There’s an old saying that, “perception is reality.”

How absolutely true that is.

Please take a moment to consider the following.

What is the world around us other than how we perceive it?

Each of us has our own unique and personal perception of the world around us, our own unique and personal reality.

I suggest that there are only two possibilities:

Either you exist because I do, or we all exist separately in our own realities, and in either situation we exist in our own reality.

I don’t think it is possible to prove which one is the case either.

We may share a reality that is very similar, but no two realities could ever be exactly the same.

Our minds are incredibly powerful entities.

Our mind translates and deciphers the input it gets from our senses and presents this information back to itself or to the conscious being inside of us.

For example, take the word “us” from the previous sentence. When we read the word “us,” there’s a lot of processing going on in our brains. First we recognize the shape “u” represents the letter “u.” Next we associate the sound “uh” with that “u.” We go through the same process for the “s,” and then we put them together to form the word “us,” which represents or is defined as a person, a place, a thing, an action, etc. And that’s just language. Think about all of the experiences, relationships and knowledge that help to shape the translating and deciphering our mind does.

Do “we” exist only because our mind exists, or do we “exist” regardless of the functionality of our minds?

If someone suffers brain damage, or from alzheimers, is there a “conscious” life force still in there that just can’t communicate via its physical vehicle anymore, or is that “person” that once was there now gone?

Since there is only one thing for sure, that we each live in our own reality, I choose to believe our life force, or spirit, lives on regardless of what happens to our temporary physical entity here on earth.

And there’s nothing you can say or do that will change that reality… unless I allow it.

That’s the reality of it all!

“We don’t see things as they are, we see things as we are.” – Anais Nin

It looks like Congress has been having a party, and you can either be sexually harassed or have cake…and they’re all out of cake!

It would appear these establishment representatives, leading members in “the swamp,” have no shame and no limit as to how low they will go.

Apparently, these establishment politicians feel entitled, and they have attempted to make themselves above reproach, or at least comfortably unaccountable.

So, let’s dig a little deeper and see how this all works. (I hope you’re sitting down and have taken your blood pressure medicine!)

According to the Office of Compliance’s own web site, this is what they do:

“The Congressional Accountability Act of 1995 (CAA) protects over 30,000 employees of the legislative branch nationwide and establishes the Office of Compliance (OOC) to administer and ensure the integrity of the Act through its programs of dispute resolution, education, and enforcement. The OOC assists members of Congress, employing offices and employees, and visiting public in understanding their rights and responsibilities under the workplace and accessibility laws. The OOC advises Congress on needed changes and amendments to the CAA; and the OOC’s General Counsel has independent investigatory and enforcement authority for certain violations of the CAA.”

Of course that all sounds good, and of course quite innocuous, but where does it mention paying-off victims of sexual harassment?

Anyway, all of this was established back in 1995. This was the first piece of legislation passed by the 104th Congress. Bill Clinton was our esteemed president and Bob Dole was the majority leader in the house. Neither party can point fingers with this one, however, as the bill passed, incredibly, with a 429-0 vote. Everybody was on-board for this one!

Since the inception of this law, it is now being reported that at least 268 “cases” have been “settled” through 2014, with the final number of cases expected to be over 350, counting 2015 and 2016.

What about 2017 you say? Since President Trump took office, there have not been any “settlement” requests. Hmmm, I wonder why that is?

The OOC has paid out over $17 million in settlements to date. And where did this $17 million come from?

The Taxpayers! You and I.

These members of Congress misbehave and “We the People” get to pay for it!

Well isn’t that special!

I don’t recall getting a “thank you,” do you?

Can I hear again how the budget is so tight and that we can’t afford to cut this or lower that?

I didn’t think so.

Of course, when it was attempted to establish some level of accountability somewhere, reporters found that, “It’s not clear how many other lawmakers, if any, in addition to the House administration committee’s top two members are privy to details about the settlements and payments.”

In addition, a source in House Speaker Paul Ryan’s office told reporters that, “Mr. Ryan is not made aware of the details of harassment settlements, …and that the top Democrat and Republican on the House administration committee review proposed settlements and both must approve the payments.”

Not to be outdone, a source in Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s office indicated that, “Ms. Pelosi also is not made aware of those details, and that they are confined to the parties of the settlement and the leaders of the administration committee.”

They of course are “conducting a full review” of this entire situation and, “working on multiple bills to reform this secretive and woefully inadequate process.”

Of course you are…now that you’ve been busted!

It’s the “same old, same old.” Back in “the swamp,” you get to do pretty much whatever you want without fear of being caught, found, or even being identified.

Why isn’t this story not being pursued tirelessly by the media?

Why isn’t the media demanding some answers here?

Well, I’ll tell you, because this all happened prior to 2017 and President Trump can’t be blamed for any of it, that’s why.

President Trump and his administration are doing what they can, but there are only so many hours in a day, and “the swamp” is big, and it stinks.

Reading and writing English is a little easier if you grew up with it, but English is actually one of the hardest, if not the hardest language to learn and use.

The problem is our letters represent multiple sounds and many words have multiple meanings.

Some words are spelled exactly the same, but are pronounced differently.

Other words can be spelled and sound the same, but mean something totally different. In other cases, words can be spelled differently, but pronounced the same!

This is not the case with most other languages. So how do we know what’s what!? Wait, what?

Most good readers of the English language use context clues (how the word is being used in the sentence) to help them know what word is appropriate to be used in that case.

Check out these crazy examples below of our wonderful English language!

The bandage was wound around his leg to cover his wound.

The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.

“No time like the present,” he said.  “It’s time to present her with the present.”

Startled, the dove dove into the bushes.

I did not object to the object being used as evidence.

We were too close to the door to close it.

When does are near, a buck does funny things.

She shed a tear when she saw the tear in her dress.

John had to write to the right people to keep his rights during his rites.    See what I mean!?

Let’s face it, English is a crazy language.  Consider the following:

There is no egg in eggplant, nor ham in hamburger.

There are neither apples nor pine in a pineapple.

Are you ready for some more?

Quicksand actually works slowly and boxing rings are square.

One mouse, two mice, means one house, two hice, right?

If a vegetarian eats vegetables, then what does a humanitarian eat?!  Yeow!

Who else has noses that run and feet that smell?

How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same thing, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?

You have to marvel at the craziness of a language in which your house can burn up while it’s burning down, forms are filled out by being filled in, and an alarm that’s gone off is on.   That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible!

Just remember, we can all weather the storm, whether we like the weather or not!

Ok! Enough already! Let’s just give our brains credit for being able to sort this all out.

Thank you to Dr. Albrecht Classen, from the University of Arizona, for contributing to this article.

Envision a dark and foggy swamp. Now envision a spooky island, located deep in the heart of the swamp.  That is where “the deep state” resides. Like a voodoo witch doctor, affecting outcomes and influencing actions from places unseen, impregnable and unaccountable.

“The deep state” is like a grand consortium of vampires. We can’t really hope to destroy them, but we can drive them further into the shadows by shining some light on them from time to time.

“The deep staters” have varying interests. Some are mainly interested in self-preservation, while others try to use the government to fulfill their private ambitions, to get richer and to obtain more power.  Mostly, it’s about money and power, just like always.

Have no doubt that “the deep state” is the enemy of “We The People.” “Their” interests and “Our” interests are seldom the same.  “The deep state” has advantages over “Us” in that “We” are not organized, and even if “We” were, “We” would have a hard time identifying “Our” exact enemy.

The intelligence community, in general, are denizens of “the swamp” and citizens of “the deep state.”

President Trump has become the point man for “We The People” against “the deep state.” He has taken his fight with the intelligence community public, thus shining some light on “the deep state.”  “They” obviously don’t like this and they now have President Trump in their sights, at least according to former NSA intelligence analyst John Schindler, who tweeted that a friend in the “intelligence community” told him that Trump “will die in jail.”  Pretty scary, huh?

“The deep state” is basically a three-headed monster.  We have already discussed one of those three heads, the intelligence community.  A second head would be private corporate power, especially associated with finance, the arms trade, and fossil fuels.  The third head would represent the many embedded bureaucrats of the US government’s many administrative agencies.

“The deep state” also likes to encourage groups of individuals within “We The People” to argue and fight amongst themselves. In this way, “they” keep “Us” focused on each other and not on “them.”

It is also a popular strategy of “the deep state” to use misinformation to “spin” the discussion and form a narrative that is more desirable for them. President Trump, for example, though fighting for “We The People” against “the swamp” on a daily basis, is painted as incompetent or a problem rather than as a defender of “We The People.”

Just remember, “The truth will set you free, but first it will probably make you mad!”

The “Thanksgiving” that The Pilgrims celebrated back in 1621 (almost 400 years ago) may not have been exactly what many of us believe it was, but it was probably pretty close. Let’s take a look.

Their first year in this new land had been a very difficult one to say the least, and they were just truly thankful to be alive. They were also very thankful to the Native American people who helped them to survive in this new land, and of course they were thankful to God as well.

Almost a year earlier the first landing party had arrived at the site of what later became the settlement of Plymouth. During that first winter, the Mayflower colonists suffered greatly.  45 out of 102 immigrants died that winter.  The following March, the first formal contact occurred with the Indians (or Native Americans).

(Note: All the way back to 1492, and the days of Christopher Columbus, the Native Americans here were referred to as “Indians” because Columbus believed he had landed in India, which was his real target destination at the time.)

Both sides managed to establish a formal treaty of peace. This treaty ensured that each people would not bring harm to the other, and that they would come to each other’s aid in a time of war.

By November 1621, only 53 pilgrims were alive to celebrate the harvest feast which modern Americans now know as “The First Thanksgiving.” Of the original 18 adult women, 13 died the first winter while another died in May. Only four adult women were left alive for the first Thanksgiving.

This first “Thanksgiving” was really a celebration of survival, a show of goodwill and a way for the settlers to show their appreciation to their Native American neighbors, by sharing a feast with them after their harvest, and before the onset of another winter.

When we think about “Thanksgiving,” it’s all about the food! Turkey, gravy, potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn, stuffing, cranberry sauce, hot rolls, and pumpkin pie are what most of us would feel is required of a real “Thanksgiving” dinner.  Different families may have certain additional items that have been added to the tradition as well.  But what did the Pilgrims and their guests have to eat at that first “Thanksgiving?”

Well, the Pilgrims and their guests didn’t have corn, apples, potatoes or even cranberries. No one knows for sure if they even had turkey, although they did eat turkey from time to time. Ducks or geese would have been more plentiful this time of year.  The only food we know they had for sure was deer (venison).

The feast between The Pilgrims and the Native American Wampanoag people probably also contained fish, lobster, eels, clams, turnips, berries, pumpkin, and squash.

You didn’t hear any moms or dads yelling at the kids to use their fork either. Forks weren’t invented yet!

So where did we get the idea from that you have to have turkey and cranberry sauce and such on Thanksgiving? It was because the people of the Victorian Era prepared Thanksgiving that way.

The Victorian era of history was the period of Queen Victoria’s reign over Britain from 1837 until she died in January of 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, and refined social behavior. Thanksgiving became a national holiday, beginning in 1863, when Abraham Lincoln issued his presidential Thanksgiving proclamations.  There were actually two of them, one to celebrate Thanksgiving in August, and a second one in November.  Before Lincoln, Americans outside New England did not usually celebrate the holiday.

So there you have it, and remember to say “please” before you ask someone to “pass the eels” this Thanksgiving!

Note: Some of the information here was taken from a November 2001 article, by Rick Shenkman, of the History News Network. Thanks Rick!

I think we can all agree that the most important jobs in our society (in alphabetical order) are: doctors, farmers/ranchers, firefighters, the military, nurses, police, teachers, and skilled tradesmen. On average, these important jobs pay about $60,000 a year, meaning that half of them pay less than that.

Our military personnel, many of which risk their lives on a daily basis, get paid an average of $26,000 a year.

Our police and firefighters constantly risk their lives as well, and get paid around $55,000 a year.

Our teachers, who many of us give credit to for helping to shape our lives, make an average of $36,000 a year.

If these jobs are what we consider to be the most important jobs, why do we not pay these jobs the highest salaries?

There are hundreds of jobs that out there that pay substantially more than our list of most important jobs.

The most egregious differences in pay emerge when we look at what entertainers are paid. Why do we value and reward entertainment so much, when the entertainment field is arguably one of the least important of all?

It is definitely an enigma wrapped in a conundrum.

What kind of differences am I talking about? Well, let’s take a look.

Beyonce makes more in one day than what an average doctor makes in an entire year.

LeBron James makes over TWO THOUSAND TIMES a year what an average teacher makes.

Tom Cruise could pay the entire police force for the City of Green Bay, Wisconsin, or for Albany, New York, for a whole year, with what he earns for making one film.

The average baseball player earns $8,000 every time he goes up to hit. That means the average baseball player (not even the players that make the most money) make more in one game than a member of the military or a teacher earns in a year.

The average NFL player makes about $2 million a year.

The average MLB player makes about $4 million a year.

And, the average NBA player makes around $8.5 million a year.

The highest paid players make over $30 million a year. The highest paid entertainers make over $75 million a year, all the way up to $130 million a year.

And who pays for all of these exorbitant salaries? All of the poor slobs with the “important” jobs.  We buy tickets, we pay for TV, and we pay when we buy all of the products that pay for advertisements related to all of the above.  We pay a hidden price for every beer or soda we drink, for every hamburger or pizza we eat, and for every call we make or text we send on our phones.

On top of that, we are forced to endure political and social scoldings from all of these fortunate people that we allow to entertain us and lead these extravagant lives.

I really wouldn’t begrudge our entertainment stars making a really comfortable living, but we have moved way past comfortable and into the ridiculous neighborhood.

Ah yes, it’s a wonderful life.

There are over 3,000 four year colleges and universities in The United States.

Ranked by the size of their endowments, just the top 100 colleges and universities have endowments totaling over $240 billion. That’s right. That’s billion, with a “b.” What do you think our total would be if we added in the other 2,900 colleges? Like Darth Vader would say…, “impressive.”

Their average annual investment gain is about 11%, or $26.4 billion, tax free. Again, that’s just the top 100.

House GOP leaders just recently released their new tax legislation proposal called the “Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.” Under their new proposal, private colleges and universities would pay a 1.4% tax on their endowment investment income. Currently, college endowments are not taxed at all.

The top 10 university endowments hold an unbelievable amount of wealth. Harvard University’s endowment stands at $37.1 billion, while Yale University can boast an endowment fund of $27.2 billion. What are they doing with all of this money?

“University endowments pay for student financial aid; faculty salaries and benefits; much of the research, teaching and learning they all do; and the infrastructure that makes it all possible, including libraries, computers, museums, and lab equipment,” a spokesperson from Harvard told Business Insider Magazine in 2015.

Really? Tuition and fees at Harvard are about $65,000 a year, which gives the college an annual income of about $1.4 billion. What are they doing with all of that money then? Nothing that could be construed as patriotic, conservative or constitutional I would hazard to guess. And this doesn’t even take into consideration annual federal and state subsidies to colleges that total over $100 billion nationally. That’s a high price to pay for a socialist indoctrination.

So even though all of these colleges are virtually drowning in money, our government, many students, and their families, are on the hook for over $1.45 trillion (yes, that’s trillion with a “t”) in student loan debt.

Do you ever get the feeling that you’re being taken advantage of? Do you ever get the feeling that almost everything is rigged against you in this country? That’s what it’s like when you live outside of “the swamp” and you’re looking in.

_{Please refer back to the blog I posted on 10/5/2017, titled: “An open letter to President Trump,” before reading this blog, in order to gain some perspective on this whole situation. Thank you.}

_{From a Nov 8, 2017 Press Release:}

_{Barletta Saves Job Corps Program from Cuts.}

_{WASHINGTON D.C. – Congressman Lou Barletta (R-PA), Co-Chair of the Job Corps Caucus, claimed victory in his fight to protect the Job Corps program from impending cuts by the Department of Labor (DOL). This week Barletta, along with Congressman Pete Sessions (R-TX) and Congressman Sanford D. Bishop Jr. (D-GA), led a bipartisan effort that produced a letter expressing concerns over a recently announced plan to reduce Job Corps student capacity to 33,532 total students in 2017.  This amounted to a reduction of 4,662 training slots, despite the program receiving a one percent funding increase in the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2017.  The letter garnered over 100 bipartisan signatures.  Within hours of submitting the letter, Barletta’s office received word that the DOL would reverse the cuts. “Job Corps is one of the most important programs we have to encourage America’s young adults to succeed and learn the value of civic duty,” Barletta said.  “I am very pleased the DOL now understands the importance of this program.” “When I was a mayor, I met the students from the Keystone Job Corps Center and witnessed the work they did for our community.  They helped to build the sidewalks around City Hall and designed the trash receptacles during the downtown beautification project.  I’ve also had numerous Job Corps students intern in my Hazleton district office.  Job Corps allows young adults to get involved in our community, which benefits everyone.  For 50 years the program has empowered the youth of America.” Barletta, the Republican Co-Chair of the Job Corps Caucus, said that the partnerships with local organizations and businesses have helped to foster a safe and secure environment, while benefitting both students and the community.}

_{The Job Corps program was enacted as part of the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 and most recently reauthorized in 2014 as part of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act.  That bill contained provisions similar to Barletta’s H.R. 497, America Works Act to encourage states and localities to prioritize federal spending on education and training.}

_{Job Corps is designed to provide young people with the skills necessary to obtain and hold jobs, enter the armed forces, or enroll in continuing education.  The 124 Job Corps centers across the country serve more than 60,000 participants, who must be ages 16 to 24, low income, and facing barriers to employment and education.}  

_{“Thank you” to all of the members of Congress who came together to do the right thing here. Maybe this bipartisan cooperation will start a new trend? I’m hopeful, but I don’t think I’ll hold my breath either.}

_{Photo: Barletta met with Red Rock Job Corps Center students in October.}  

This past weekend I was listening to a “talking head” refer to some Harvard study on media bias, so I decided to check it out for myself. The fact is, it’s hard to find any study on media bias more current than 2008. There were a couple I came across that were worth mentioning, however.

“The Quarterly Journal of Economics,” in August of 2007, referred to “The Fox News effect” and its impact on voting. The study could have been titled, “How voters react when they hear news other than our biased version of the news.”   This journal is a production of Harvard University, and “… it is invaluable to professional and academic economists and students around the world,” according to themselves.

“The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,” from 1985, which is published by The American Psychological Association, tried to address “the biased perception of media bias.” If we stake it a step further, can your biased perception be biased? Let’s just leave that one alone.

Also, while checking out some of these studies, I stumbled across an article that I found interesting. It is titled: “Trump’s Getting Killed In The Media, But Not Because Of Bias.”  It is by someone named Mark Joyella, who is a contributor to Forbes Magazine.

In his article he refers to a report from the Harvard Kennedy School’s Shorenstein Center of Media, Politics and Public Policy, which is pictured with my blog here. Only a member of the biased mainstream media could “spin” this chart into meaning anything even close to fair.

Mr. Joyella’s premise is: “If your favorite football team gets destroyed by another team, and the local newspaper writes a story about the game, is the resulting news story–which paints an ugly picture of your team’s performance–an example of the newspaper’s bias against your beloved team?  Of course not.  But that’s essentially what some conservative media believe when it comes to coverage of the Trump White House. In their view, since most coverage of Trump is negative, that proves the media is biased against the president.”

In my view, Mr. Joyella’s analogy is biased in its own right. What Mr. Joyella conveniently “forgot” to mention is that my favorite football team had won five games in a row prior to getting “destroyed,” but the local newspaper never bothered to give them credit for that or even cover those games.  In fact, although the team is very popular with the locals, the local newspaper seems to have a vendetta against the team, and rarely reports on anything positive, choosing only to focus on the negative.