Several years ago, my friend and I got into a friendly argument. You see, he is liberal and I am conservative. We each take turns at trying to get the other to ‘see the error of their ways’.

   He was at my house this day, and he had the look on his face that one gets when they think they have the ultimate idea. He grabbed an apple pie my wife and I had just baked, and as he held it in his hands he said “Wouldn’t you rather a liberal piece of this pie instead of a conservative piece?” He thought he had me and he was quiet for a moment waiting for my reply.

   After a moment to think, I replied to him this…”Here is your problem as a liberal. This is my pie. I didn’t buy it, it was baked here in my kitchen. It was made with apples that I grew on my tree in the backyard. I watered the tree. I pruned the tree. I harvested the apples. I cut the apples. I paid for the sugar and the flour and the cinnamon to make this pie. It was baked in my oven. I paid for the electricity that cooked this pie. I paid for the pie plate. You want to then take my pie, cut out a large piece to share with my neighbors that have no pie, then take a piece for yourself for sharing my pie with my neighbors and leave me with only a small sliver of my pie. Isn’t that stealing? Since I paid for everything that went into this pie and no one else helped, shouldn’t I get to determine how the pie will be cut and who will be offered a piece of my pie?

   I had won the argument. He had no retort for my come back. That is what President Barrack Hussein Obama is doing when he ‘spreads the wealth around’. He is kicking in my front door, marching into my kitchen and stealing my pie to share with my neighbors who did not plant an apple tree, water that tree, prune that tree, harvest the fruit, and bake the pie. In essence, he wants to take away the fruits of my labor and share it with those that chose not to work. Now, where is the fairness in that?

   Do you not remember the story of ‘The Little Red Hen’? My mother read it to me as a child. You can look it up on the web, but the premise is that the little red hen found some seeds and asked for help from her friends on the farm, but got no help. She planted the seeds by herself. She then asked for help in cutting the wheat, milling the wheat, she even asked for help in making the bread, but no one would help her. In the end, the barnyard friends wanted to help the little red hen to eat the bread, but she said ‘no’ because she did all the work and no one helped her.

   The moral of the story is plain. But the liberals want to rewrite the story so that the barnyard animals get a ‘fair share’ of the little red hens bread, even though they would not help her bake the bread. 

   All this talk of pie and fresh bread has made my hungry. I like my pie with vanilla ice cream. How about you?

The Thinking Tinker

  When I was little, my mother smacked my hand as I went to touch the pan on the stove. Like any reasonable child, that smack hurt and I did not understand why my ‘mommy’ would cause me to hurt. When she was not looking, I went and touched that handle anyway. The sting of her smacking my hand was nothing compared to the sting of getting burned.

   When I was in elementary school, I was given plenty of time to get a book report done. When my dad asked if I was working on it, I of course told him I was. Then, the weekend before it was due, I panicked and made something up. I failed and my dad found out and yes, I was spanked for lying and not doing my work. My teacher allowed me to rewrite it, I turned in a B minus report, but because it was late, I received a C minus.

   As a child, I was given a math test. I got a big fat F and it was emblazoned in bold red ink.  I had neglected to pay attention and I had not studied. I earned the F.

   I had failed, but I do not think I am a failure. I burned myself touching the hot handle of the pan on the stove. I learned not to touch things on the stove. I neglected to study and read the book for the book report. I learned to plan better and study and not wait until the last moment to do my homework or any work I have to accomplish. In math, I did not pay attention, ask questions or do my homework. I failed the test and learned to study, ask questions and study better to avoid the big fat red F. Pain can be a teacher. It teaches us what to avoid.

   In 1989, a new Star Trek motion picture was released. I, being a Trekker had to go see it in the theaters. It was one of the worst of the movie franchise in my opinion. However, there is a great premise in the movie. We learn that Spock has one of the greatest secrets ever kept. He has a brother named Sybok. Now, if you are at all familiar with the franchise, Vulcans work to suppress emotion and only embrace logic. Sybok, while embracing logic also embraces emotion and we see him walking up to people and ‘releiving’ them of emotional pain. That was his special ability. To heal the emotional pain of a person. Captain Kirk refused to allow Sybok to ‘heal’ his emotional pain. “…the pain is what makes me human.” How right that is. You are the sum of your experiences, emotion, thoughts and education. In order to become prepared for life, we must be allowed to experience failure.

   We all know that in Star Trek, one of the tests command cadets must take is the ‘Kobayashi Maru’. This is a test given to monitor the character of the cadet in a ‘no win’ situation. How will the cadet handle complete failure. Everyone dies, the ship is destroyed and nothing the cadet does will avoid complete and utter failure to accomplish the mission. Captain James T. Kirk cheated. He snuck into the testing center and reprogrammed the simulation so that he could, in fact find one way to succeed and save the ship. It was discovered, afterward, that he had cheated but the instructors found that he had showed a creative scenareo. He was allowed to graduate even after being found to have cheated the ‘Kobayashi Maru’. Some would say that Capt. Kirk never faced personal failure and was ill prepared when faced with almost complete failure when his son was killed, the Enterprise NCC1701A was destroyed, Spock was killed and the ‘Genesis’ device was deployed on an unstable planet. (The wrath of Khan).

   Now, of course these examples are fictional. But they do present a great example of what is wrong with liberals today. There are schools that forbid students from having ‘best friends’ but instead force the students to play with large groups of children because the school psychologists want to shield the children from the pain when the friendship fails. There are schools that permanently cancel ‘Honor Student Dinners’ because it is not fair to recognize exceptional achievement when other kids are not being recognized as well. There are schools that do not keep score when children play sports because it is unfair to the loosing team. Emotional pain is a teacher. It prepares us for the real world. When I asked Julie to go to the prom and she not only said ‘no’ but she did it in a public way. It was painful. It prepared me for real life. Imagine what would happen to someone who never had to face emotional pain when they propose marriage to someone that says ‘no’. Imagine how unprepared someone is when they never have to face emotional pain of failure when they get their first job and get fired for making a mistake.

   The emotional pain we experience as children help prepare us for real life. Our children that are ‘shielded’ from this emotional pain now will be stunted in their adulthood. These adult children will suffer greatly and will flock to someone that promises to protect them, like a ‘nanny state’ government as depicted in ‘Oceana’, the government of George Orwell’s ‘Nineteen Eighty-four. The Constitution of the United States of America guarantees the ‘right to pursue happiness’, but it does not guarantee success. Abraham Lincoln failed as a businessman, he ran for several positions in legislature and failed but you can not call him a failure. One could argue that his previous failures actually prepared him to run as President of the United States of America which he succeeded.

   Our pain teaches us. How we handle that pain molds our character. Our perception and actions become who we are and help us in future decisions. To deny our children these learning opportunities will ‘retard’ our children’s growth and maturity. If we continue with policies like these, I do believe our society will fall into ‘anarchy’ because our children will not have had the necessary mental growth. If Sybok came to me and offered to ‘relieve’ my pain, I like to think I would respond like Captain James T. Kirk and say ‘…The pain is what makes me human. I need my pain.” Remember the adage ‘What does not kill me, makes me stronger’ But maybe you don’t want to learn. Maybe you want to be shielded. Maybe you want to be told what to do and where to go. If so, learn what happened to Winston Smith at the end of the book ‘Nineteen Eighty-four” or what happened to Sybok at the end of ‘Star Trek; The undiscovered country’ and look into your future.

  (Note: I can’t believe I remember the details of those movies)

The Thinking Tinker

  OK, by now almost everyone has heard about what New York Mayor Bloomberg (nicknamed Doomberg) has and is proposing as laws. We have heard that in New York, mayor/dictator Bloomberg is trying to pass a law that you can not buy a sugary drink bigger than 16 oz. I have heard some refer to it as the ‘anti Slurpee’ law. He also wants to pass a law preventing salt to be on the tables at restaurants because he thinks New Yorkers ingest too much salt. He even went so far as to pass laws saying you can’t have more than seven bullets in your gun…even New Yorks finest, the police can only have 7 rounds of ammo in their guns to fight crime.

   These laws remind me of a Sylvester Stalone movie with Wesley Snipes and Sandra Bullock called ‘Demolition Man’. In this scifi futuristic utopian society, all vices have been eliminated, supposedly, by a Dr Cocteau. A person can not swear, eat salt, use toilet paper or even have sex for fear of being fined credits by a computer that monitors everyone. All of this to supposedly protect the people. The police don’t have guns anymore, but instead use ‘glow sticks’ to deliver a mild electrical shock to a perpitrator committing a crime, kind of like a cattle prod. The enemy is a character played by Denis Leary who leads a group of people on raids to steal food. This group lives underground away from Dr. Cocteau and his controling laws.

   In this movie, we see that Dr. Cocteau was the true enemy. He had control of the society and wanted even more power. This power greed lead to even more death and destruction. It was an example of the adage ‘power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely’. Near the end of the movie, we see Denis Leary’s character come out and say’

 You see, according to Cocteau’s plan, I’m the enemy, ’cause I like to think; I like to read. I’m into freedom of speech and freedom of choice. I’m the kind of guy who likes to sit in a greasy spoon and wonder, “Gee, should I have the T-bone steak or the jumbo rack of barbecued ribs with the side order of gravy fries?” I WANT high cholesterol. I wanna eat bacon and butter and BUCKETS of cheese, okay? I want to smoke a Cuban cigar the size of Cincinnati in the non-smoking section. I want to run through the streets naked with green Jell-o all over my body reading Playboy magazine. Why? Because I suddenly might feel the need to, okay, pal? I’ve SEEN the future. Do you know what it is? It’s a 47-year-old virgin sitting around in his beige pajamas, drinking a banana-broccoli shake, singing “I’m an Oscar Meyer Wiener”.

   This is an example of what these laws do. They take away a persons choice. The Constitution gives people rights, not the state. It limits the state or government, not people. A person has the right to pursue happiness, but the Constitution does not guarantee happiness, only the right to pursue happiness. The same law to give people the God given right to pursue happiness MUST also grant them the right to fail.  President Abraham Lincoln failed many times, but you can’t call him a failure.

   People must be responsible for their own actions, not give up those rights to the nanny state government. If ‘We the people…’ give up our rights to make our own choices, we will not have ANY rights whatsoever. If you enjoy the ability to choose between a T-bone steak or a jumbo sized rack of bar-b-que ribs, then the time is NOW to tell the government that the Constitution limits government NOT individuals rights.

   So, what will it be? Will you allow Dr. Cocteau to dictate that you can not eat salt, or are you going to stand up for your right to drink that 32 oz. Slurpee? As for me, I will choose to enjoy my God given rights to enjoy a Slurpee…mine is cherry Coke flavored.

The Thinking Tinker

https://thethinkertinker.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/redrose.jpg”> I have to admit that I had a few friends growing up, but one of my best friends was my grandpa and my aunt. My grandpa was my best bud. We went fishing together, hiking, watermelon eating, we just had a good time together. I remember my grandpa saying in a conversation to someone ‘give me my flowers when I am alive to enjoy them’. I forget the context of the conversation, but those words stuck in my mind. I had to think what he meant by that statement…’give me my flowers when I am alive to enjoy them’. Of course he was saying that he wanted to spend time with everyone and receive the gift of time while he was alive to enjoy those moments. I have learned that those moments I spent with my grandpa have become threads that have interwoven into the fabric of my character. I learned alot about life from him and came to fully understand the statement. I tried to spend as much time with my best buddy while I could. When I bought a gift, it was the best I could afford. When we spent time together, I cherished every moment. He even had a way of telling me what I had done wrong in a way that was not condescending. My grandpa had truly woven his character into mine.

I was a pallbearer at his funeral. His funeral was both sad and happy as it was a celebration of his life, and he had truly lived a life worthy of celebrating. As everyone filed by to say their goodbyes and toss in a rose onto the casket, I did not. I kept that rose and notably did not toss it in. A few people seemed put out that I refused to toss in the rose and asked me why I had not. My only response was ‘I gave him his flowers while he was alive to enjoy them’. Some may not have understood, but I felt it would have been an insult to his memory had I thrown in a flower that he could not enjoy.

That was another one of life’s lessons. To those people that have meaning in your life, give them the gift of your ‘presence’ not necessarily a gift of ‘presents’. Allow those moments to weave into the tapestry of your character. In that way, they truly never die. And when others weave you into their tapestry, everything and everyone you share with them also enjoy a prolonged life as those moments, dreams, experiences and thoughts weave into the tapestry of their character.

As human animals, our time is limited on this earth. We have a beginning and an end. We are on a vacation on this earth and it would be a shame to not add your character into your loved ones lives. So when it comes to your funeral, someone can look back and say ‘I gave them their flowers while they were alive to enjoy them’.

“322”

Is it a number? Does it refer to a date? What could be the significance of this number?

I am not a conspiracy theorist. I do not believe George Bush caused the catastrophe in New Orleans during the hurricane Katrina. I do not believe Jews caused the collapse of the World Trade Center. I do not believe in tiny green aliens invading our politicians to control world politics. But sometimes, one must question circumstances and think for themselves. 322 may have some significance. One real possibility may be the date March 22.

Have you heard of the Georgia Guidestones? I had not either until recently. In 1980, a new set of Ten Commandments were erected in Elbert County, Georgia by designer R. C. Christian. Some say it is a guide for the New World Order.

1) Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.

2) Guide reproduction wisely — improving fitness and diversity.

3) Unite humanity with a living new language.

4) Rule passion — faith — tradition — and all things with tempered reason.

5) Protect people and nations with fair laws and just courts.

6) Let all nations rule internally resolving external disputes in a world court.

7) Avoid petty laws and useless officials.

8) Balance personal rights with social duties.

9) Prize truth — beauty — love — seeking harmony with the infinite.

10) Be not a cancer on the earth — Leave room for nature — Leave room for nature.

These ‘guidelines’ seem innocent unless you look at all of them as a whole. Number one is a world population of 500,000,000 people. China’s population alone is well over 1 billion. So how will the ‘New World Order’ reduce the world population to only 500,000,000? ‘Guide reproduction wisely’, could that be a reference to abortion or privileged births? And what is this ‘living new language? And I am concerned with this term ‘Balance personal rights with social duties’. What else, you might ask, could 322 pertain to?

March 22nd, 2010, something very important happened and you may not have even thought to question it. ObamaCare was passed into law with its far reaching control over your lives in the interest ‘of National Health’. In the over 1000 pages that Nancy Palosi stood before us and said “We must pass this Bill to see what is in it” and we sure have seen the Pandora’s Box that it was and is. Now doctors are mandated to report your religious preferences and if there are any guns in your house. Why should it matter if you are a Christian, Jewish, Hindi or Buddhist?

Also, ‘Skull and Bones’, that super secret society from Yale that has ironically produced many of the World Leaders. George W. Bush is a member of this secret society and he used the term ‘New World Order’ many times in his speeches. There are many members of this secret society that are also members of another secret society known as the ‘Trilateral Commission’.

“The Trilateral Commission is international and is intended to be the vehicle for multinational consolidation of the commercial and banking interests by seizing control of the political government of the U.S.”
Sen. Barry Goldwater

No one except members of the ‘Skull and Bones’ truly know the meaning of these numbers ‘322’, but they are very significant.

It has been ‘back engineered’ that the ‘Skull and Bones’ secret society came from Germany to America in the early 1800’s. And what is their strange obsession with the month of March? And who was Christian RosenKreuz and what is Rosicrucian? What to have nightmares, look it up.

March, it seems, is the only month named after a planet and is the start of spring. In the astrological signs, isn’t March 22 the start of Aries?

Now, we have all heard that the ‘fiscal cliff’ is looming and unless the Republicans in Congress allow President Barrack Hussein Obama to borrow even more money to fund things we don’t need, we will fall into the same financial abyss that Greece and many other European nations have fallen into. But our dollar is artificially propped up by the private financial group called the Federal Reserve Bank, which has never, in recent years been audited. Well, what if something catastrophic happened on March 22, 2015 causing the United States to loose its strategic place at the financial table? Think about it, The International Monetary Fund has been calling for an alternative to the dollar for awhile now. The Dollar is the International World Reserve Currency. But Russia, China, Japan and Europe see the devalue of the dollar and have been secretly negotiating for a new world reserve currency. What would happen if the Federal Reserve representative came out on March 22nd, 2015 and said America is broke and our nations debts are being called? Is it really far reaching to think that? What would the value of the dollar be then? Would you use it to replace toilet paper because if the United States looses the position of World Reserve Currency, we will see a repeat of the Weimar Republic. Have you ever been taught what that is? It was the country now known as Germany after WWI and went bankrupt after doing what Obama has been doing for the last six years, borrowing more and more money to prop up a failing currency and government. The ensuing Nazi Party legislated contrary to the countries Constitution. Sound familiar?

We are in a major battle right now, arguing that the Constitution guarantees the right of the individual to own a gun, yet what if the President adopted emergency powers because of a national emergency? Do you think Barrack Hussein Obama would ‘temporarily’ adopt dictatorial power in an economic crisis and suspend the Constitution? Where would our precious Constitution be when the UN, under direction of the President, come to your door and demand your guns and stockpiled foodstores? Think it can’t happen? It already did in Katrina, when United States Military Forces were going door to door confiscating any and all guns “for your protection”. Those guns were destroyed by rust and ignorance and most of the owners never got them back. Look at this video

Those that do not study history are doomed to repeat it. Wake up America! The enemy is already in your house, and you let them in.

In today’s politically correct society, what I am going to type now will be NOT politically correct. It may stir some emotion and anger. But once you have calmed down and thought about it, you will see I am correct. We, as a society, have become a slave to ‘political correctness’ and our emotions.
Allow me to explain. There are some words in the English language that invoke so much emotion, thought seems to disappear. Now, let me set this discussion up by first stating that if you get angry at the utterance of a word, you have allowed the person that spoke that word to control somewhat your emotions. You must first allow the word to make you angry, or sad, thereby relinquishing control of your emotions. Now, the person that spoke the word has the upper hand. Once that happens, you have most assuredly lost the argument.
Let us take the dreaded ‘N’ word. We dare not speak the actual word, but instead use a letter to indicate the word we want to portray. Speak that word to some people, and you may very well end up in the hospital or worse. In that instance, the person or persons have relinquished thought and replaced it with pure anger and hatred.
There have been many instances where two or more people are discussing politics, and when one side is clearly loosing the debate of ideas they invoke a war of words deliberately meant to distract the fact they are clearly loosing the debate. How many times have you heard when discussing that one does not like President Obama’s politics, and in the discussion the supporter of Obama’s politics is loosing will inevitably say something like ‘well you just do not like Obama because you are prejudice’, or ‘You just don’t like Obama because he is black’ or something of the sort simply to distract everybody. The audience will then be so distracted, they loose track of the discussion. Thought and reason have given way to emotion.
In these instances, we as a nation have become a slave to our emotions and have lost all reasoning. A man is caught and arrested and has two guns, the usual response is “He had an arsenal”. A man has an anti Obama bumper sticker on his vehicle and is involved in an accident or runs a red light and you hear “He is a right wing wacko”. A person does not believe in abortion and is labeled “intolerant”. Again, society has become a slave to emotion. The enemies of thoughtful discussion will use emotionally charged words to distract people and create a ‘fog’ of emotion.
Our law makers in Congress are quick to create laws in the midst of emotionally charged  situations. As much as you may not like it, the best thing to do BEFORE creating new laws is to step back, look at the facts and shelve emotions. We, as a nation, need to ‘think’ more and ‘react’ less.
America needs to stop making decisions based on emotion and start thinking. The next time you watch on T.V., hear on the radio or read in the news, watch out for those key emotionally charged words. Pay more attention to the ideas being portrayed, the long term effects of those ideas and who is trying to quash those ideas. Do not be so quick to judge and instead, take a moment to think. When you start ‘thinking’ for yourself, you start to break those chains of emotional bondage.

Money
What is it and how does one acquire it? And just how does capitalism work anyway?
I would gather that most students are never taught what the dollar bill really is. I had the benefit of both public and private education and no one in my school was taught this. Have you ever really looked at a bill of the United States currency? It has printed on it ‘Federal Reserve Note’ which basically means it is an I.O.U. It is a piece of dirty paper that has no value except what the Federal Reserve Bank will back up.
To put it a better way, it is an I.O.U. which allows the bearer to trade it in on goods or services. Remember that; goods or services. In America, one trades either a product he or she has made or provides a service another wants or needs.
Most Americans go to work. They trade their time to receive a paycheck. Their employer either creates a product or provides a service that others trade their dirty pieces of paper for.
For example let us look at Apple. They produce several products that people need and or want i.e. an Apple iPhone, iPad, iPod or a service like iTunes. The employees of Apple trade their time to create the product or support the service that others will ‘pay’ for. In return, they receive compensation for their time.
Now the employee can then trade their ‘dollar’ for a product that they want or need like food, medical services or the like.
I know that some of you are saying that you already know that, but let us look deeper. Let us take two people. For the purposes of this argument, let us say they are twins and had the same environment growing up. Both men are valuable in their own right in society. As a human, each are indispensable and unique. Now, the first twin decides to be a janitor. A job that needs to be done and is valuable to society. The other twin becomes a neuro-surgeon. Also a very valuable service. Now the Janitor is a job that will not take years to learn. The basics of the job can be learned in a short amount of time. It does not mean the job is any less important. The neuro-surgeon goes to college for years. Goes thru a residency program for years. Then must go to school even longer to specialize in neuro-surgery. Lets say this twin did it all in 12 years for the purposes of this example. He has spent countless hours studying, observing, training and working with and around other people dedicated in the field of the human anatomy focusing on the brain. Both men provide a valuable service but one has learned his service in a fraction of the time the other has. He can be replaced more easily than can the neuro-surgeon. The amount of compensation for the surgeon will necessarily be greater because the service is more specialized and can not be done by nearly as many people as the janitor.
In these few examples, we do not judge the men. Both work hard and provide a valuable service. However the compensation for each reflects the difficulty in performing the service and the ease or difficulty of replacing them.
The more value in your product or service, the more of these dirty paper I.O.U.’s you can get. They act like coupons. It says that you have provided a product that someone else wanted and/or needed or provided a service that someone else was willing to pay for thus allowing you to then trade that coupon for goods or services that you want and/or need.
Too many people associate salary with human worth. Socialism says all compensation should be the same, Capitalism says all humans are equal in their opportunity to provide a service.
I recommend you look into Nightingale/Conant course entitle ‘Lead the Field’. Earl Nightingale does a much better job of explaining how capitalism works. Once you realize how capitalism works, you will see it is the best way, although not perfect, in allowing a person to succeed and excel in order to reach their full potential and benefit society.

The Thinking Tinker

Get a backbone America!

When I was a kid, I remember playing dodge ball on the playground during recess. If you don’t remember dodge ball, watch the movie ‘Dodge ball’ and that is pretty much it. You have a red rubber ball hurled at you as hard as someone can and you have to either dodge it or catch it. Now, sometimes those balls are flying pretty fast and in the fray, you might get hit anywhere. The foot, knee, arm, body and yes, the face. Once, I was hit in the face. I wanted to quit because it was a shock. It stung. Now, while I cannot remember the names of the kids I played with nor the name of the kid that threw that ball at my face, I remember the principle, Dr. Ide. He was the referee, so to speak. I looked to him thinking he might say something like ‘time out’ or ‘foul’, but to my surprise he uttered the words ‘you’re out’.

That was a lesson to me. What I thought was unfair was not. It was a game. I was not hurt, except for my self-imposed sense of fairness. Who told me that I could play a game and not get hurt? Think of all the games we played as kids; baseball, football, soccer, basketball, dodge ball, tag, hide and seek. All of these games are fun, all require physical effort, and all have their own set of risks. All have their own rewards. Risk and reward. Sounds like life.

Getting hit in the face during dodge ball was a small life lesson to me and many other kids. Life is full of risks. My dad told me to ‘suck it up and get back in the game’. In other words, get a backbone and get back out and play the game. Learn the rules and ‘risk’ getting hit. The rewards are worth it. So, the next time we played dodge ball, I was lucky enough to catch the ball and now it was my turn to hurl that red rubber ball and I did. I do not remember whether or not I hit my target, but I do remember having fun. Jumping, dodging, throwing, catching, physical activity. Learning the joy of winning and the pain of not. Learning to do better if when I did not win. It was a game.

Now, we in America don’t let kids play dodge ball. The public schools have determined it is a brutal game and the risk of someone getting hurt is too much. The teachers just want the kids to go out on the playground and play games where nobody gets hurt or left out or loses. Kids are now told that if they answer that 2 and 2 are 5, that it is ok, they are not wrong, just not right. So where is the risk? If we coddle these kids and don’t let them experience failure, if they don’t get hit in the face with the dodge ball, if they are not told that they are incorrect when they in fact are wrong, then we are raising a generation of failures, wimps, woosies, people that will believe all their lives that they are owed a good grade, owed a good job, owed a good living and good pay. These children will grow up and not be successful because they will not know risk and reward. And it will be because we did not have a backbone and demand that our children be prepared for life. Life has its own set of rules. Risk and reward. Life is not fair or unfair, it just is.

The Constitution of the United States of America states that we have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, but does not guarantee that happiness. We have the right to try and fail. After being hit in the face with that dodge ball, the sting on my face was a lesson that I will not always win, and life can be painful, but the rewards are great if pursued. So I say to you today, ‘get a backbone, get off the ground, dust yourself off and get back in the game.