Sugar Creek Publishing

Senses forge into memory over years. No matter your age, some experiential impressions last for a lifetime. When it comes to the older set — of which I am a proud member — such reminiscences are just that. Memories. Their sources are rare at best, and more often absent from modern life.

More often than not, sights and smells rule when it comes to memory, giving sounds short shrift. Yet, for me — and many of you — sounds are as important to our childhood and young adult years as the other sense that are imbedded in our brains.

The first of November renewed my love for a particular sound. As I walked into a local paint store accompanied by my Newfoundland dog, I paused for a moment and basked in the plaintive whistle of a passing train.

From the 40s to the 60s, train whistles were a part of daily life in this county. Since the “big four” cut diagonally across the landscape going from Cincinnati to Chicago, my generation witnessed countless trains on the gleaming tracks. Those we didn’t glimpse we heard.

Often, you could recognize an engineer by his whistle. Some engineers whistled once at a crossing, while others seem to have fashioned their own little codes. I recall hearing one short and two long, three long, and two shorts. Undoubtedly, there were many others, but those stick in my mind and I can close my eyes and hear them easily as a mental traveler.

Other unique sounds also come to mind… a screen door as it hit the doorframe… a hand pump at the kitchen sink… the ice block sliding from the truck to be caught up in black iron tongs… the click of the old-fashioned ice box (I seldom use the term refrigerator.)….

What sounds bring back memories for you? Shifting gears in the family car or truck? The slap of wipers racing to reach the metal strip that divided the windshield? The whoosh of coal as it slid down into the basement? The clink of glass bottles as the milkman made his rounds? The whirring of the neighborhood grocery meat grinder as a butcher ground beef?

While those days may have lacked a lot in terms of convenience, they offered volumes in terms of endearment. How many of you know the meat department personnel by first name? Still call in a grocery list for delivery or pick up later in the day? I doubt it.

I, for one, can still hear Fred Heckman’s voice on flagship station WIBC in Indianapolis. A legend in his field, he imparted much more than news. His little feature, “My Town Indy” fueled our imaginations and inspired us to explore our state capital with zest.

As you go about your day, take a moment to notice the sounds of today? The chime of a computer as it comes to life at the touch of a key… the beep of a vehicle as a remote key locks the doors… the music of a cell phone with an incoming call… the beep as your Mac or PC alerts you to a new email….

And so it goes… what was commonplace for us is novel to younger folks. Some day, when a magazine article is unearthed by a future generation, I wonder if they will know that deeming something “cool” has nothing to do with temperature? Time will tell. In the meantime, take heart in memory. Musing about the past is not only be instructive, but also comforting. Think about it.

We stop our daily grinds a bit to divert to family and lots of good food to commemorate the gathering of the Pilgrims as they partook of a meal after a devastating existence in a strange land.

Our daily problems pale in comparison to what the Pilgrims faced, yet we all sit down to a table laden with food and peppered with friendship and love to take a moment to give thanks.

There are too many things for which we are truly thankful, but we take most of them for granted. We live freedom, yet we don’t cherish it as we would have had we lived under a political system that deprived people of freedom.

We enjoy so many things in the course of a day that it is embarrassing to think that we would not take a moment — now and then — to remember that we are a unique people with varied backgrounds, talents, and motivations. Nonetheless, we operate as a well-oiled machine, depending on the equanimity of our basic freedoms and relying on the expertise of our fellows when we are ill or in danger.

Those who work on Thanksgiving Day labor in many areas. Hospitals still hum along on the holiday. Firehouses and police stations echo with laughter and camaraderie of uniformed “brothers” who willingly take their time to protect us all. Squad cars patrol our cities and state policemen take to the roads in anticipation of increased traffic — and they take it in stride.

Today, as you sit down with family or friends to enjoy the bounty of harvest and celebrate the Pilgrims conquest of a new land, vow to take your freedom less for granted. Don’t assume that freedom will always abound. It is fragile and easily dislodged when leaders seek power for power’s sake and forget that they, too, are servants of the people. Don’t allow Thanksgiving to be relegated to a single day.

Thank God for the United States of America. God bless us all.

We take a great deal for granted when we flip on the radio, turn on the television or boot up a computer or cell phone to check the weather. It wasn’t always that easy. In fact, when you research it a bit, you find that the history of weather reporting is deep, but the handy resources only date back to the inventions cited above.
Samuel Morse gave us our first taste of modern communication with his telegraph in 1832. In the nearly two hundred years since, our means of weather reporting has increased exponentially.
As with most public notification systems, weather forecasts were encouraged and sponsored at the federal level. What is surprising is the genesis of such programs. According to the NOAA website, The National Weather Service had its beginnings in the early history of the United States. Weather has always been important to the citizenry of this country, and this was especially true during the 17th and 18th centuries.
The beginning of the National Weather Service we know today started on February 9th, 1870, when President Ulysses S. Grant signed a joint resolution of Congress authorizing the Secretary of War to establish a national weather service. This resolution required the Secretary of War.

Later that year, the first systematized, synchronous weather observations ever taken in the U.S. were made by “observing-sergeants” of the Army Signal Service at 22 stations and telegraphed to Washington. An agency was born which would affect the daily lives of most of the citizens of the United States through its forecasts and warnings.

For most of us who vividly remember the local weather since the 1950s, voices such as Fred Heckman on WIBC come to mind. Later, Mike Ahern of Channel 8 in Indianapolis was a familiar figure for the Indianapolis CBS affiliate station. Doppler Radar is so much a part of our vocabulary that we probably never give a thought to how it developed. Oddly enough, it heralds from the first inklings of what we know as the handy way of spotting objects out of our line of sight.

My sources confirm that some of this history is attributed to a European scientist. German Heinrich Hertz (1857 -1894) calculated that an electric current swinging very rapidly back and forth in a conducting wire would radiate electromagnetic waves into the surrounding space (a modern antenna). In 1886, Hertz created such a wire and detected such oscillations in his lab, using an electric spark, in which the current oscillates rapidly, explaining how lightning creates its characteristic crackling noise on the radio! Today we term these oscillations “radio waves”. Earlier, science dubbed them “Hertzian waves”. Today, in recognition of his work, the unit of frequency of a radio wave – one cycle per second – is named the hertz, measuring frequencies in Hertz (Hz), oscillations per second and megahertz (MHz) for radio frequencies.

Hertz built on the work of James Clerk Maxwell, who predicted the existence of radio waves. Hertz was the first to demonstrate experimentally the production and detection of Maxwell’s waves. This discovery led directly to radio.

According to official sources, six years later, another major development came from a British laboratory when determined Scottish physicist Sir Robert Alexander Watson-Watt (1892–1973) developed the radar locating of aircraft in England. In 1917, while at the British Meteorological Office, he designed devices to locate thunderstorms.

Watson-Watt was the man who coined the phrase “ionosphere” in 1926. Appointed as the director of radio research at the British National Physical Laboratory in 1935, he completed research to enable the military to locate aircraft. Watson-Watt’s other contributions include a cathode-ray direction finder used to study atmospheric phenomena, research in electromagnetic radiation, and inventions used for flight safety. While many may guess that radar is a fairly recent invention, the paperwork tells another story. Modern radar dates to a 1935 British patent.

The term “Doppler” is so familiar to children today that they don’t give it a second thought. Like the inventions when we were kids and unknown when our parents were young, Doppler positions itself as an integral part of current meteorology — but do you know its origin? Again, go to the sources!

Doppler RADAR dates to a man named Christian Andreas Doppler. In 1842, Doppler was an Austrian physicist who first described how the observed frequency of light and sound waves was affected by the relative motion of the source and the detector. This phenomenon became known as the Doppler effect.
Most often demonstrated by the change in the sound wave of a passing train, the train whistle’s sound becomes “higher” in pitch as it approaches and “lower” in pitch as it moves away.
Children are rarely treated to a first-hand experience of a passing train. More’s the pity. Our childhood memories reaffirm the plaintive, questing call of the chugging engine that fired our imaginations as we lay in bed and heard the engineer’s call as he passed county roads and city streets. The destination of those trains inspired us to travel beyond our neighborhoods or farms and see the country for ourselves.
As for the sounds of the whistle, scientists explain it this way. Frequency is the number of sound waves reaching the ear in a given amount of time and it determines the tone, or pitch, perceived. The tone remains the same as long as you are not moving.
As the train moves closer, the number of sound waves reaching your ear in a given amount of time increases — so the pitch increases. As the train moves away, the opposite happens. I wish more children experienced simple explanations of physics. That knowledge could open doors for them that could lead to tremendous inventions in the future.
Weather. It might be a daily concern, but the science within meteorology hints at a deeper theme. Change — not only in the weather itself, but also in the science of weather. Sonograms enable parents-to-be to see their unborn, but that would not have been possible without a man named Robert Rines. His interests might pique your interest as well, because he not only invented high definition radar and the sonogram, he was also a patent attorney, the founder of the Franklin Pierce Law Center and a chaser of the Loch Ness monster.
The next time you rush to the TV after hearing a major storm alert or tune in that car or truck radio for the latest update, remember those stalwart individuals who used their “gray matter” to come up with the inventions that so enhance our lives today. May science change as swiftly as the weather. If it does, we will all be better for it.

We hear the term “blood and treasure” a lot these days. I’m not sure when I first heard it on a news broadcast, but it has been used so much that I fear the general public is numb to its meaning.

My parents belonged to what Brokaw termed “the greatest generation”. My father’s friends flew over Normandy. Unaccepted into aviation because he wore glasses, he went to work at a defense plant and won awards for his ideas that saved the company tens of thousands of dollars.

I remember no war stories. Those men and women didn’t talk about their experiences in Europe or the Pacific. They kept their feelings inside and only their spouses and closest family members heard the muffled sounds of horrific dreams.

At eleven o’clock on November 11th, Armistice was signed ending World War I. Dubbed the “war to end all wars”, it didn’t live up to its moniker. There would be another World War and the continent of Europe would never be the same. An entire generation of young, patriotic Frenchmen died. The culture began to fracture with no elders to instill it in the children.

As you, hopefully, pause to remember those who died to keep us free, I ask you to say a prayer for all those who fight yet today to secure freedom — ours and foreigners who have never set foot on American soil.

Serving one’s country is a high calling. It beckons the patriotic to put aside the fortunes of the private sector and forego jobs with high salaries to toil in bitter cold or blistering heat… to go weeks without a warm meal… to endure the harshest physical punishment… And for what? No, not for what — for whom! For you.

Many restaurants offer free meals to active and retired military personnel today. Yet, there is something equally important that any one of us can do. We can stop and thank them when we see them on the street… in an airport, train depot, or bus station… in a public venue…. It’s the least we can do, considering what they do for us every day. Think about it.

Happy Veterans’ Day to one and all. We owe all those who serve — to a man and woman — a debt that can never be repaid.

The next time someone spouts off a remark that flies in the face of logic and reason, take a deep breath and walk away. It does no good at all to counter their position. These folks don’t listen. They rant away with no basis in fact, but with the enthusiasm of a cornered boxer.

Perhaps they are — cornered, that is. Today is Election Day and if you haven’t been to the polls yet, grab the car keys, jump on the scooter, pile on the bike or take the lawnmower if you will, but go.

This is a pivotal election. Oh, I know that pundits have over used the term, but in this case it applies — in spades. Trumps all else, that is.

I have had it with people who spend my grandchildren’s future as if it were Monopoly money. To a degree, it has been. It has been THEIR monopoly and it’s coming to a screeching halt. Today!

I had the privilege of a great mentor at Franklin College. A native of Mainland China, he fled with his parents when he was a child and eventually served at the Attorney General of Taiwan. He knew the value of freedom and taught Constitutional Law. To this day, nearly twenty years later I remain convinced that any student under his tutelage learned more with him with any other instructor.

Why? He’d seen the results of the rule of the few over the many. He knew what it meant to see his homeland decimated and taken over by those who sought only power and went to any ends to achieve it.

I once heard a political scientist explain the pitfalls of the large government we encounter today. Many of those within the inner circles of it consider any elected official “part time” help. Basically, the bureaucrats outlast any Congress and administration. Like germs, they outlive their adversaries.

I don’t know what it will take for us to return to the concept of a citizen legislature — men and women who leave their jobs to serve and then return to their private lives. We’ve lost that. The system envisioned by our founders is no more and we are not any better for the loss of it.
There are calls for term limits, but then when it comes down to “brass tacks”, nothing happens. It’s fine in the conceptual sense, but it gets no traction within the confines of the party leadership at the national level.

So, what’s new? Just when was the last time you noticed that movements within the upper echelons of government made sense? Do you spend more than you can afford? If you do, you file for bankruptcy, and that is — what I fear — may await the nation very soon.

This spending spree must stop. It cannot be attributed to one political party, either. In an effort to appease the other side and conciliate a mutual decision, the administration of the 43rd president bowed. Well, I use the “bowed” but, in truth, they just bent over — not a safe position.

Take the time to send a clear message to both parties. Democrats, your tax and spend days are over. Republicans, get with the program and quit trying to get along. You need to move along. Move along the track to restore the image of the United States in the world and stand for freedom first.

Encourage your congressional delegation to move the US back to a firm foundation. It’s very ironic that Richard Nixon not only opened the doors to China, but he also took us off the gold standard. That allowed the fed to print money at will — money not backed by gold. Bad decision.

Do we need to plan for the future? Unquestionably. However, we need to look to the past and correct the poor decisions and policies that fuel the mess in which we find ourselves mired today. I fume at the prospect of hard working Americans paying the mortgages for those who couldn’t manage their own money. It’s time for a major correction. Swing that pendulum, but make sure that once new officials are in place that they think about what will happen if they only pay lip service to what Americans demand. Hold their feet to the proverbial fire. Make them accountable.

Do it. Do it today. Vote. ‘Nuf said.

For all of you folks who remember “Give-a-way Don” on late night television in the 1950s and 1960s, cutting prices on used cars was a given. The blackboard sat mid-stage with “original” prices scrawled to the left. Don, with his trademark flourish, would strike that chalk across the figures and slash them “to the bone,” as he put it.

Well, take a deep breath and lean back, for the newest version of that old personality is at it again. Voices rise in fervor as they cast out across the waters and seek support of those who want the government to take care of them. This has never worked. It won’t work now, but they banter away incessantly as if repetition equates results. Working folks know better. For want of a better explanation, use the old adage that remains as valid today as when it first surfaced: “There is no free lunch!”

Labor yields capital. Anyone heard of that mantra? Well, it seems that the 48% of Americans who paid absolutely no federal income taxes in 2008 haven’t been exposed to that credo. Undoubtedly, this figure is even higher today. And what of the rest of us — employed and retired? Well, we foot the bill and nobody in the federal government seems the least bit concerned that there are soon to be more folks in the wagon than pulling it.

Oops! Where has America failed? It all began with the dismantling of the nuclear family. Three generations ago, single mothers were widows. Families were close knit and worked together. The only debauchery flaunted was that of the characters described in The Great Gatsby, where money fueled bad behavior and poor moral habits. Sadly, such philandering is still common among some of the upper crust. But don’t judge all by a few. There are a lot of families who have worked their way up the corporate ladder and still held to traditional values.

The franchise is the keystone of our republic. I am reminded of Benjamin Franklin.
When asked what type of government the American people were going to participate in, by a well-meaning woman, a stern Benjamin Franklin warned that our new government was going to be “A republic, madam, if you can keep it.”

Recently, I booted up a site called Freedom’s Phoenix. You remember Phoenix, the bird that rose again from the ashes. Well, we’re not in ashes yet, folks, but we are smoldering and it should alarm you to such a degree that you encourage others to go to the polls and vote people into office that ascribe to the tenets of the Founders and rebuff the current attitudes that border on outright Socialism. Like the famed “Trojan Horse”, government promises sound good, but they hold a dark secret — they aren’t free. If you work, you will pay for them and so will your children and grandchildren!

Freedom’s Phoenix asks a simple question of readers: Can we preserve our great country or will the American government be irretrievably lost to the special interests who would dare to use our country for their own ends, regardless of the cost. Consider this Robert Hutchins’ quote:

“The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.”

The site goes on to expound on basics that guided those educated and determined men who fashioned this nation so many years ago. America has indeed been living on momentum which began with the Founding Fathers and has been perpetuated by successive generations of American people, until recently,

Increasingly, the American people witness the abrogation of their political rights, their economic futures and the heritage of its children. Yet, the events that would have plunged America into the throes of a bloody revolution only a couple of generations ago are met with notable indifference today.

To which I add this. That indifference should not accompany you to the ballot box. Despite what the majority in Congress thinks, they do not know what is best for you. You do. Clear the board. I saw a wonderful slogan on a tee shirt at one of the rallies earlier this week.

We the people…. Are coming. Are you? I hope so. Think about it. You need not take up arms. Use your vote. Some of the most famous freedom fighters in the world never held a gun. One came from India.

“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight
you, then you win.” Mahatma Gandhi
My, my, how things stay the same. They ignored us. They laughed at us. They called us names. Now they must fight us. The end will come swiftly. We will win.

Take up your flag and hold it in your heart and you enter that booth on Tuesday next week. The future is in you hands. Forge it well.

“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”
Mahatma Gandhi

For all the pundits who prognosticate on the upcoming midterm elections, perhaps it’s time to look a bit further — to 2012. Aha, you say, the presidential election cycle. No, not that…

It is compelling to read the forecasts of the Aztecs — yes, the same people who built the impressive pyramids in Mexico’s interior. They claim the world will end on December 21, 2012. Some historians look at this as a cultural date set in stone, so to speak, a date that reflects the very incisive elements of a civilization that predated present-day America by centuries.

When Native Americans hunted for food and scalped their enemies, the Aztecs built monumental structures that dovetailed so closely with astronomy that their calendar was more precise than any set by any other people on earth.

Do a little research. You will come away slack-jawed at their ingenuity and ability to scan the stars and build their temples to coincide with the sun. Odd, isn’t it, so many cultures around the world worship “up”? Earthlings look to the sky for an entity responsible for creation.

Yet, in retrospect, some scientists claim that the date of 12-21-12 (see the similarity among the numbers?) is not a designation for Doomsday, but something far different.

If, in fact, these scientists are correct, that ominous date heralds the beginning of a new era. Given the history of the past 60 years and the exponential increase in populations dependent upon government for basic needs, then one would hope that the change cited would be a massive swing in the pendulum toward self-reliance.

You remember that, don’t you? The ability to take care of one’s self. It’s dormant in a large part of society, but if sparked by actual need, it can right itself and sail into the future — paving the way for a better life for all of us.

When you teach a child to read, you open countless doors of opportunity. When you teach a man to work, you give him an identity and pride that no amount of aid can equal. Giving a person something robs the very real impetus to achieve. When you remove incentive, you weaken the species.
It is not lost on a lot of us that the year 2012 coincides with a major presidential election cycle in the United States. If ever we were in need of a sea change in attitudes and control, it is now.

History, again, is the best teacher. Nowhere on earth and at no time in history has socialism ever worked. Look at Russia. When the Bolsheviks took over in 1917, the first thing they did was to take all the intelligencia and remove them from society — crippling any chance of societal gain. Farmers were taken to Siberia and city dwellers were placed on farms. Food production nearly came to an end.

Years later, when hunger was rampant, those who worked the land were given small plots of their own where they could raise their own food. What happened was predictable, in purely economic terms. The harvests from the small plots outstripped those of the government farms to such a degree that even the most hardened Communist had to see the difference.

Did the system change? Hardly. The government boot remained on the necks of the people for decades. No competition fostered sad examples such as warehouses of size 9 brown shoes. No choice. No opportunity. No incentive. No progress.

When Lyndon Baines Johnson launched the War on Poverty, he began the only real war that America has lost. Contrary to those who criticize the war in Viet Nam, no American unit ever lost a battle there. It was pure politics that withdrew the troops and left the South Vietnamese people to be slaughtered by the North Viet Nam Communist troops.

Do we have fewer poor? We have more. Do we have intact families among the poor? No. Do we respect the institution of marriage and decry practices held in dim view for millennia? We do not.

It is time for us to expect — yes, and pray for — a sea change in our political system and a reinstitution of personal responsibility. The growing numbers of government-dependent Americans needs to come to a screeching halt.

Schools need to be in local control. Many government programs need to end. When the average government worker makes more than a worker in the civilian sector, there is something terribly awry in the wage system. Common sense needs to be the rule of the day.
We, as a people, need to relegate “Political Correctness” to the ash heap. No amount of justification can defend it. There is right and there is wrong. To err is human, and I — for one — am tired of watching liars parse their language and sincere people ridiculed for honest opinions.

Don’t despair and abandon the fight. There is light at the end of the tunnel and it emanates from a lamp held by a grand lady on Ellis Island. Freedom lights the way. Creeping socialism threatens that light, but it can be fueled once again by a simple ballot.

Do not allow those who seek “basic fairness” (what a crock!) for all. Equality for all is not only not achievable, but also unneeded. Take away incentive and a people become serfs. This nation was not built by a people that sat on its corporate backside. It was built on work, and it’s time we put work first.

To take a play on words from 1970s California — of all places — remember the call of Santa Monica: “Surf’s up!” Twist this a bit and you have the warning for our time: “Serfs up?” I hope not. Think about it.

“Leadership or Needership?”

Every time an election rolls around, the words fly. Yet, not one of us is able to escape the repercussions of recent history. The following discussion is not a digression from the title of this column. Rather, it is a prologue to a clearer understanding of what we face and what we must do about it.

I had a fabulous professor of African-American History at Butler University in the early 1990s. Her name was Katherine and she was very young. Perhaps barely thirty, she had just earned her doctorate and was as enthusiastic as any person I ever had the privilege of having as an instructor in graduate school.

Of all the interesting and thought-provoking elements of her class was her explanation of how the demographics of the inner cities — and more succinctly — the wider society among the twelve or so percent of Americans who prefer to be called African American than the much older term Negro or its temporary, socially-acceptable newer term Black.

Those of us who grew up in Shelbyville had a false sense of society. Yes, there was discrimination to people of color, but to a far lesser degree than in the counties around us. The mindset of those counties was punitive, caustic and often spelled out in crude signs warning people of color not to stay beyond sundown. That signs were left up speaks volumes for the residents of the counties where such signs marked city limits of county seats.

Getting back to Katherine. She explained that from their first arrival on American shores until the mid-19th century, the African American culture was based solidly on the family unit. Think back on your youth if you are close to 60 or so. If you do, you will see the evidence here at home.

I cannot recall one friend of color who did not live with a mother, a father and brothers and sisters. Often, a family also included a grandparent or an aunt or uncle whose age made it difficult to live independently.

The statistics are high, and I’m not sure I can quote them precisely, but I think that Katherine said that the close Black family unit was not only the norm among the culture, but also nearly unanimous. Pushing further into the lives of those who lived in Black areas of larger cities, evidence affirms that there was a wide spectrum of occupations among the residents. Children grew up among their own people, but they had built in incentives to aspire to choose a career. Indeed, it was more difficult to enter a college, but even hurdles that would daunt some young people didn’t deter those who dreamed of a bigger life and were willing to work hard to achieve it.

Youngsters went about their daily lives and saw black doctors, dentists, lawyers, insurance agents, shopkeepers, barbers, hairstylists, and merchants in their neighborhoods. Sadly, the greatest movement toward equality brought with it a distinct downside for the poor unable to raise themselves to a middle class level.

Once integration took hold and housing opportunities opened up for Black families yearning for their piece of the American Dream, professionals fled for the suburbs. Doctors and dentists may have kept their inner city offices for a while, but little by little, they drifted away from the old neighborhood.

As a result, poor children marooned in the central cities gradually had fewer and fewer role models. When the stable elements left the area, the criminal elements gained a foothold. The saddest point of all this is that out of wedlock births skyrocketed among the poor the inner cities, fueled by government payments to women with dependent children. Suddenly, the social stigma of unwed mother disappeared. This, however, is not a condition specific to the Black population. It was society wide and cut across the economic and ethnic spectrum.

Parallel to it, and even larger in sheer numbers were white folk who were poor, plus other minority populations who struggled to make meager ends meet. Clearly, the consequence of handing out money to those without a father in the home and to those who were not working began a downward spiral that now eclipses the lives of nearly one in seven Americans. What a travesty! What a tragedy! Removing incentive draws us close to collapse.

It is hard to estimate how many children grew up in a home without a father. Black or white, Asian or Hispanic, the children suffer. This is not to say that a single mother who was abandoned, a divorced mother, or a widow could not rear a child well. Of course, they could. However, a solid family unit is a building block of priceless value that cannot be underestimated.

Now, to elections…. Alexis de Tocqueville warned of the danger inherent when the people realize that their vote can access the national treasury. Well, isn’t that special? (Shades of Saturday Night Live’s “Church Lady”!) Nearly fifty percent of Americans pay no federal income taxes and a very small number at the high end pay nearly all of them.

I’m all for a flat tax that closes the loopholes of the super wealthy, but I lament the fact that the growing numbers of those dependent upon the government for their existence seek “needership” with their franchise, not the “leadership” that will spark a new generation of schools that teach factual American and world history, explain that no study of great art, music, or literature can be done without the basics of religion — in specific, Christianity — and focus on what freedom means and that it is not, and never has been free. This “leadership” would engender ambition and inspire those with little resources to work toward a better life.

Not all kids will achieve the success of a Donald Trump or a Steve Jobs, but each of those kids can learn the rewards of pride in accomplishment and the good feeling of a job well done. Are these within reach of them? You betcha!

Those who champion food stamps and extended unemployment insurance as a cure all to today’s ills need to get a grip on reality. The path to economic freedom is a society built on jobs. Compare the salaries of government workers with those in the private sector, but do it before you eat.

What will it be for you? Are you ready to turn this country over to those who see the people as servants rather than bosses? November looms closer and the power is in your hand as you stroke the pen on a ballot, turn a handle, or press a button. “Leadership or Needership? It’s your choice. Think about it.

To my complete dismay, there doesn’t seem to be a particular group among us that has a lock on a demeanor that is not only disgusting, but also unnecessary. The standard “please” and “thank you” are disappearing from conversation at an alarming rate, but along with those time-honored words a general attitude of civility is waning and that should give each one of us pause.

A few days ago in a place far, far away (at least in terms of miles from home), I found myself face to face with a truly rude person. It always takes me aback to be in that spot, but what amazes me is that it happens more and more frequently.

I can’t be sure that I am correct in my assessment, but I do feel that this increase in bad behavior only reflects a larger problem among us today: the preoccupation with self. The “I” factor that rears its ugly head does nothing to elevate the one who parrots self-worth. In contrast, it speaks volumes about the one who places self above all else.

I found it much easier to allow this woman to make a fool of herself than to respond and get into a verbal sparring match. She certainly did a good job of showing her true personality. Yes, there were others present and after she left the venue, they bantered about and apologized to me for her. After all, I was a visitor to the area and she was a resident.

I wasn’t offended. Ignorance doesn’t offend me. It disgusts me, but it fails to offend me. I wondered, as she drove away in a very dirty car, if she had any friends at all. It would be difficult to forge a meaningful friendship with her social skills.

Do things get under my skin? Of course they do. The bottom line is how I react to them. Oh, I mutter great retorts to myself when alone after the attempted confrontation is a mere memory, but I never lower myself to spit back a nasty comment to anyone who has a mind (?) to act so rudely.

No doubt, you have been on the receiving end of a barb or two in the past. The only way you can distinguish yourself from the rude person is to react in a neutral way and let the words fall at your feet. That’s where they belong anyway. Train up your children and grandchildren to ignore rudeness. The only ammunition rude people have is to quote your response. Don’t give them the opportunity to make a fool of you. Take the high ground. Think about it.

In a world besieged with messages on what to wear, what to eat, what to drive, or what to do, there is a trend that needs more than a little attention.

In the early days of television, companies were hesitant to use competitors’ names. Some of you are old enough to remember Bufferin versus Brand X in a familiar pain reliever ad. Oh, were those days ones of innocence!

Ideally, an effective ad presents prospective customers with facts in order to persuade them to purchase a particular product. Over time, the simplicity of those early television ads has morphed into an industry that funnels untold sums of money into the coffers of both mainstream and cable television channels. It’s big business, and it doesn’t reside solely on Madison Avenue anymore. Small concerns with high tech tools can produce ads that rival the older, established advertising agencies.

Lately, I grow more and more wary of some of the current ads. I focus on one aspect of them — an aspect that should worry all of us.

Let’s examine just two of these ads. The first is actually a multiple of glitzy ads touting a major city with a reputation for glitz. Various characters appear on these ads, but — in the end — the message is that it doesn’t matter what you do there, there will be no consequences. In essence, what goes there stays there. Oh, gee, is that an invitation to bad behavior? You think? The message is unsettling — particularly because young people find them humorous. Bad behavior funny? Evidently. How sad.

The second ad features a mother and a daughter. In one scene, the mother is having a good time. In her exuberance, she spills something on her clothing. Later, the daughter complains that she cannot find her favorite top. Clearly disappointed, the daughter then leaves the house. The next scene shows the mother using a brand name laundry detergent to wash the top. Then the ad cuts to the daughter wearing the top, now with no sign of any stain. Instead of stepping up to the plate and admitting that she borrowed her daughter’s clothing, the mother quietly allows the girl to think that somehow she missed it when she was rummaging through her closet earlier.

The message? It’s perfectly acceptable to lie so long as you don’t have to admit your bad behavior. How nice — parents deceiving children. Some message. If anything, it makes me vow to never buy any of the sponsor’s products, and it makes a lot of them!

Is this how far we have come? Do we now watch these commercials and ignore lying and misbehaving as updated norms for society. If we do, I fear for those among us lacking a moral compass with which to judge these ads. Minus guidance, youngsters are the most vulnerable among us.

How do you react to ads of this type? Do you find them unsettling and troublesome? Clumped together with the clothing ads laced with sexual messages, ads pummeling our kids should demand more of our attention than they do. I’m not a fan of boycotts, but a barrage of letters might get the attention of the proper people.

I realize that I’m preaching to the choir, but there are times when I’ve had it up to my ears with advertisements. If you disagree with current practices, use your voices. Most companies have a toll-free number. Call it. You can find corporate addresses in many places. Drop the company a note.

Ironically, if sponsors paying huge dollars for these ads knew how many of us hit the MUTE button the moment a televised program cuts to a commercial break, they might think twice about what they run for ads in the first place.   What ever happened to “truth in advertising”?  Think about it.