tired of listening to him and ignore him. We should be much more concerned right now about the things he's doing rather than the things he's saying.
Note to the reader: This would be a good time for me to say that anything you read on my blog is my opinion and nothing more. If you agree with me, well that's great, but it's also great if you don't. It's a free country (at least for now).
Friday, February 24, 2017
Can You #resist ?
Are you willing to #resist? I am. I know it is going to cost me dearly. I'll lose friends, the respect of my peers, and maybe my job. I have a lot to lose, but I think it's worth it. I have to do something now. This post is about my thought process that brought me to where I am now.
This is not some kind of revelation I had today while I was driving home from work. I knew it was coming. Look, I could just sit here, keep out of the line of fire, and wait for nature to take it's course, but I can't do that any longer. I don't like what's happening today and I don't like the direction we're heading. I want things to change. And I want them to start changing now. That's what this post is about and I desperately hope you'll feel the same way. And I promise I won't hold it against you if you don't. We're all entitled to our opinions and we should be comfortable with them.
I am not happy about the direction our country is heading. I'm not just unhappy about it. I'm downright scared and I'm angry about it. Over the course of my life I've seen America change in many ways. Change has come on many fronts and all of these changes have collectively shaped us as a society. Some changes have been easy and some have been extremely painful for us, but in the end they were worth it. We're changing again right now and I'm not so sure the pain is going to be worth it this time.
By now you've probably figured out that I'm talking about our new President. I'd like to write a bunch of flowery prose here, but the short story is that I just don't trust this guy and I don't think he's going to do a good job for us. I think he's going to hurt us and he's going to enjoy doing it. There, I said it. I don't think he's in this for us. I think he's in it for himself. To him it's all about winning and fueling his ego. It's not about us.
And I'm worried. Every day I see news about how he's rolled back protections for our environment, low income Americans, or immigrants who came here hoping to build a better life for themselves and their families. These protections are not bad things. If you think about it, you'd have a hard time convincing yourself that it's good to give big oil companies permission to pollute the environment. Or that the best way to help low income Americans is to discontinue their insurance and food subsidies that they wouldn't be able to afford otherwise. Or that the refugees who are fleeing their homes to avoid watching their children die from a poison gas attack at the hands of their own government are all bad people and shouldn't be allowed to enter our country. Common sense should tell us these things, but we've just stopped listening to common sense.
At some point some of our ancestors were probably immigrants. We wouldn't be here if some asshole had prevented them from coming to America because he/she was afraid of people who were different from them. Just look at the inscription on the Statue of Liberty:
"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
This isn't some kind of code. Anyone can understand it. There are no conditions here. It is what it is and it is also what built the United States.
Ok, let's get back to #resist. I don't like what our President is doing and I'm willing to pay the price for doing something about it. If you want to know why I don't like it, then please read the other posts in my blog. There are a lot of reasons and I'm not going to repeat all that stuff here. That would be a lot of copying and pasting and, although it's worth the effort, I think you're smart enough to read it for yourself.
What am I willing to do to #resist? I think we have a lot at stake here, so I'm willing to push the envelope and do whatever gets us some relief. I feel strongly enough about this to sacrifice everything. Things are good for me now, but they haven't always been that way. I know what it's like to not know where your next meal is coming from or where you're going to sleep tonight. I've been there and I didn't like it. I'm willing to work hard to make sure someone else doesn't suffer that because of something our government did.
Hopefully you'll think about this yourself and figure out the best way for you to help. If you're not willing to protest and go to jail as a result, that's OK. If you can't call your Senator and tell him/her what you think because you want to spend that time with your kids, I understand. If you think you'll lose your job over it, I understand. If you just don't agree with me, I understand that too. But if you just don't care enough to do anything about it because you think someone else will do it for you, then fuck you. You deserve what you get.
Take action, whatever action you can take. And #resist. Right now.
This is not some kind of revelation I had today while I was driving home from work. I knew it was coming. Look, I could just sit here, keep out of the line of fire, and wait for nature to take it's course, but I can't do that any longer. I don't like what's happening today and I don't like the direction we're heading. I want things to change. And I want them to start changing now. That's what this post is about and I desperately hope you'll feel the same way. And I promise I won't hold it against you if you don't. We're all entitled to our opinions and we should be comfortable with them.
I am not happy about the direction our country is heading. I'm not just unhappy about it. I'm downright scared and I'm angry about it. Over the course of my life I've seen America change in many ways. Change has come on many fronts and all of these changes have collectively shaped us as a society. Some changes have been easy and some have been extremely painful for us, but in the end they were worth it. We're changing again right now and I'm not so sure the pain is going to be worth it this time.
By now you've probably figured out that I'm talking about our new President. I'd like to write a bunch of flowery prose here, but the short story is that I just don't trust this guy and I don't think he's going to do a good job for us. I think he's going to hurt us and he's going to enjoy doing it. There, I said it. I don't think he's in this for us. I think he's in it for himself. To him it's all about winning and fueling his ego. It's not about us.
And I'm worried. Every day I see news about how he's rolled back protections for our environment, low income Americans, or immigrants who came here hoping to build a better life for themselves and their families. These protections are not bad things. If you think about it, you'd have a hard time convincing yourself that it's good to give big oil companies permission to pollute the environment. Or that the best way to help low income Americans is to discontinue their insurance and food subsidies that they wouldn't be able to afford otherwise. Or that the refugees who are fleeing their homes to avoid watching their children die from a poison gas attack at the hands of their own government are all bad people and shouldn't be allowed to enter our country. Common sense should tell us these things, but we've just stopped listening to common sense.
At some point some of our ancestors were probably immigrants. We wouldn't be here if some asshole had prevented them from coming to America because he/she was afraid of people who were different from them. Just look at the inscription on the Statue of Liberty:
"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
This isn't some kind of code. Anyone can understand it. There are no conditions here. It is what it is and it is also what built the United States.
Ok, let's get back to #resist. I don't like what our President is doing and I'm willing to pay the price for doing something about it. If you want to know why I don't like it, then please read the other posts in my blog. There are a lot of reasons and I'm not going to repeat all that stuff here. That would be a lot of copying and pasting and, although it's worth the effort, I think you're smart enough to read it for yourself.
What am I willing to do to #resist? I think we have a lot at stake here, so I'm willing to push the envelope and do whatever gets us some relief. I feel strongly enough about this to sacrifice everything. Things are good for me now, but they haven't always been that way. I know what it's like to not know where your next meal is coming from or where you're going to sleep tonight. I've been there and I didn't like it. I'm willing to work hard to make sure someone else doesn't suffer that because of something our government did.
Hopefully you'll think about this yourself and figure out the best way for you to help. If you're not willing to protest and go to jail as a result, that's OK. If you can't call your Senator and tell him/her what you think because you want to spend that time with your kids, I understand. If you think you'll lose your job over it, I understand. If you just don't agree with me, I understand that too. But if you just don't care enough to do anything about it because you think someone else will do it for you, then fuck you. You deserve what you get.
Take action, whatever action you can take. And #resist. Right now.
Thursday, February 23, 2017
Seriously? How Much of This Bullshit Do We Have to Endure?
I'm getting tired. Really tired. Every day I get up and read the news while I drink my coffee. This used to be part of my relaxing morning routine. It helped me ease into another work day. Lately it hasn't been so relaxing.
Now I want you to understand that I don't agree with Donald Trump on anything, but I try to at least look at things with an open mind. Who knows, maybe at some point he'll do or say something I agree with. I've been doubtful and hopeful at the same time. But now I'm neither. I'm just fed up.
Every morning I spend my first waking minutes reading about things that are so bizarre and cruel that I have to read them two or three times to figure out if they actually happened or if I'm reading some kind of incredible fiction. This morning it was a bunch of articles from different news agencies reporting that Donald Trump had rolled back an executive order by Barack Obama which directed schools to allow students to use bathrooms for the gender with which they identify. If you haven't already figured out what this means, it means that a biological male can use a female restroom if he self-identifies as a female and vice versa.
Republicans are against this idea because they say every student deserves a safe learning environment and this scenario makes them feel unsafe. I think a simple way to solve the problem would be to ask the students what they think. I suspect that, for the most part, they wouldn't care one way or another. Let's just ask them. When I was a student I don't think we would have cared.
Ok, back to my point. Every day I see another example of the Trump administration's disregard for basic right and wrong. And it's not just disregard, it's indignant disregard. Mean, cruel, self-righteous disregard. Disregard for the environment. Disregard for the Constitution. Disregard for freedom of the speech and our right to listen to others. Disregard for our health. Disregard for the education of our children. Disregard for our efforts to build a decent life for ourselves. Disregard for our basic needs. Disregard for our country.
Basic social theory says that, as citizens of a country, we must contribute by paying taxes and obeying laws. In return, our country provides for us. In Trump's world things just don't work that way. Our president has built a predatory government with no intention or duty to provide for us. In fact, they are systematically taking away basic human rights as well as rights guaranteed to us by the Constitution. And I'm fed up with it.
My question now is "What are we going to do about it?" We can't put up with this forever. We can't even put up with this for four years. This man is a malignant narcissist who gets what he wants by bullying others who are in no position to resist him. He preys on the weak and defenseless. He is truly a living example of the worst qualities of mankind.
Please take a few minutes to think about our current situation. I'm not asking you to do anything crazy. I'm just asking you to speak up when you see something that you know is wrong. Not just once. Every time. Eventually this will have some effect and maybe we'll all get some relief. And maybe I'll be able to enjoy my coffee again.
Now I want you to understand that I don't agree with Donald Trump on anything, but I try to at least look at things with an open mind. Who knows, maybe at some point he'll do or say something I agree with. I've been doubtful and hopeful at the same time. But now I'm neither. I'm just fed up.
Every morning I spend my first waking minutes reading about things that are so bizarre and cruel that I have to read them two or three times to figure out if they actually happened or if I'm reading some kind of incredible fiction. This morning it was a bunch of articles from different news agencies reporting that Donald Trump had rolled back an executive order by Barack Obama which directed schools to allow students to use bathrooms for the gender with which they identify. If you haven't already figured out what this means, it means that a biological male can use a female restroom if he self-identifies as a female and vice versa.
Republicans are against this idea because they say every student deserves a safe learning environment and this scenario makes them feel unsafe. I think a simple way to solve the problem would be to ask the students what they think. I suspect that, for the most part, they wouldn't care one way or another. Let's just ask them. When I was a student I don't think we would have cared.
Ok, back to my point. Every day I see another example of the Trump administration's disregard for basic right and wrong. And it's not just disregard, it's indignant disregard. Mean, cruel, self-righteous disregard. Disregard for the environment. Disregard for the Constitution. Disregard for freedom of the speech and our right to listen to others. Disregard for our health. Disregard for the education of our children. Disregard for our efforts to build a decent life for ourselves. Disregard for our basic needs. Disregard for our country.
Basic social theory says that, as citizens of a country, we must contribute by paying taxes and obeying laws. In return, our country provides for us. In Trump's world things just don't work that way. Our president has built a predatory government with no intention or duty to provide for us. In fact, they are systematically taking away basic human rights as well as rights guaranteed to us by the Constitution. And I'm fed up with it.
My question now is "What are we going to do about it?" We can't put up with this forever. We can't even put up with this for four years. This man is a malignant narcissist who gets what he wants by bullying others who are in no position to resist him. He preys on the weak and defenseless. He is truly a living example of the worst qualities of mankind.
Please take a few minutes to think about our current situation. I'm not asking you to do anything crazy. I'm just asking you to speak up when you see something that you know is wrong. Not just once. Every time. Eventually this will have some effect and maybe we'll all get some relief. And maybe I'll be able to enjoy my coffee again.
Tuesday, February 21, 2017
Who Pays for Donald Trump's Expense Account?
Are there any limits on how much of the taxpayers' money the president can spend on himself? Should we expect him to spend our money responsibly or is it ok for him to spend it however he chooses? I'm pretty sure he gets paid for being president, so he shouldn't expect to live like a king at our expense.
Donald Trump has been in office for about a month and has already run up a tab of a little over $10 million for his commutes each weekend to Mar-A-Lago, his private club in Florida. Now to be fair, he's required to be accompanied by an entourage of Secret Service agents and other support staff and that gets expensive.
My problem is that he doesn't have to go to Mar-A-Lago every weekend. He goes there because he wants to. He could just stay in the White House like every other president has done since it was built. He's started calling it "The Southern White House," so it sounds to me like he plans to keep going there often. Can you imagine going to a resort every weekend and then telling your boss he has to pay for it? And I wonder if he's also billing the taxpayers for his suite and entertainment at Mar-A-Lago. After all, it's a private club and staying a couple of nights there would cost some serious money.
And what about Camp David? That's the presidential retreat outside of Washington that serves as a place for the president to get away from the White House for awhile. It's owned by the taxpayers and it exists to provide the president with a place to go when he/she needs a break. Presidents have used it for years and have had leaders of other countries stay there many times.
To put things in perspective, Barack Obama took occasional vacations too. He spent an average of $12.1 million of taxpayer money each year to pay for his entourage of Secret Service agents and support staff. And he paid for his family's expenses out of his own pocket. Most of the time he just stayed in Washington at the White House.
And then there's Melania Trump's residence in New York City. The tab for her security and support staff is estimated at a little more than $15 million per month. Well, more than a little more that $15 million per month. It's actually estimated at $15.25 million per month. That's 371 times the average yearly salary of an American worker. For just one month.
Now I understand the fact that they have a son in school in New York and they don't want to turn his life upside down by moving him to a new school in Washington. It's their choice, not mine. But I don't think the taxpayers should have to foot the entire bill for it, especially when the president is telling us every day how the government is spending our tax money unwisely. We didn't put the Trumps in a position where they had no choice in the matter. They chose this arrangement themselves. They apparently don't think they have to make hard choices like other Americans. And was this the only reason, or was it also because New York offers a more glamorous and less toxic social life than Washington?
So if you've been keeping track of the math, you've probably realized that the taxpayers will be subsidizing the Trump's lifestyle to the tune of $303 million per year, or about $4.2 billion during Donald Trump's first term as president. Taxpayers will be paying for this because of his choices, not because of necessity.
All this is happening at a time where the programs that average Americans depend upon are being quietly discontinued through a series of executive orders and presidential mandates. We're told every day that our country is near financial ruin and there must be cutbacks, yet it's leader spends our money like it's his own to use for whatever personal comforts he desires.
You can decide for yourself, but this looks like hypocrisy to me.
Donald Trump has been in office for about a month and has already run up a tab of a little over $10 million for his commutes each weekend to Mar-A-Lago, his private club in Florida. Now to be fair, he's required to be accompanied by an entourage of Secret Service agents and other support staff and that gets expensive.
My problem is that he doesn't have to go to Mar-A-Lago every weekend. He goes there because he wants to. He could just stay in the White House like every other president has done since it was built. He's started calling it "The Southern White House," so it sounds to me like he plans to keep going there often. Can you imagine going to a resort every weekend and then telling your boss he has to pay for it? And I wonder if he's also billing the taxpayers for his suite and entertainment at Mar-A-Lago. After all, it's a private club and staying a couple of nights there would cost some serious money.
And what about Camp David? That's the presidential retreat outside of Washington that serves as a place for the president to get away from the White House for awhile. It's owned by the taxpayers and it exists to provide the president with a place to go when he/she needs a break. Presidents have used it for years and have had leaders of other countries stay there many times.
To put things in perspective, Barack Obama took occasional vacations too. He spent an average of $12.1 million of taxpayer money each year to pay for his entourage of Secret Service agents and support staff. And he paid for his family's expenses out of his own pocket. Most of the time he just stayed in Washington at the White House.
And then there's Melania Trump's residence in New York City. The tab for her security and support staff is estimated at a little more than $15 million per month. Well, more than a little more that $15 million per month. It's actually estimated at $15.25 million per month. That's 371 times the average yearly salary of an American worker. For just one month.
Now I understand the fact that they have a son in school in New York and they don't want to turn his life upside down by moving him to a new school in Washington. It's their choice, not mine. But I don't think the taxpayers should have to foot the entire bill for it, especially when the president is telling us every day how the government is spending our tax money unwisely. We didn't put the Trumps in a position where they had no choice in the matter. They chose this arrangement themselves. They apparently don't think they have to make hard choices like other Americans. And was this the only reason, or was it also because New York offers a more glamorous and less toxic social life than Washington?
So if you've been keeping track of the math, you've probably realized that the taxpayers will be subsidizing the Trump's lifestyle to the tune of $303 million per year, or about $4.2 billion during Donald Trump's first term as president. Taxpayers will be paying for this because of his choices, not because of necessity.
All this is happening at a time where the programs that average Americans depend upon are being quietly discontinued through a series of executive orders and presidential mandates. We're told every day that our country is near financial ruin and there must be cutbacks, yet it's leader spends our money like it's his own to use for whatever personal comforts he desires.
You can decide for yourself, but this looks like hypocrisy to me.
Sunday, February 19, 2017
The Difference Between Indians and Native Americans
I was discussing current events with a couple of guys from work the other day and one of them asked me why I described some of the Standing Rock protesters as Native Americans rather than Indians. I explained it to him, but I think it went right over his head.
I explained to him that Indians are people who come from the country of India. Native Americans are the indigenous people of the Americas. Calling them Indians is like saying people from Nebraska are calledTexans. It just doesn't make any sense.
And then there are all the negative connotations associated with the term Indians. When I was young we were taught all about the "Indians" and the early settlers. In our textbooks the Native Americans were always called Indians and they were almost always described as bloodthirsty savages. If you've ever spent a significant amount of time with a Native American, you know that just the opposite is true. They are generally very peaceful souls trying to live in tune with nature and with each other. Native Americans don't have some genetic trait that makes them want to go around scalping people. In fact, they learned how to do that from white people. The rest of us have a lot to learn from them.
So why did my generation consider the Native Americans of 200 years ago to be bloodthirsty savages? Well, put yourself in their shoes for a minute. A bunch of people show up on your shores one day and think they can just take whatever they want from you by force. You're going to get a little angry about it, aren't you? I sure would. I would do whatever was necessary to preserve my people and their way of life, including cracking open a few heads. That's what they did and that's why we were taught that they were bloodthirsty savages. We only got one side of the story.
I won't get into what ensued over the next 200 years because I don't know enough about it, but we need to cut the Native Americans a little slack and take a minute to understand why they're mad at us. And stop calling them Indians. They're not from India. They are from America.
There. Finally got that off my chest.
I explained to him that Indians are people who come from the country of India. Native Americans are the indigenous people of the Americas. Calling them Indians is like saying people from Nebraska are calledTexans. It just doesn't make any sense.
And then there are all the negative connotations associated with the term Indians. When I was young we were taught all about the "Indians" and the early settlers. In our textbooks the Native Americans were always called Indians and they were almost always described as bloodthirsty savages. If you've ever spent a significant amount of time with a Native American, you know that just the opposite is true. They are generally very peaceful souls trying to live in tune with nature and with each other. Native Americans don't have some genetic trait that makes them want to go around scalping people. In fact, they learned how to do that from white people. The rest of us have a lot to learn from them.
So why did my generation consider the Native Americans of 200 years ago to be bloodthirsty savages? Well, put yourself in their shoes for a minute. A bunch of people show up on your shores one day and think they can just take whatever they want from you by force. You're going to get a little angry about it, aren't you? I sure would. I would do whatever was necessary to preserve my people and their way of life, including cracking open a few heads. That's what they did and that's why we were taught that they were bloodthirsty savages. We only got one side of the story.
I won't get into what ensued over the next 200 years because I don't know enough about it, but we need to cut the Native Americans a little slack and take a minute to understand why they're mad at us. And stop calling them Indians. They're not from India. They are from America.
There. Finally got that off my chest.
Repealing Obamacare
Republicans have been making noises about repealing and replacing Obamacare for some time now. It's no secret that repealing it is high on their list of priorities. I've seen news stories over the last few weeks saying that their replacement would be some type of HSA, or Health Savings Account, so I decided I should find out more about HSAs.
According to the information I could find, an HSA is an account where you can deposit pre-tax money to be used later to pay for your qualifying healthcare costs. If you don't use it, the money just sits there until you need it. If you are lucky enough to go through your entire life without any qualifying healthcare expenses, you can eventually withdraw it and pay taxes at the time of withdrawal. You also pay a penalty if you withdraw your money before you reach a certain age, just like the penalty you would pay if you withdrew money early from your 401k.
So let's do some simple math. If your Obamacare insurance costs you $150 per month, you'll pay about $1800 per year in premiums. If you're healthy and you don't incur any major healthcare expenses, your $1800 is gone. You will never see it again. If you took that $1800 and put it in an HSA, you might eventually see your money again if you don't use it. Depending on what you use it for, you may be able to withdraw that money after you reach a certain age and get it back, but you may have to pay tax on it at that time and you may also have to pay a penalty for withdrawing it. Your Obamacare premiums are not ever taxed.
But what if you have a major medical expense? I'll give you an example from my own experience. A couple of years ago I had an adverse reaction to some medication and had to be taken to the hospital in an ambulance late one night. I was unconscious and could not make healthcare choices on my own. When I woke up the next afternoon, I learned that the hospital suspected a stroke and had done a bunch of tests, including a CT scan, EEG, and an MRI. I went home the same day and a few days later I received a bill for my 12 hour hospital visit. It was about $25,000. My insurance company paid all but $500.
What would have happened if I had an HSA instead of insurance? I would have had to pay the hospital bill out of my HSA. If there wasn't enough money in my HSA to cover the entire bill, I would have had to pay the rest myself. At that time I was paying about $130 per month for my insurance. If I had been putting $150 per month into an HSA instead, I would have had to contribute to my HSA for 192 months, or 16 years, to cover the cost of my hospital visit. And that's if I didn't have to use any of it to pay for any yearly check-ups or any preventative healthcare during those 16 years. And, assuming that I had contributed for 16 years, all my HSA money would be gone after my hospital visit. What would happen if I needed another hospital visit before another 16 years ticked by and I had replenished my HSA? I would have to pay for it out of my pocket. That's what would happen.
You don't have to be a rocket scientist to see that paying $130 each month for insurance makes more sense for me. Republicans are saying that Obamacare is too expensive for people to afford, but the bottom line is that if you can't afford to pay $130 per month for Obamacare, then you aren't going to be able to afford putting $130 per month into an HSA either.
Think about it and see if you still feel the same way about repealing Obamacare.
According to the information I could find, an HSA is an account where you can deposit pre-tax money to be used later to pay for your qualifying healthcare costs. If you don't use it, the money just sits there until you need it. If you are lucky enough to go through your entire life without any qualifying healthcare expenses, you can eventually withdraw it and pay taxes at the time of withdrawal. You also pay a penalty if you withdraw your money before you reach a certain age, just like the penalty you would pay if you withdrew money early from your 401k.
So let's do some simple math. If your Obamacare insurance costs you $150 per month, you'll pay about $1800 per year in premiums. If you're healthy and you don't incur any major healthcare expenses, your $1800 is gone. You will never see it again. If you took that $1800 and put it in an HSA, you might eventually see your money again if you don't use it. Depending on what you use it for, you may be able to withdraw that money after you reach a certain age and get it back, but you may have to pay tax on it at that time and you may also have to pay a penalty for withdrawing it. Your Obamacare premiums are not ever taxed.
But what if you have a major medical expense? I'll give you an example from my own experience. A couple of years ago I had an adverse reaction to some medication and had to be taken to the hospital in an ambulance late one night. I was unconscious and could not make healthcare choices on my own. When I woke up the next afternoon, I learned that the hospital suspected a stroke and had done a bunch of tests, including a CT scan, EEG, and an MRI. I went home the same day and a few days later I received a bill for my 12 hour hospital visit. It was about $25,000. My insurance company paid all but $500.
What would have happened if I had an HSA instead of insurance? I would have had to pay the hospital bill out of my HSA. If there wasn't enough money in my HSA to cover the entire bill, I would have had to pay the rest myself. At that time I was paying about $130 per month for my insurance. If I had been putting $150 per month into an HSA instead, I would have had to contribute to my HSA for 192 months, or 16 years, to cover the cost of my hospital visit. And that's if I didn't have to use any of it to pay for any yearly check-ups or any preventative healthcare during those 16 years. And, assuming that I had contributed for 16 years, all my HSA money would be gone after my hospital visit. What would happen if I needed another hospital visit before another 16 years ticked by and I had replenished my HSA? I would have to pay for it out of my pocket. That's what would happen.
You don't have to be a rocket scientist to see that paying $130 each month for insurance makes more sense for me. Republicans are saying that Obamacare is too expensive for people to afford, but the bottom line is that if you can't afford to pay $130 per month for Obamacare, then you aren't going to be able to afford putting $130 per month into an HSA either.
Think about it and see if you still feel the same way about repealing Obamacare.
Saturday, February 18, 2017
Our President Is Not Like Us
Is your president like you? Mine isn't. If you live in the United States and you are reading this in February of 2017, then we have the same President. And he's not like me. He doesn't understand me. He has no idea what I deal with every day and he never will, yet he decides my fate and governs my every action. I don't like this arrangement one bit.
When we elect a President we are taking a leap of faith. We expect our President to look out for us and act in our best interests. We trust him. Even if we didn't vote for him, we expect him to look out for us on some level and do what's right for the country. We understand that sometimes a President has to make tough decisions that may not benefit us individually, but are good for the country as a whole.
This time around we didn't get that. I'll tell you up front that I didn't vote for Donald Trump. I'm not a Hillary Clinton supporter, but I voted for her because I thought she was the better of two bad choices. Donald Trump won the election whether you like it or not. I don't like it. And if Hillary Clinton had won, it's likely that I would be writing this post about her. Now that we have that out of the way, I'll continue with what I want to say.
Donald Trump is not like me. He can't understand what I deal with every day. That's not his fault and I don't hold that against him. What I do hold against him, however, is that his ego is more important to him than my problems. What's good for him is more important than what's good for me. I just don't buy it this time around.
The problems I deal with every day are different from his, so how can he understand them? He doesn't understand what it's like to have to decide whether to pay the gas bill or buy your kid a birthday present. He doesn't understand what it's like to look at your bank balance and try to figure out if you're going to make it to the next payday. He's never had to deal with that, so how can he know? He doesn't worry about global warming and the effect his actions will have on the environment. He doesn't worry about what will happen if wolves in Montana are hunted to extinction. He doesn't worry about what will happen if we allow a Canadian pipeline company to desecrate Native American burial grounds by running pipelines through them. He doesn't worry about the impact to our children of putting someone in charge of our public schools who has never seen the inside of one. He doesn't know any of the things I worry about every day. The fact that he doesn't know these things concerns me, but not as much as the fact that he just doesn't care to know about them because all these things are not as important to him as his ego. To him, facts are not as important as perception.
I'd like to say that I don't fault him for this because that's the way he is and he can't help it, but that's not true. I do fault him for it. It gets in the way of his ability to do his job. We knew he had a big ego when we elected him, but I don't think we realized how big it really was and how much it needs to be fed.
Donald Trump has never had to make the decisions that I have had to make. Good for him. I'm glad for him. But that's not my problem with him. My problem is that he claims to know what is best for me, yet he doesn't understand why I feel the way I do and he doesn't care that he doesn't understand.
If we give tax breaks to big business then things will be better for me. If we ignore what scientists are telling us about global warming then things will be better for me. If we allow oil companies to build pipelines then things will be better for me. If we relax regulations on predatory banks then things will be better for me. If we abolish the EPA and eliminate laws that protect our environment then things will be better for me. If we make it easier for big business to make money then things will be better for me.
I'm not the smartest guy in the world, but I just don't see the upside for me. I think there's too much risk. I'm not convinced that making sacrifices to ensure the success of big business means things will be better for me. Sorry, but that's what I think. I've made several decisions in my life when my gut told me not to and I've found that my gut is always right. Not sometimes. Always.
Look, you've probably read some of the other posts on my blog and you know I'm not a fan of Donald Trump. I think he's a malignant narcissist and a compulsive liar. He can't help it. That's the way he is. The question is whether we trust him to guide our country and represent us to the rest of the world . My answer would be no, but you can form your own opinions. Just do me a favor and try to think this out for yourself rather than listen to the sound bites and political posturing we hear every day. Think for yourself and make your own decision.
When we elect a President we are taking a leap of faith. We expect our President to look out for us and act in our best interests. We trust him. Even if we didn't vote for him, we expect him to look out for us on some level and do what's right for the country. We understand that sometimes a President has to make tough decisions that may not benefit us individually, but are good for the country as a whole.
This time around we didn't get that. I'll tell you up front that I didn't vote for Donald Trump. I'm not a Hillary Clinton supporter, but I voted for her because I thought she was the better of two bad choices. Donald Trump won the election whether you like it or not. I don't like it. And if Hillary Clinton had won, it's likely that I would be writing this post about her. Now that we have that out of the way, I'll continue with what I want to say.
Donald Trump is not like me. He can't understand what I deal with every day. That's not his fault and I don't hold that against him. What I do hold against him, however, is that his ego is more important to him than my problems. What's good for him is more important than what's good for me. I just don't buy it this time around.
The problems I deal with every day are different from his, so how can he understand them? He doesn't understand what it's like to have to decide whether to pay the gas bill or buy your kid a birthday present. He doesn't understand what it's like to look at your bank balance and try to figure out if you're going to make it to the next payday. He's never had to deal with that, so how can he know? He doesn't worry about global warming and the effect his actions will have on the environment. He doesn't worry about what will happen if wolves in Montana are hunted to extinction. He doesn't worry about what will happen if we allow a Canadian pipeline company to desecrate Native American burial grounds by running pipelines through them. He doesn't worry about the impact to our children of putting someone in charge of our public schools who has never seen the inside of one. He doesn't know any of the things I worry about every day. The fact that he doesn't know these things concerns me, but not as much as the fact that he just doesn't care to know about them because all these things are not as important to him as his ego. To him, facts are not as important as perception.
I'd like to say that I don't fault him for this because that's the way he is and he can't help it, but that's not true. I do fault him for it. It gets in the way of his ability to do his job. We knew he had a big ego when we elected him, but I don't think we realized how big it really was and how much it needs to be fed.
Donald Trump has never had to make the decisions that I have had to make. Good for him. I'm glad for him. But that's not my problem with him. My problem is that he claims to know what is best for me, yet he doesn't understand why I feel the way I do and he doesn't care that he doesn't understand.
If we give tax breaks to big business then things will be better for me. If we ignore what scientists are telling us about global warming then things will be better for me. If we allow oil companies to build pipelines then things will be better for me. If we relax regulations on predatory banks then things will be better for me. If we abolish the EPA and eliminate laws that protect our environment then things will be better for me. If we make it easier for big business to make money then things will be better for me.
I'm not the smartest guy in the world, but I just don't see the upside for me. I think there's too much risk. I'm not convinced that making sacrifices to ensure the success of big business means things will be better for me. Sorry, but that's what I think. I've made several decisions in my life when my gut told me not to and I've found that my gut is always right. Not sometimes. Always.
Look, you've probably read some of the other posts on my blog and you know I'm not a fan of Donald Trump. I think he's a malignant narcissist and a compulsive liar. He can't help it. That's the way he is. The question is whether we trust him to guide our country and represent us to the rest of the world . My answer would be no, but you can form your own opinions. Just do me a favor and try to think this out for yourself rather than listen to the sound bites and political posturing we hear every day. Think for yourself and make your own decision.
Thursday, February 16, 2017
Oil and Water Don't Mix
Today began the next chapter of an environmental battle here in Nebraska that will affect everyone in the Unites States. TransCanada, a Canadian oil company, filed another application to build their controversial Keystone XL pipeline across our state so they could transport Canadian tar sand oil from the oil fields in Canada to the Gulf of Mexico. Tar sand oil is a secondary product that is squeezed out of oil wells that have stopped producing. It contains many impurities and is known in the oil industry as the dirtiest kind of oil because of this.
In his first few weeks in office Donald Trump extended an invitation to TransCanada and another pipeline company, Energy Transfer Partners, to resume construction of the new pipelines that President Obama had effectively killed over environmental and human rights issues. Nothing Donald Trump does, no matter how bizarre, illegal, racially unjust, or morally bankrupt surprises us anymore, so the resurrection of these projects was expected.
I have environmental concerns over both of these projects. I am also opposed to the Dakota Access Pipeline (the Energy Partners project) because of the harm it will cause to Native Americans living in or near it's path. I believe it's just another example of the US government ignoring the basic human rights of a minority because they think they can get away with it. I think this time things might turn out differently, but we'll have to wait and see. The Native American protesters at Standing Rock have the support of most Americans and are willing to resort to any means to stop construction of DAPL. Their willingness to give up everything, including their lives in many cases, may limit the options of the government and force a change in plans for that project.
My main concerns over Keystone XL are environmental. There is a large body of water that runs underneath most of the pipeline's path, from South Dakota all the way to Texas. It is know as the Ogallala Aquifer and it is perhaps the most important water supply in America. Let me tell you why.
Scientists have estimated that the amount of water contained in the Ogallala aquifer is roughly the same amount contained in Lake Huron. Because both the saturated thickness and the areal extent of the Ogallala Aquifer is greater in Nebraska, the state accounts for two-thirds of the volume of Ogallala groundwater, followed by Texas and Kansas, each with about 10 percent. If spread across the U.S. the water contained in the aquifer would cover all 50 states with 1.5 feet of water.
The Ogallala Aquifer is the most important source of water for us here in the High Plains region (we call it the midwest, but scientists call it the High Plains region). It provides nearly all our water for residential, industrial, and agricultural use. Farming in this region accounts for about 20% of the wheat, corn, cotton, and cattle produced in the US. Without irrigation from the Ogallala Aquifer, none of this would even be possible.
If you want to learn more about the Ogallala Aquifer, you can find more information here.
By now you should have an idea of how big the Ogallala Aquifer is and why it's so important to us. Without it, it would be impossible to produce up to 20% of this country's agricultural products. That's a lot of stuff that would need to be sourced elsewhere at a much higher cost to the consumer. The other alternative would be to just do without.
My greatest concern with the Keystone XL is that it runs right above the aquifer, only a few feet in some places. If an accident occurred, oil would flow directly into the aquifer. Proponents of the pipeline say that nature is resilient and that the aquifer would cleanse itself of oil spilled into it over time. Yes it will, but in this case "over time" means about 10,000 years. TransCanada has a pretty good safety record, but it's not perfect. Would you want to risk your supply of fresh water on their safety record?
Proponents of the pipeline also say that it will bring new jobs to the US. Yes, this is true. It will create a large number of construction jobs while the pipeline is being built. These jobs disappear after the pipeline is operational. TransCanada has stated that after it's initial construction, Keystone XL will provide 35 permanent jobs. That's 35 jobs total, not the thousands that the Trump administration claims. I have no idea where they got their claim of thousands of permanent jobs. TransCanada says otherwise.
Advocates of the pipeline also claim that Keystone XL will reduce America's dependency on oil from the Middle East and South America. This would be a true statement if any of the refined oil was going to stay in the US, but it isn't. TransCanada will ship tar sand oil through the pipeline to a refinery on the Gulf coast, where it will be refined and loaded on tankers bound for China. They have stated this fact already, so there is no basis to the Trump administrations's claim that this oil will be available for use in the United States.
I can't figure out what the Trump administration hopes to gain by moving this project forward. Our president either has a personal interest buried somewhere in the pipeline or he's simply not smart enough to see that it would be harmful to build it. From what we've seen so far it seems like he makes decisions based on what sounds good at the moment rather than through careful consideration and information gathering. And with an ego like his, once the decision has been made he is afraid he will lose face by changing it, so he viciously defends even his worst decisions rather than admitting he made an error.
So the bottom line here is that a Canadian company wants to ship the dirtiest oil product in existence across our water supply, refine it, and then ship it to China. The oil will be produced by a Canadian company, owned by a Canadian company, and sold by that Canadian company to a Chinese company. The only thing we get out of this deal are 35 jobs and we also have to figure out how to dispose of the waste products produced during the refining process before the finished product is shipped somewhere else. And we get to bear the risk of not being able to use our water supply for the next 10,000 years. Not a Canadian water supply or a Chinese water supply. Our water supply.
Does that sound like a good deal to you? Not to me. I'm not yet sure what kind of activism I'll use to try and stop this from happening, but I'm not going to sit by and just watch. I hope you will also get involved because the whole country has a lot to lose and very little to gain if the Keystone XL is built.
Wednesday, February 15, 2017
How Your Franklin Planner is Killing Your Relationships
The Franklin Planner. I've used one and maybe you have, too. Although the Franklin Planner may help you organize your life, it may be slowly killing you and those around you. I want to tell you about it before it's too late.
If you already know how a Franklin Planner works, you can skip ahead a few paragraphs if you want. If you don't already know, then read on. The next few paragraphs will help you put this terrible force you're dealing with into perspective.
Most of us make lists of things we need to do. You might not make them all the time, but at some point in your life you've probably had a bunch of stuff you needed to get done and you wrote them down on a scrap of paper, a legal pad, or maybe even the palm of your hand just to make sure you didn't forget anything. It was your "to-do list." Really not a big deal, right? To start to understand the Franklin Planner, think of it as a to-do list on steroids.
For each day of the year, the Franklin Planner has two facing pages. The left side has a bunch of lines where you write your to-do list. To the left of each item there are two more spaces, one for the priority of your task and the other for it's status. The page on the right side is your schedule for the day broken into 15 minute sections. The idea is to completely map out your whole day, both how you're going to spend every second and what you are going to accomplish during your waking hours.
This may seem to be pretty innocuous, but when you dig into it a little more, you will see a different picture. You are supposed to start your day with something called "Planning and Solitude." This is the number one item on your list every day and it also occupies the first 30 minutes of your day. The idea here is to spend 30 minutes making your to-do list and prioritizing all your tasks. Think about it. The first item on your to-do list is to make your to-do list. Your day is about to get completely out of hand and you haven't even been out of bed for an hour yet.
A couple of paragraphs ago I mentioned the spaces for priority and status. During your Planning and Solitude time, one of the things you're supposed to be doing is prioritizing your list. To prioritize, you put and A, B, or C next to each item. Of course, you may have more than one of each priority of items, so you put a number after the letter to indicate the priority within the priority. I suppose you could probably add another letter or number if you like so you'd have a priority within a priority within a priority. You leave the status field blank until you actually start working on the task. At that point you put a dot in the field and then change the dot to a check mark whe the task is completed. If you need to move the task to the next day, you put a right-facing arrow in the field and then copy the task to the next day. You are only allowed to do this once for B and C tasks, but not at all for A tasks. A tasks have to be completed that day no matter what. You can also delegate the task to someone else. I can't remember the mark you use to indicate that the task was delegated.
Now, when you think about it you might think this sounds like a pretty good system of keeping things organized. And you'd be right because it is. The Franklin Planner is a great system for organizing your tasks so you don't have to remember every little task you need to get done. The problem is what comes with your planner.
People are often introduced to the Franklin Planner through a training course offered in their workplace. The Franklin Planner courses teach users that there is nothing more important than organization and that not completing at least your A tasks is unacceptable. They don't come right out and say it, but you are a failure if you're pages aren't completely filled with tasks and scheduled events and you are not able to successfully put check marks next to each item before the end of your day. Nothing less is acceptable. No exceptions. Your are taught to judge the success or failure of your day by the number of tasks you complete and how much of the day's calendar was filled. Congratulations, your new Franklin Planner comes with a free membership in a cult.
You might say that buying into this whole thing is an individual choice, but unfortunately it doesn't always stop there. Remember the status field next to each item? One of the things you are allowed to put in there is a mark that says you have delegated the task to someone else. That's fine if you're at work and you manage a group of people, but when your task list starts to fill with tasks that belong in your non-work life, then the line between work life and personal life begins to blur. And when you start delegating personal tasks to family members, friends, and others you have a big problem. When your planner isn't large enough to hold all the tasks and scheduled events you identified during your Planning and Solitude so you go buy a larger one, you are obsessed, not productive. When you start assigning tasks to your family, then you have a huge problem that isn't going to go away by itself.
When the people you live with work just as hard as you all week and look forward to some down time on the weekend, the last thing they want to see when they get up on Saturday morning is a two page list of things for them to do by the end of the day. They will resent the fact that you think it is your responsibility to plan their day for them. It isn't. Their time is theirs, not yours.
So, if you use a Franklin Planner or something similar, do a little extra thinking tomorrow morning during your Planning and Solitude and decide if your planner is hurting you or your loved ones. Get things back in balance before it's too late.
If you already know how a Franklin Planner works, you can skip ahead a few paragraphs if you want. If you don't already know, then read on. The next few paragraphs will help you put this terrible force you're dealing with into perspective.
Most of us make lists of things we need to do. You might not make them all the time, but at some point in your life you've probably had a bunch of stuff you needed to get done and you wrote them down on a scrap of paper, a legal pad, or maybe even the palm of your hand just to make sure you didn't forget anything. It was your "to-do list." Really not a big deal, right? To start to understand the Franklin Planner, think of it as a to-do list on steroids.
For each day of the year, the Franklin Planner has two facing pages. The left side has a bunch of lines where you write your to-do list. To the left of each item there are two more spaces, one for the priority of your task and the other for it's status. The page on the right side is your schedule for the day broken into 15 minute sections. The idea is to completely map out your whole day, both how you're going to spend every second and what you are going to accomplish during your waking hours.
This may seem to be pretty innocuous, but when you dig into it a little more, you will see a different picture. You are supposed to start your day with something called "Planning and Solitude." This is the number one item on your list every day and it also occupies the first 30 minutes of your day. The idea here is to spend 30 minutes making your to-do list and prioritizing all your tasks. Think about it. The first item on your to-do list is to make your to-do list. Your day is about to get completely out of hand and you haven't even been out of bed for an hour yet.
A couple of paragraphs ago I mentioned the spaces for priority and status. During your Planning and Solitude time, one of the things you're supposed to be doing is prioritizing your list. To prioritize, you put and A, B, or C next to each item. Of course, you may have more than one of each priority of items, so you put a number after the letter to indicate the priority within the priority. I suppose you could probably add another letter or number if you like so you'd have a priority within a priority within a priority. You leave the status field blank until you actually start working on the task. At that point you put a dot in the field and then change the dot to a check mark whe the task is completed. If you need to move the task to the next day, you put a right-facing arrow in the field and then copy the task to the next day. You are only allowed to do this once for B and C tasks, but not at all for A tasks. A tasks have to be completed that day no matter what. You can also delegate the task to someone else. I can't remember the mark you use to indicate that the task was delegated.
Now, when you think about it you might think this sounds like a pretty good system of keeping things organized. And you'd be right because it is. The Franklin Planner is a great system for organizing your tasks so you don't have to remember every little task you need to get done. The problem is what comes with your planner.
People are often introduced to the Franklin Planner through a training course offered in their workplace. The Franklin Planner courses teach users that there is nothing more important than organization and that not completing at least your A tasks is unacceptable. They don't come right out and say it, but you are a failure if you're pages aren't completely filled with tasks and scheduled events and you are not able to successfully put check marks next to each item before the end of your day. Nothing less is acceptable. No exceptions. Your are taught to judge the success or failure of your day by the number of tasks you complete and how much of the day's calendar was filled. Congratulations, your new Franklin Planner comes with a free membership in a cult.
You might say that buying into this whole thing is an individual choice, but unfortunately it doesn't always stop there. Remember the status field next to each item? One of the things you are allowed to put in there is a mark that says you have delegated the task to someone else. That's fine if you're at work and you manage a group of people, but when your task list starts to fill with tasks that belong in your non-work life, then the line between work life and personal life begins to blur. And when you start delegating personal tasks to family members, friends, and others you have a big problem. When your planner isn't large enough to hold all the tasks and scheduled events you identified during your Planning and Solitude so you go buy a larger one, you are obsessed, not productive. When you start assigning tasks to your family, then you have a huge problem that isn't going to go away by itself.
When the people you live with work just as hard as you all week and look forward to some down time on the weekend, the last thing they want to see when they get up on Saturday morning is a two page list of things for them to do by the end of the day. They will resent the fact that you think it is your responsibility to plan their day for them. It isn't. Their time is theirs, not yours.
So, if you use a Franklin Planner or something similar, do a little extra thinking tomorrow morning during your Planning and Solitude and decide if your planner is hurting you or your loved ones. Get things back in balance before it's too late.
Sunday, February 12, 2017
Learning to Hate Someone
I take hating someone else very seriously. By that I don't mean to say that I enjoy it or that it's a hobby for me. Just the opposite. It's an unpleasant task that I'd rather not do, but I'm sorry to report that I've done it anyway. To me, hating someone else is a last resort. It's what you do after you've tried everything you can possibly do to explain their existence in the same world as you. It is one of the worst feelings in the world and I hope you never have to do it.
Hate is one of the strongest emotions we as humans can experience. It is unpleasant and not satisfying in any way. Now I'm not talking about just mentioning to a friend that you hate someone while you're discussing a local band, a Facebook post, or your boss. That's dislike or disapproval, but it's not real hate. Real hate is actually wishing that they didn't exist. Real hate can escalate into deplorable actions if it's not controlled by moral values and common sense. Thankfully, I've never let mine escalate that far and my brain would hopefully not let me take any of these actions.
I believe our brains need to somehow organize all of the information passing through them each day. By organizing and categorizing, the brain builds memories, knowledge, and emotional bonds. I think that when a brain has too much unpleasant information relating to a person, place, or thing it becomes unable to categorize this unpleasantness and just parks the information in a category called "things I hate." For most people the number of things parked in this category is very small. Some lucky people go through life without ever using this category at all. Some people figure out a way to move items out of this category and put them into a category called "things I don't like." Some unfortunate people can't tolerate having anything in this category and spend a lot of their time trying to move things out of it by removing the information stored there out of their lives entirely.
Throughout the course of my life I've only really hated one person. True story. Sure, I have a number of people and things in my "things I don't like" category (scallops, cucumbers, egocentric presidents, and of course menudo), but there's only one item in the "things I hate" category. To understand why he's there, you have to understand how he earned his place there.
In the mid 1980's I was lucky enough to land a job at one of Omaha's best country clubs as a Sous Chef. I was excited about it because I was going to work for one of the best chefs in the midwest. If you're thinking that "good chef" and "midwest" shouldn't be used in the same sentence, you're wrong. We have a vibrant, innovative, and rapidly growing food scene here. When I started working at the club there were more restaurants per capita than in any other city in America. I worked there happily for about a year before the Executive Chef decided to leave and go to an exclusive private club located on the top floor of an office building downtown. This restaurant was where Omaha's elite dined. The country club had a very wealthy and influential membership, but even most wealthy and influential of these people didn't qualify for membership at the chef's new place. After he left, I acted as Executive Chef at the country club while they searched for a new chef. I considered trying to get the job, but I just wasn't ready for that kind of position yet.
This is where the hate part of the story begins. The club's General Manager hired a Executive Chef from an exclusive country club in Pennsylvania and moved him and his family to Omaha. His name was Nabil. He was from Egypt and we were all told that he had impressive credentials, although all we really knew for sure was that the GM had worked with him somewhere in the past. I had worked with chefs from other countries in the past and I knew that there were cultural differences that we should be aware of. Sometimes someone from another culture does something that you think is mean or disrespectful, but they mean no harm. The reverse is also true. It takes a little time to figure out all of these things, but in the end we are basically all the same and mean no harm. Except for this guy. He was toxic.
Eager to establish his authority as Executive Chef, he immediately changed all the salaried employees' work schedules to "6:00AM until I say that you can leave" for seven days a week. If we wanted a day off we would need to ask him ahead of time. Even if he granted our request, it was subject to change without notice. There were several times where I had asked for a day off and he approved my request. Then, at 9:00AM on my day off I'd receive a phone call asking why I wasn't at work and that, if I wanted to keep my job, I had better get to the club immediately. The day chef, banquet chef and myself all had young families, so this was a big problem for us.
The quality of food began to suffer. We were not allowed to purchase quality ingredients anymore. No fresh fish, no quality meats, bargain basement produce, and very little inventory to work with. We couldn't even order staples like salt and pepper, so we bought our own and brought them to work hidden in our knife rolls. Dairy was rationed. We made a lot of French food, so the shortage of heavy cream and butter alone crippled our production. Our signature recipes were changed. The items that the club had been known for were removed from the menu or altered so they no longer resembled the things our customers had loved for many years.
There were a number of times when we didn't have the basic ingredients to prepare for banquets scheduled for the day. Nabil's solution was to simply serve them something else. I remember one function for about 50 people where the event's sponsor had made it clear to us that he wanted a certain cut of steak and a small cold water lobster tail. He contacted the kitchen several times to make sure we were procuring the best steaks available and that the lobster tails were cold water tails instead of commodity lobster tails like you get at Red Lobster. He kept telling us that price was no object. He wanted the best of everything.
On the morning of the event we still did not have any lobster or steaks in the building. I had asked Nabil about it on the previous two days and he assured me that he was handling it. I went to his office and asked him again. He replied with "What do you need them for? How do you expect me to get steak and lobster on such short notice?" I wanted to say "It's your fucking job, you incompetent douche-nozzle," but I held my tongue and apologized for interrupting him. He said that he was supposed to meet his friend Bashir at Perkins for tea and now I had ruined it for him because I wasn't doing my job and he would have to spend that time procuring steak and lobster.
By 4:00 we still hadn't seen any steak or lobster arrive, so I asked him again. He responded with an angry tirade about being the only person who ever did any work and rushed off to the golfer's grill downstairs. After about half an hour he came back with a large tray of hamburger patties and 3 boxes of frozen breaded shrimp. "Here. You will serve them this. And make sure this doesn't happen again or you will not work here any more." He Disappeared back into his office upstairs.
You may not fully understand the hierarchy in a professional kitchen, so I'll sum it up as briefly as I can. The Executive Chef is the undisputed boss. You absolutely MUST do whatever he/she tells you. There is no other option. Period. The Executive Chef tells his Sous Chefs and Banquet Chefs what he want done and they make sure it is done. As a Sous Chef you have to make sure it gets done no matter what the cost or level of effort. And it is not your place to question the Executive Chef on anything. Ever. No exceptions. That's pretty much how it goes down every day in almost every kitchen.
So we prepared the items he told us to prepared and everyone, including the General Manager, watched in horror as it was all taken out to the tables. The general Manager and service staff understood the kitchen hierarchy and that we just didn't have any other choice but to serve what Nabil told us to serve. We were not held responsible.
But there were repercussions. The club member sponsoring the event went ballistic, and with good reason. He had gone to great lengths to make sure we were planing on serving a spectacular meal and we didn't do it. And who wants to pay $95 per plate for something you can get at the Long John Silver's drive-thru for $3.49? We had embarrassed the club member in front of 50 of his closest friends. The next morning the member was waiting in the General Manager's office with a board member when the GM arrived at work. The door was immediately closed and remained closed for over an hour. Then Nabil was summoned and the door remain closed for another hour. This time angry voices and uncontrolled screaming could be heard form outside the door.
Afterwards, Nabil immediately called a mandatory meeting for 2:00 that afternoon. Everyone including those who had the day off were required to attend or be fired. When the meeting started, Nabil immediately began screaming at us about how incompetent we were. We were told that the only reason we had jobs was because of him. He told us that we had better shape up or we would be fired. He did this for about an hour, but never told us what we had done wrong or how we need to to "shape up." It was just an angry, incoherent rant. At several times during his tantrum, he pointed his index finger at his chest and screamed "I am the best! You have no idea how good I am! You are lucky to be working for me and don't forget it!"
It was during that day that I realized three things:
First, he could control what we did every day, but he couldn't control what we were thinking. This thought was somehow comforting.
Second, I realized that I was sitting ion the front row and that my chef's coat was wet from minute droplets of his saliva that he had been spitting all over us in his rage.
Third, I realized that I truly hated this man. Not dislike, but true hate.
The Nabil situation went on for a long time after that. There were more screwed up banquets, more meetings behind closed doors, more mandatory rage sessions for us, and every day his grip over all of us became more intense and stifling. All creativity and joy in our work was forcefully and completely drained from us. Any time we were seen talking to another employee we were questioned at length about the subject of our conversation. More arabic-speaking kitchen staff members were hired and Nabil spoke to them in Arabic when he didn't want the rest of us to understand what they were talking about. We suspected that they were placed in the kitchen to keep an eye on us when he wasn't around, which was most of the time. We tested this theory by saying a few things in front of them that we knew Nabil would want to hear and then seeing if the information was passed back to him. Our suspicions were proved to be entirely correct.
Nabil was Egyptian, but he had an American wife. They had been married about 10 years and had somehow managed to have 12 children together. During the birth of their last child, there were some complications and they were told she could not bear any more children. Nabil was not happy about this and he began to openly telling everyone that he was looking for a new wife because he was "done with this one" since she could no longer bear any more children. What a piece of shit.
In order to pave the way for dumping his current wife and starting to look for a new one, he packed up all 12 children one night and took them to stay with his family in Egypt. He was gone three weeks. He had not told anyone, including the General Manager, that he was going, yet he was somehow allowed to keep his job. His wife had no way of retrieving her children and had not even had a chance to say goodbye to them. She just woke up one morning and everyone was gone. According to Nabil it was her fault and he was protecting his children.
Nabil made several more trips to Egypt during his first six months at the club and we realized that he had spent more time in Egypt than he had spent at his job. And he was paid for all of it. Each time he returned we were all immediately summoned to another mandatory meeting and berated again just like I described earlier. By now we all knew he was the pure embodiment of evil. I don't mean that sarcastically, either.
After almost a year of this, I just couldn't take any more and resigned during one of his trips to Egypt. I had no place to go, but even being unemployed was better than working for him for one more minute. Everyone at the club, including the General Manager who had hired Nabil, understood completely and supported my decision. It was obvious that the GM regretted his hiring decision and had expresses it several times.
What does all this have to do with hate? I told you all of that because of the impact it has had on the rest of my life. Even after 32 years I still despise that man like no other and that, my friends, is true hatred. It's the kind of hate where if you saw him on the side of the road next to a broken down car in the middle of nowhere with his thumb out asking for a ride, you would have to make a decision. The decision wouldn't be whether or not to stop and give him a ride. The decision would be whether or not to swerve over and hit him with your car going 70 miles per hour. I know I hate that man because I'm not completely sure I would just keep driving past and ignore him.
I'm happy to say that Nabil is the only person I've encountered in my life that I truly hate. I lost track of Nabil a long time ago. The last I heard of him was that he had been travelling in Kuwait on an American passport at the start of the first gulf war, so karma may have taken care of things for me when the Iraquis invaded. I hope you are one of the people who is lucky enough to never have to hate someone during your lifetime. It would be way better that way.
Hate is one of the strongest emotions we as humans can experience. It is unpleasant and not satisfying in any way. Now I'm not talking about just mentioning to a friend that you hate someone while you're discussing a local band, a Facebook post, or your boss. That's dislike or disapproval, but it's not real hate. Real hate is actually wishing that they didn't exist. Real hate can escalate into deplorable actions if it's not controlled by moral values and common sense. Thankfully, I've never let mine escalate that far and my brain would hopefully not let me take any of these actions.
I believe our brains need to somehow organize all of the information passing through them each day. By organizing and categorizing, the brain builds memories, knowledge, and emotional bonds. I think that when a brain has too much unpleasant information relating to a person, place, or thing it becomes unable to categorize this unpleasantness and just parks the information in a category called "things I hate." For most people the number of things parked in this category is very small. Some lucky people go through life without ever using this category at all. Some people figure out a way to move items out of this category and put them into a category called "things I don't like." Some unfortunate people can't tolerate having anything in this category and spend a lot of their time trying to move things out of it by removing the information stored there out of their lives entirely.
Throughout the course of my life I've only really hated one person. True story. Sure, I have a number of people and things in my "things I don't like" category (scallops, cucumbers, egocentric presidents, and of course menudo), but there's only one item in the "things I hate" category. To understand why he's there, you have to understand how he earned his place there.
In the mid 1980's I was lucky enough to land a job at one of Omaha's best country clubs as a Sous Chef. I was excited about it because I was going to work for one of the best chefs in the midwest. If you're thinking that "good chef" and "midwest" shouldn't be used in the same sentence, you're wrong. We have a vibrant, innovative, and rapidly growing food scene here. When I started working at the club there were more restaurants per capita than in any other city in America. I worked there happily for about a year before the Executive Chef decided to leave and go to an exclusive private club located on the top floor of an office building downtown. This restaurant was where Omaha's elite dined. The country club had a very wealthy and influential membership, but even most wealthy and influential of these people didn't qualify for membership at the chef's new place. After he left, I acted as Executive Chef at the country club while they searched for a new chef. I considered trying to get the job, but I just wasn't ready for that kind of position yet.
This is where the hate part of the story begins. The club's General Manager hired a Executive Chef from an exclusive country club in Pennsylvania and moved him and his family to Omaha. His name was Nabil. He was from Egypt and we were all told that he had impressive credentials, although all we really knew for sure was that the GM had worked with him somewhere in the past. I had worked with chefs from other countries in the past and I knew that there were cultural differences that we should be aware of. Sometimes someone from another culture does something that you think is mean or disrespectful, but they mean no harm. The reverse is also true. It takes a little time to figure out all of these things, but in the end we are basically all the same and mean no harm. Except for this guy. He was toxic.
Eager to establish his authority as Executive Chef, he immediately changed all the salaried employees' work schedules to "6:00AM until I say that you can leave" for seven days a week. If we wanted a day off we would need to ask him ahead of time. Even if he granted our request, it was subject to change without notice. There were several times where I had asked for a day off and he approved my request. Then, at 9:00AM on my day off I'd receive a phone call asking why I wasn't at work and that, if I wanted to keep my job, I had better get to the club immediately. The day chef, banquet chef and myself all had young families, so this was a big problem for us.
The quality of food began to suffer. We were not allowed to purchase quality ingredients anymore. No fresh fish, no quality meats, bargain basement produce, and very little inventory to work with. We couldn't even order staples like salt and pepper, so we bought our own and brought them to work hidden in our knife rolls. Dairy was rationed. We made a lot of French food, so the shortage of heavy cream and butter alone crippled our production. Our signature recipes were changed. The items that the club had been known for were removed from the menu or altered so they no longer resembled the things our customers had loved for many years.
There were a number of times when we didn't have the basic ingredients to prepare for banquets scheduled for the day. Nabil's solution was to simply serve them something else. I remember one function for about 50 people where the event's sponsor had made it clear to us that he wanted a certain cut of steak and a small cold water lobster tail. He contacted the kitchen several times to make sure we were procuring the best steaks available and that the lobster tails were cold water tails instead of commodity lobster tails like you get at Red Lobster. He kept telling us that price was no object. He wanted the best of everything.
On the morning of the event we still did not have any lobster or steaks in the building. I had asked Nabil about it on the previous two days and he assured me that he was handling it. I went to his office and asked him again. He replied with "What do you need them for? How do you expect me to get steak and lobster on such short notice?" I wanted to say "It's your fucking job, you incompetent douche-nozzle," but I held my tongue and apologized for interrupting him. He said that he was supposed to meet his friend Bashir at Perkins for tea and now I had ruined it for him because I wasn't doing my job and he would have to spend that time procuring steak and lobster.
By 4:00 we still hadn't seen any steak or lobster arrive, so I asked him again. He responded with an angry tirade about being the only person who ever did any work and rushed off to the golfer's grill downstairs. After about half an hour he came back with a large tray of hamburger patties and 3 boxes of frozen breaded shrimp. "Here. You will serve them this. And make sure this doesn't happen again or you will not work here any more." He Disappeared back into his office upstairs.
You may not fully understand the hierarchy in a professional kitchen, so I'll sum it up as briefly as I can. The Executive Chef is the undisputed boss. You absolutely MUST do whatever he/she tells you. There is no other option. Period. The Executive Chef tells his Sous Chefs and Banquet Chefs what he want done and they make sure it is done. As a Sous Chef you have to make sure it gets done no matter what the cost or level of effort. And it is not your place to question the Executive Chef on anything. Ever. No exceptions. That's pretty much how it goes down every day in almost every kitchen.
So we prepared the items he told us to prepared and everyone, including the General Manager, watched in horror as it was all taken out to the tables. The general Manager and service staff understood the kitchen hierarchy and that we just didn't have any other choice but to serve what Nabil told us to serve. We were not held responsible.
But there were repercussions. The club member sponsoring the event went ballistic, and with good reason. He had gone to great lengths to make sure we were planing on serving a spectacular meal and we didn't do it. And who wants to pay $95 per plate for something you can get at the Long John Silver's drive-thru for $3.49? We had embarrassed the club member in front of 50 of his closest friends. The next morning the member was waiting in the General Manager's office with a board member when the GM arrived at work. The door was immediately closed and remained closed for over an hour. Then Nabil was summoned and the door remain closed for another hour. This time angry voices and uncontrolled screaming could be heard form outside the door.
Afterwards, Nabil immediately called a mandatory meeting for 2:00 that afternoon. Everyone including those who had the day off were required to attend or be fired. When the meeting started, Nabil immediately began screaming at us about how incompetent we were. We were told that the only reason we had jobs was because of him. He told us that we had better shape up or we would be fired. He did this for about an hour, but never told us what we had done wrong or how we need to to "shape up." It was just an angry, incoherent rant. At several times during his tantrum, he pointed his index finger at his chest and screamed "I am the best! You have no idea how good I am! You are lucky to be working for me and don't forget it!"
It was during that day that I realized three things:
First, he could control what we did every day, but he couldn't control what we were thinking. This thought was somehow comforting.
Second, I realized that I was sitting ion the front row and that my chef's coat was wet from minute droplets of his saliva that he had been spitting all over us in his rage.
Third, I realized that I truly hated this man. Not dislike, but true hate.
The Nabil situation went on for a long time after that. There were more screwed up banquets, more meetings behind closed doors, more mandatory rage sessions for us, and every day his grip over all of us became more intense and stifling. All creativity and joy in our work was forcefully and completely drained from us. Any time we were seen talking to another employee we were questioned at length about the subject of our conversation. More arabic-speaking kitchen staff members were hired and Nabil spoke to them in Arabic when he didn't want the rest of us to understand what they were talking about. We suspected that they were placed in the kitchen to keep an eye on us when he wasn't around, which was most of the time. We tested this theory by saying a few things in front of them that we knew Nabil would want to hear and then seeing if the information was passed back to him. Our suspicions were proved to be entirely correct.
Nabil was Egyptian, but he had an American wife. They had been married about 10 years and had somehow managed to have 12 children together. During the birth of their last child, there were some complications and they were told she could not bear any more children. Nabil was not happy about this and he began to openly telling everyone that he was looking for a new wife because he was "done with this one" since she could no longer bear any more children. What a piece of shit.
In order to pave the way for dumping his current wife and starting to look for a new one, he packed up all 12 children one night and took them to stay with his family in Egypt. He was gone three weeks. He had not told anyone, including the General Manager, that he was going, yet he was somehow allowed to keep his job. His wife had no way of retrieving her children and had not even had a chance to say goodbye to them. She just woke up one morning and everyone was gone. According to Nabil it was her fault and he was protecting his children.
Nabil made several more trips to Egypt during his first six months at the club and we realized that he had spent more time in Egypt than he had spent at his job. And he was paid for all of it. Each time he returned we were all immediately summoned to another mandatory meeting and berated again just like I described earlier. By now we all knew he was the pure embodiment of evil. I don't mean that sarcastically, either.
After almost a year of this, I just couldn't take any more and resigned during one of his trips to Egypt. I had no place to go, but even being unemployed was better than working for him for one more minute. Everyone at the club, including the General Manager who had hired Nabil, understood completely and supported my decision. It was obvious that the GM regretted his hiring decision and had expresses it several times.
What does all this have to do with hate? I told you all of that because of the impact it has had on the rest of my life. Even after 32 years I still despise that man like no other and that, my friends, is true hatred. It's the kind of hate where if you saw him on the side of the road next to a broken down car in the middle of nowhere with his thumb out asking for a ride, you would have to make a decision. The decision wouldn't be whether or not to stop and give him a ride. The decision would be whether or not to swerve over and hit him with your car going 70 miles per hour. I know I hate that man because I'm not completely sure I would just keep driving past and ignore him.
I'm happy to say that Nabil is the only person I've encountered in my life that I truly hate. I lost track of Nabil a long time ago. The last I heard of him was that he had been travelling in Kuwait on an American passport at the start of the first gulf war, so karma may have taken care of things for me when the Iraquis invaded. I hope you are one of the people who is lucky enough to never have to hate someone during your lifetime. It would be way better that way.
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