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Sunday, December 5, 2010

My Day

"There is only one way in which those of us who live can repay the dead who have given their utmost for the cause of liberty and justice. They died in the hope that, through their sacrifice, an enduring peace would be built and a more just world would emerge for humanity."
-Eleanor Roosevelt


I wonder if these words are still true today, for the men and women who have given their lives in the middle east. Are we fighting for an enduring peace? Is such a thing in that region of the world even possible? An eye for an eye leaves everyone blind. When will the cycle of violence end? I can tell you one thing, it won't happen without a Palestinian state. Israel keeps crossing the limits of acceptable in the eyes of everyone, even the United States has condemned their settlement expansions, and yet we continue to support them. And the terrorists that Israel has to fight will continue to fight and hate with such fervor that while at the same time disagreeing with Israel's policy of expansion it's hard to argue that they should concede anything, when history has taught us nothing if not that they will continue to be terrorized even if they chose to give back territory for a Palestinian state. Everyone is working at odds against themselves, not to mention everyone else. Until we're willing to forgive past wrongs and work together, there will always be conflict. I see both sides of this argument. I do not, however, see a solution. The idea that (and I'm going to generalize here) the Arabs will stop hating the Jews for stealing their land, persecuting them, and forcing them from their homes and that the Jews will stop hating the Arabs for attacking and terrorizing them is pure fantasy. It's never going to happen. How depressing.

So what are we fighting for? We are the United States of America. We need to completely extinguish our dependance on foreign oil so we have no personal investment in the region and let them sort it out themselves, to their benefit or detriment. Basically, our goal needs to be to butt out and make it possible for it not to be our problem. This isn't WWII. A little isolationism would do us good.

Saturday, December 4, 2010

Trying to Understand

I'm finding myself increasingly interested in politics and economics. They seem to be what make our world go round. Politics seems much more straightforward than economics. Reading an article on politics requires much less background knowledge than reading one about economics. I may actually have to educate myself, because my one semester of macro-economics did not remain in my brain. I do, however, still have my text and workbooks. So maybe I'll dig them out to peruse during my massive amount of free time. Unfortunately not making time to do so will mean that my current understanding the system will continue to be lacking, and I really feel the need to learn up.

Friday, December 3, 2010

What is a blog?

I write. I write a lot. I write a lot about a lot of things. I have a bazillion blogs (ok, maybe closer to eight, but in terms of number of blogs eight might as well be a bazillion in terms of ridiculousness). I also have a journal, after learning the hard way that some thoughts are meant to be private. So what exactly is a blog? More specifically, what is the point of all of my blogs? It's not like so many people are interested in what I have to say that any of them besides my baby blog are even warranted to exist. I have a baby blog. I have a general blog. I have a cooking blog. I have a "green" blog. I have a couple of private blogs. And now I find myself asking, WTF do I have all of these blogs? And is the answer consolidation or just deletion? I think the answer might be to get it down to two. My baby blog and my general blog. People interested in the baby stuff don't have to be bothered with all the rest of the crap I like to write about, but I will be getting my accomplishments (what accomplishments, this is a load of bs, that's what this is) out there so I feel satisfied (about my massive amount of non-accomplishments). Maybe if I record everyday, normal stuff in a blog it feels more like an accomplishment.

I've recently come to the conclusion that I am extremely mentally lazy. And let's just skip the quips about all the other ways I'm lazy, but it was rather like an epiphany. We are capable of so much, and I don't know about the rest of you, but I let most of that potential go to waste. When I think about all the things there are to think about that I don't think about...well, it makes me feel mentally lazy, I said that already. They aren't kidding when they say learning makes you smarter. Now, mental laziness is directly related to physical laziness. I mean, why can't I learn a language? Because I'm too lazy to take the time out of my day to sit down and make my lazy brain work. Lazy, lazy, lazy. People like Louis Howe (no, I don't expect you to know who that is unless you're a history buff like me, but you can google it if you're curious) must never have given their brains a chance to rest, they were so busy and accomplished so much by working so hard. Does everyone in politics think like that? If they don't, does that explain so many of the problems in our government? Maybe everyone is just mentally lazy and they hide it by knowing how to look like they're doing something. I think I just summed up the American legislative branch.

This wouldn't be that important, except I've been trying to figure out what the point of having a blog is when I have a journal. Did you know that people who journal every day have higher IQs? I think it has something to do with self reflection and organizing ideas. I think that the blog is for specific ideas, things that I would write an essay on, or could, at least. My journal is for me to record the important thoughts my internal narrative has had that day. To keep track of my thoughts. Heavens, I forget more than I'll ever remember. Ha.

Ok, the baby is asleep. He's been asleep all morning, so it's time to wake him up. Or maybe take a nap. Hey, I said I was lazy. I'm also tired.