Dr. Mom: November 2008

Fighting the constant stream of misinformation Mom gets living in central Florida...

-------Original Message-------
From: Dr. Lisa Earle
Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2008 3:49 PM
Subject: Fw: Again....food for thought

Kinda scary to ponder over...
-------Froward Message-------
From: gjparrish@...

DO READ THIS !!!! It has the ring of truth! Love ya., Jean
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Subject:How Long Do We Have?
NOW HERE IS SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT. SAD PART IS THE FACT THAT IT WILL WORK THAT WAY. SO FAR WE ARE THE ONLY COUNTRY THAT HAS LASTED WITH A DEMOCRACY OVER THE TWO HUNDRED YEARS.

HOW LONG DO WE HAVE?
This is the most interesting thing I've read in a long time. The sad thing about it, you can see it coming.
I have always heard about this democracy countdown. It is interesting to see it in print. God help us, not that we deserve it.

How Long Do We Have?
About the time our original thirteen states adopted their new constitution in 1787, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh , had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years earlier:
'A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government.'
'A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury.'
>From that moment on, the majority always vote for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.'
'The average age of the world's greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years'
'During those 200 years, those nations always progressed through the following sequence:
1. From bondage to spiritual faith;
2. From spiritual faith to great courage;
3. From courage to liberty;
4. From liberty to abundance;
5. From abundance to complacency;
6. From complacency to apathy;
7. From apathy to dependence;
8. From dependence back into bondage'

Professor Joseph Olson of Hemline University School of Law, St. Paul, Minnesota, points out some interesting facts concerning the 2000 Presidential election:
Number of States won by: Democrats: 19 Republicans: 29
Square miles of land won by: Democrats: 580,000 Republicans: 2,427,000
Population of counties won by: Democrats: 127 million Republicans: 143 million
Murder rate per 100,000 residents in counties won by: Democrats: 13.2 Republicans: 2.1
Professor Olson adds: 'In aggregate, the map of the territory Republican won was mostly the land owned by the taxpaying citizens of this great country. Democrat territory mostly encompassed those citizens living in government-owned tenements and living off various forms of government welfare...' Olson believes the United States is now somewhere between the 'complacency and apathy' phase of Professor Tyler's definition of democracy, with some forty percent of the nation's population already having reached the 'governmental dependency' phase.
If Congress grants amnesty and citizenship to twenty million criminal invaders called illegal's and they vote, then we can say goodbye to the USA in fewer than five years.
If you are in favor of this, then by all means, delete this message. If you are not, then pass this along to help everyone realize just how much is at stake, knowing that apathy is the greatest danger to our freedom.

WE LIVE IN THE LAND OF THE FREE,
ONLY BECAUSE OF THE BRAVE

-------Original Message-------
From: Dave Ruden
Date: 11/13/2008 5:36:53 PM

Well this is kinda disturbing.
I was with it (although wondering about its “truthiness” ;) until the rather incorrect Joseph Olson stuff.
Yes, the geographic area won by Rep is larger than that won by Dem.
But…
Lie number 1: It was 28 Dem to 21 Rep (with Missouri *still* undecided).
Lie number 2: The popular vote tally was 66.6Mil for Dem, 58.2Mil for Rep.
(If eligible voters didn’t vote, they don’t count in this particular statistic.
And I assume children count with their parents (until they can vote themselves).)
Lie number 3: Well I don’t know the stats on Murder-rates, but given the above two, I would guess
that this is either a lie also, or at least misleading.

As for having a larger geographic area, that counts for little. The LAND doesn’t vote. People do. Huge tracts of Rep-claimed land is very sparsely populated – consider Alaska for example. It makes up nearly half of the number claimed to Rep below all by itself.

Furthermore, I’d say that in those states where concentration of population is higher, there seems to be an intrinsic understanding that Society is a cooperative structure. One where we work together to succeed, and allow for high levels of tolerance for differences among people.
Seems to me the Blue states are more ‘evolved’ socially than the “me only, screw everyone else” Red state mentality.

So there’s my 2 cents (or 5 bucks maybe ;).
----Dave

-------Original Message-------
From: Dr. Lisa Earle
Sent: Thursday, November 13, 2008 5:45 PM

Thanks for the Analysis...makes sense!
Love you, Mom

-------Original Message-------
From: Dave Ruden
Sent: Friday, November 14, 2008 10:52 AM

Hmm, I just noticed that the Olson write-up below is for the 2000 election, not the most recent.
I wonder if there was some kind of subtle intent to confuse that one with this one.
Nonetheless, Olson’s stats on the states and vote counts are probably correct then. However I still don’t see what it has anything to do with the series of “on Democracies” quotes enumerated above it (and I still don’t trust the ‘murder-rate’ stat).

Is he claiming that the Dem states are mostly comprised of welfare leaches? I would hope everyone would immediately see this as an incredibly stupid statement. So ok, if not that then he must be claiming that the Dem states hold most of the welfare recipients and the Red states generally don’t have welfare recipients. I’d be willing to bet that this is false. The Red states generally encompass very rural America. Lots of great places and great people there. But there is also an oppressive amount of poverty there – lack of industry, lack of opportunity, lack of jobs that pay a decent living wage. Lots of people living in rural America subsist on what they earn, but plenty others of them take on welfare.

And here’s another stat for you. The vast majority of welfare recipients are on it for less than 2 years, use it in the way it was intended as temporary help while they find proper means for self-support (e.g. jobs), and then get off it. The Rep’s keep screaming about the abusive use of welfare. They get all upset over hearing about the cases where it is abused, but neglect to notice that that is a small percentage of its beneficiaries. And even for those few Reps that do understand the stats on it, they would rather see the entire thing shut down rather than let it improperly benefit a single abuser.

If a single abuse of welfare – stop doing it! (i.e. shut down the system)
I offer up another one for them:
If a single abuse of the death penalty (i.e. execute an innocent citizen) – stop doing it!
The Reps do not apply the same logic to this issue as they do to welfare. Hypocrisy is rampant among that group’s platform. Dems also to be sure have their hypocrisies, but I think quite more so for the Reps.

See, I can live with the hypocrisy of saying on the one hand
If a single abuse of death penalty, stop doing it.
And on the other hand
If a single abuse of welfare, keep doing it.
Because the error/mistake of a system where the welfare abuse can happen, can be corrected – the abuser can be caught and removed from welfare (or even prosecuted legally). Whereas the error/mistake of the death penalty applied to an innocent person, is simply impossible to correct. That degree of tragedy should be disallowed, and this completely mitigates the hypocrisy of above position.

So at least I try to think my way through my hypocrisies – many I find a way to reconcile (like this example above), a few I don’t and simply accept my hypocrisy. The Reps, it seems to me, do not even try at all to think about how incredibly hypocritical they are in their various positions.

o) No to welfare because it can make mistakes; but yes to death penalty even though it can make mistakes.

o) Yes this is a Democracy, by, of, and for the *people*; but yes the gov was founded as a Christian nation, and *God* should be directing its path. – Take your pick, democracy or theocracy? You can’t have both.

o) Yes, government should have a law against gay marriage because it’s religiously immoral to some; but no government should not be telling people what to do.
- That’s a big one, and recurs as a frequent hypocrisy.

o) Yes government should make abortion illegal because it’s religiously immoral to some; but no government should not be telling people what to do.

o) Yes government should ban stem-cell research because it’s religiously immoral to some; but no government should not be telling people what to do.

o) Yes keep government out of environmental protection; but no don’t let *my* backyard be polluted.

The list could go on and on. They simply don’t make any damned sense in far too many areas.
If the Rep party sticks to its core value – “Small government. Fiscal responsibility in government”, then they would at least mostly make sense.
But these folks have completely forgotten this core-value of their party. It started to waver back and forth on them in the late 60s and 70s I think. By the 80s, the core value was completely lost among a few big incompatible values that hijacked the party. It has been lost ever since.

If they can eject this extra value-clutter and return to the core of simply small gov and fiscal responsibility, they’d get my respect. Maybe not my vote, but I’d respect them for at least being mostly internally consistent.

Whoops... got me going on that one. :)))
---D.

-------Original Message-------
From: Dave Ruden
Date: 11/12/2008 4:03:48 PM
To: Dr. Lisa Earle; J Ruden
Subject: Little Switzerland Blog

Hi Mom, Julie,
I’ve got some quick write up on our weekend in Little Switzerland up on my blog. I’ve created a Dave And Pam blog for collecting these things, rather than having to create a new blog for every trip or such. Have a look!
(btw, you can make comment on it, I think)
http://daveandpamela.blogspot.com/
Love you.
---Dave.

-------Original Message-------
From: Dr. Lisa Earle
Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2008 4:38 PM

Thanks for sharing - it's the kind of weekend, that I find truly delightful! I really enjoyed the "Freudian Slip" at the end of your well-written tale (...this truly LOVEY (LOVELY?) WOMAN...

You both look great, although you seem to be in need of a shave ( mustache must goooo)...

Love you bunches...
MOM

-------Original Message-------
From: Dave Ruden
Date: 11/12/2008 4:54:00 PM

Yep, I could have bet you wouldn’t like the new style-addition :{)>
Didn’t notice the Freudian Slip. Good catch!
Love you.
---D.

-------Original Message-------
From: Dr. Lisa Earle
Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2008 5:03 PM

Are you trying to resemble Johnny Depp (on a baaaad day?) How does Pam like the moustache?

-------Original Message-------
From: Dave Ruden
Date: 11/12/2008 5:09:14 PM

You’re funny!

I let it grow out some for Halloween – leaving myself open for costume options (e.g. a grungy looking pirate or some such). Pam said she liked it, so I’ve been hanging onto it for a little while. It was looking a bit scraggly for the pics in the blog. Just yesterday I picked up a trim-kit for it, so it’s a bit more tame looking. Keeping it pretty short (1/3 as long as in the photos), plus a bit cleaned up around the edges. Still trying to figure out what works best ☺.
---D.

-------Original Message-------
From: Dr. Lisa Earle
Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2008 5:39 PM

Sorry, but I still vote against it...and Pam wouldn't want to hurt your feelings, I
Believe...
---M.

-------Original Message-------
From: Dave Ruden
Date: 11/13/2008 10:06:15 AM

:)
Probably so, but Pam definitely likes it, so I’m going with it for the time being :).
Love you!
---Dave.

-------Original Message-------
From: Dr. Lisa Earle
Sent: Thursday, November 13, 2008 11:19 AM

Pam must be very much in love with you , so she rather encourages you to uglify your clean cut features...(not many others then will try to flirt with you...

Your mean, but loving MOM!

P.S. I also realize, the minute I criticized, you would do just the opposite :)))

-------Original Message-------
From: Dave Ruden
Date: 11/13/2008 10:40:25 AM
:)))
To be frank, I’m not crazy about the goatee-thing. I’m not used to it, and I don’t quite see the appeal. However, it should be repeated that in the photo from last weekend, it was becoming quite unkempt looking, and even Pam made mentioned of it. I’ve got it trimmed back now and it looks much better (though I still don’t understand the appeal). Pam likes it, and several of my women friends have commented that they quite liked it as well. Their response was such that I take it as real (as opposed to simply being polite). I don’t understand it, but perhaps it’s just the part of the country here – i.e. they like it more here. Who knows :).
Love.
---D.

PS, Attached is a pic I just now took. Not so great a shot, but it shows the shorter trimming :).

-------Original Message-------
From: Dr. Lisa Earle
Sent: Thursday, November 13, 2008 2:40 PM

Looks a little better- so, try it for awhile, although it does make you look older and more mature!

P.S. I still personally think, you look more handsome clean shaven...but have fun!!!
Love you, with or without Goatee...:)))
MOM

Dr. Mom

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