Some scary sh@t.

Dear Stevie,

Do you like to be frightened by fun things like roller coasters and bungee jumping, or by scary things like ghosts, and goblins in a haunted house? 

Well, HERE YA GO....this will scare the pants off ya....(rowr)....

Yeah, I know, it gave ME the creeps too, when I first saw it.  But hey, it's HALLOWEEN!!  Suck it up!
I don't believe I need to give much comment or editorial about this particular political photograph, do I?  I'd say it's pretty self-explanatory if you asked me.

I can, however, tell you from experience, that the federal government often uses the strategy of hiring a complete IDIOT, so they can control that person if and when they ever DO get into a position of power. They really WANT mindless drones, rather than anyone who actually has any intelligence. You really cannot control an intelligent person.  (The boys in Journey learned that about YOU the hard way).

It seems to me that everything in this world is the exact OPPOSITE of what it should be, ya know?  I mean, YOU made Journey what it is today---so why then aren't YOU in charge, still in the spotlight singing and calling the shots, etc.,?  It's really the opposite of what it should be.  Now, I personally believe you ARE calling some of the shots, legally, behind the scenes, with your finger still in the money-making pie.  That tells me you are a very shrewd businessman, and for that, I admire your chutzpah. You've also obviously invested your money very well, since you don't ever have to work another day in your entire life to have wealth. That knowledge is power, that intelligence is intimidating.  And frankly, THAT is exactly what the world needs desperately----MORE people who have both of those qualities.

If it weren't for Miep Gies, the world would never know, read, attend a play, or see a film about The Diary of Anne Frank.  But, she was not allowed to be in any position of power when it comes to the "Holocaust industry."  In fact, some argue that she and Mr. Frank were among the CATALYSTS who helped CREATE the Holocaust "industry," packaging people's misery in a book or a box, and selling them on a production line. (Reference: Tim Cole's book: Selling the Holocaust).

That is the opposite--and the disgusting dysfunction---of what it should be.  At the Holocaust Museum in DC where I used to work, the Survivors were all VOLUNTEERS, re-living the horror of their experiences week after week...and yet, I got a paycheck?!  That seemed so wrong to me. So opposite of what it should have been. I mean, it was bad enough going to work every day knowing that "if it weren't for Adolph Hitler, I wouldn't have a JOB...he paid for my rent, my car, my food...my everything."

Let that thought sink in a minute. Does it make your heart and soul hurt?  Mine did.

How would YOU handle such a horrible thought, if you knew it to be true? Most people would probably have quit the job and scrubbed themselves repeatedly in several showers, to eliminate the dirty feeling, saying frantic prayers and attending church to beg God for forgiveness. But, instead, I became more and more immersed into my job---because there was a much higher purpose of the Museum, and despite the sadness of the reality that thought constantly caused me, (many tears, sleepless nights, etc)., the GOOD of the place and the lessons and concepts it teaches so many people every day, seemed well worth the sacrifice of my own disgust with myself for working there because of Hitler.

Sound familiar? I think perhaps you might have had a similar epiphany about being "in charge" of Journey. As much as it killed you to leave the one thing you loved most, you also realized that it was bigger than you, and made so many more people HAPPY with what you helped create---why dissolve something that was so popular and made so many people happy---when you knew it COULD go on without you......that thought must have killed you too.....but no matter what you did or did not do, the hard-core fans who have been with you since day one, would ultimately accept that decision.  And, most of us HAVE, and most of us have also applauded your choice.  But we also know it is sad, and hurts you, every day, when you turn on the radio and hear your own voice.

But you, dear Sir, have learned the very difficult ability of how to lead others BY EXAMPLE.

I mean, that Hitler thought....man....it really hit me like a ton of bricks shortly after I began working there. It just KILLED ME.  I literally doubled over in physical PAIN when that thought entered my brain---I was walking to work that morning, and someone had spray-painted a swastika on the newspaper box right out front of the Museum---when I saw it, I gasped, and that awful thought hit me from out of nowhere.  Suddenly I was bent over in the middle of the sidewalk, I couldn't breathe, the wind was completely knocked out of me, my head was spinning, and I felt SICK---then I spent the entire day in the bathroom crying my eyeballs out.

On top of THAT, also knowing that those Survivors received NOTHING for their emotional trauma that they must carry in their hearts every time they showed up, from re-living all the horrible memories and mourning and grieving the loss of their family and friends day after day after day, also bothered me constantly. Sure, without the Museum they would STILL be grieving and mourning their loved ones who perished, I know that...but to be in the middle of it all over again, surrounded by those photos, and those artifacts, and those very vivid and real memories...the pain they must have suffered is beyond my comprehension. They deserved so much better, so much more.  A Museum specifically BUILT to remember and HONOR those who died, and those who survived, SHOULD PAY THOSE VOLUNTEERS for being there.  It just didn't seem at all fair or anywhere NEAR right.

And if THAT didn't kill a person, living with that guilt every day, feeling awful about it, then try THIS one on for size.....Sixty-five YEARS after his death, that evil, maniacal, cowardly, horrible man---ONE MAN---is STILL creating hundreds of JOBS, (museums, historians, presenters, college professors who teach the subject, publishers of Holocaust books, etc).  But our own government, our President, our Congressmen, our Senators, our Mayors---THOUSANDS of American government workers, all CAN'T?!  Seriously??!

What the HELL is wrong with this picture?

Everything.  It's the exact opposite of what it should be.  I don't know when this phenomenon happened. Was it when Martin Luther King was shot and killed, and buried only 5 days before I was born? Was it when Kennedy was shot?  Was it way back when the Industrial Revolution began?  Who knows.

People used to admire intelligence, and proactive thinking.  Not anymore.  Having a college degree used to really MATTER and MEAN something. Not anymore. (You can ask Chris O'Donnell about all the colleges she actually LIED about attending on her resume, if you don't believe me).  Doing the "right" thing used to be a "given" for most people---from being honest, to common courtesy, to common sense.  But sense just isn't very common anymore either. Honesty, which everyone should have, use and honor--according to every God in every religion--a GOLDEN RULE--is rare, and almost extinct, in our world.

It just seems to BASS-ACKWARDS, and it makes me feel like jumping off the nearest bridge.

Well, that's the reason why I am going to the Rally to Restore Sanity in DC on October 30th. I'm sick of this world.  I'm disgusted by HOW sick this world has become.  I'm sick and tired of the dysfunction and the corruption and the hypocritical attitudes of people who have skewed priorities and have nothing to offer anyone but short-sighted, band-aid solutions to huge gaping wounds and societal problems that need more time, energy, funding, creativity, and long-term planning, to REALLY SOLVE IT.

One man, I read recently, in Philadelphia, has offered to donate $1,000 to a charity for every company who hires one unemployed person and keeps him or her on their payroll for at least 6 months or more.  Now THAT is a smart idea, and it's a win-win situation!!

THAT is the kind of person I admire.  Thinking "out of the box," being creative and solving more than one problem in one fell swoop---it is rare, but when it happens, it's amazing. He is leading by example. Why, however, our politicians and other people in positions of power, never seem to LEARN how to do that very same thing, is simply and utterly beyond my comprehension.

While driving in DC one day, I saw the funniest bumper sticker EVER...it said, "Feed the hungry...to the homeless."  I laughed myself sick, because I wondered just how long THAT would take to become an actual government policy. But hey, it solved more than one problem in one fell swoop. BRILLIANT!!

Ah well, those are just my thoughts for the day, for what it's worth.  I don't have any answers on how to fix the world.  I don't even know if the world WANTS to be saved, really---and believe me, I have been cursed (blessed?) with the chronic "save the world syndrome" since a very young age, so I know. Hell, I don't even think I can save myself FROM myself most of the time.  I just know that SOMETHING has to change, and it may already be "too little, too late" even if that change DOES happen.

People who complain about President Obama and how he's not DOING enough, he's not CHANGING enough, he's not addressing enough problems, he's not fixing enough problems, etc., are RETARDED. He, unfortunately, is the JANITOR OF OUR COUNTRY, trying to CLEAN UP the 8 year MESS that was created before he ever took office.  He's a black man JANITOR, being driven HARD by the white elite who have positions of power---from the loudmouth, holier-than-thou idiot-talking-heads on Fox TV, to the John Doe public idiot Teabaggers who created their tea-bagging club only 32 DAYS after he took office---what the HELL can anyone accomplish in 32 days at a new job?! Not a whole hell of a lot. I'd like to see ANY ONE of those tea-baggers try and solve so many problems in 32 days at a new job. My bet is, they wouldn't stand a chance.  He's got EIGHT YEARS of CRAP to clean up before any new changes can actually be implemented and actually happen. The residue of the rampant garbage that floats from office to office in DC is something that ONE MAN CANNOT FIX, and definitely NOT in only two years' time. The world, or at least, our country, has actually SET HIM UP TO FAIL.

And that, in my opinion, is the biggest, bass-ackward-iss, most GALLING opposite of what should be true, in our entire universe.

How then, do we as a human race, manage to fix all that, and make the world better for everyone again?

.....I leave you with that thought.

Love, Rebecca