Martial Law and the assassinations of the 1960s

America has never had their police force or their military force more armed and with more personnel than they have today, in which, Wikipedia.com states that: "in 2008, state and local law enforcement agencies employed more than 1.1 million people on a full-time basis," and further that in 2010, our military force consists of about 2.25 million people, including reservists.  This total force of police which have become more and more militarized in its tactics, weapons, and equipment as well as our military force, which essentially has nobody to fight or to war against, except against third rate nations and insurgents, are well trained and have demonstrated in action that they will reign destruction on innocent or guilty, alike, without compunction, and without questioning orders as given by their superiors.

In the 1960s, we suffered the assassination, of one President, John F. Kennedy on November 23, 1963, one black nationalist, Malcolm X on February 21, 1965, the great civil rights leader, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on April 4, 1968, and one Presidential candidate who had an excellent chance of not only winning the Democratic nomination but the Presidency, Robert F. Kennedy, on June 5, 1968.  The only assassination that led to any extensive rioting was the MLK assassination, of which, to the credit of the followers of MLK, as well as to other statesmen great and small, and citizens of all colors, calmness was the order of the day, and it was by that calmness by so many, that reduced the effect of the rioting that still occurred in many cities, of which, the biggest riots were in Baltimore, Chicago, and Washington DC, in which the National Guard was called out, but considering that King was a remarkable, iconic, and an exceptional man, the greatest voice of his people, the overall negative reaction to his callous assassination could have been far, far worse, but it was not.

Today, though, should assassinations of this sort, of these sorts of great visionaries re-occur or be re-visited, the response, one fears, would be the type of chaos, rioting, destruction, violence, and the declaration of martial law, on such an unprecedented scale, never before seen in this nation.  The difference that we have today as compared to the 1960s, is that the 1960s, represented for those that were oppressed a belief, that through the great society programs, through the recognition that blacks as well as other minorities, deserved and were due a place at the great table of opportunity in America, that indeed, these inequalities and these injustices, though they may take time, would eventually be overcome. 

Unfortunately, we are fifty years removed from that place in time, and while there has been progress made, and there are indeed people of color in positions of power, in government, and in the private sector, the vast majority of minorities are no closer to the promise land than they were fifty years ago, and very strong arguments can be made, and are made, that they are even further away; for the justice requested, has been replaced with unprecedented high levels of minority incarceration, the job opportunities requested, have resulted in higher unemployment vis-à-vis the white majority, and more and more minorities being stuck in dead-end jobs with no opportunity to make a living or to have a meaningful life, in addition to the fact that schools that should now be fully integrated, are, in fact, separate, unequal, and too often absolutely abysmal for minorities.

The divide between the "haves" and the "have not" is greater today than it was back in the 1960s, and the faces of the "haves" while not 100% white are predominately the same class of whites that have been on top forever, and the faces of the "have not" while having some white mixed in, are essentially the same faces of color that it has always been since the first slaves were stolen from their homeland and forcefully taken to America.

So then, the real reason why today's police force is so militarized, and why our military forces are so plentiful, has little to do with foreign fears, but has everything to do with domestic ones, for America has given up on its minorities, given up on even the semblance of fairness, and will by all means necessary, put down via martial law, the oppressed that would have the audacity to think that they can rise up against the state.

You cannot create existence out of non-existence

Modern man's ignorance of basic universal laws is stupefying.  That is to say, as man has become more intelligent, and has passed forth its collective knowledge from one generation unto the next and thereby improved upon it, man has gravitated from the knowledge that we must have a Creator to the revised knowledge that we must not, that man is indeed the measure of all things; but this cannot ever be true, isn't true at the present time, and will never be true.  This means, that man, because man doesn't want to answer to any Law that is above man's own arbitrary law, ignores the obvious, mainly because mankind wants to adhere unto itself the attributes as if man is a god, whereas man most certainly is not, and never will be.

Think carefully about the most basic of truths, that you cannot create something or anything out of nothing or non-existence, yet, esteemed scientists, teachers, and their ilk, make that argument all of the time through insipid theories such as the big bang, in which the universe theoretically came out of nothingness into our present day universe.  So too, scientists somehow are able to with a straight face believe that humanity, came forth from some primordial soup, of which intelligent life eventually evolved.

The problem with any of these atheistic theories is that taken down to the very core, there comes a time, when nothing, that is an absolute void, is somehow is able to become something, but that is foundationally flawed.  It is flawed, because it has not and cannot be produced in nature, there is nothing that has ever been made, or that has ever been created, that has started from absolutely nothing--that is to say, from a complete and total void.  The scientific model that proves the point that something can come out of nothing has not been proven and will never be proven for it cannot happen.

While it is intriguing that mankind desires to know the origin of things, and desires to ponder upon such, a scientific approach for the origin of things is hopeless.  On the other hand, mankind is gifted with the intelligence to know, to implicitly know, that time itself is an illusion, so that scriptural words such as: "In the beginning…" should not be taken literally but are given to mankind as an aid for his understanding that man is part and parcel of God, so that in reality, in regards to the creation of the earth, as well as to the creation of mankind, there never was a time when earth did not exist, or that mankind did not exist upon it, for that creation, is beyond time and space, though to us, it appears to be entwined with time and space, but that is based on the limited perception that mankind has in the physical sphere.

The reason that you exist, that is to say, your consciousness, and thereby your soul exists, is because it has always existed, and will always exist, for all that will ever be created has already been created, God therefore is not in some sort of constant flux, changing, re-inventing, or morphing, for God does not evolve, for God is timeless, changeless, and immortal.  Our very existence has naught to do with earthly things, for these, as real as they appear to us, as physical as they might be, are in reality our opportunity to play in the drama of a different dimension, in which, the true objective of the exercise is to demonstrate in action that we are knowledgeable about who and what we really are and thereby to do the right things with others, so as to be in harmony with the Creator of it all.

Brotherhood and Fratricide

Western nations, whether nominally Christian or not, all claim to be civilized countries, but that is belied by the most basic of facts, that these nations do not treat their fellow countrymen, let alone those outside of their nation, with the care and consideration that would be in keeping with the mantra that all are equally created and thereby all are our brothers and sisters.  In point of fact, the taking of anyone's life should be considered to be fratricide, for either you believe wholly in the gospel as written, that all thereby are brothers and sisters in God, or you do not, as there cannot be any conscious equivocation of what is a fundamental tenet of the Christian faith, for this too is consistent with basic morality, and there are none born of a lesser God.

The fact that many acknowledge that we are brothers and sisters on the one hand, but are not true brothers and sisters on the other hand, can only be explained by vilifying one's opposition, so as to make those certain people into something less than human, that is subhuman, something less than God created, and thereby something equivalent to an animal, which is why in wars, the opposition through media and images is universally displayed as some sort of savage, and referred to in terms that negate their value as humans.  Although, these may be the descriptors utilized, and these may be believed by people, implicitly, literally, or not, none of this is actually true in fact.

For instance, every human being in this world, from a DNA perspective, from a biological perspective, and from a visual perspective, is, in fact, a human being, despite what religion may be their faith, despite the color of their skin, despite their language or their customs, and so on and so forth, they are all human, and to try to make them into something that equates to them a value of being less than human is to wrongly deny to them their true essence.

That is why the great human religions, the great men and women of real substance, will not take up arms against their fellow man, for they see that doing so, would be a version of fratricide, for that is indeed what it actually is.  This does not mean that man has no right to defend himself, from enemies foreign and domestic, for self defense has its legitimate place, but it does mean that wars of aggression against country or neighbor cannot be right, especially when doing so, necessitates in the killing of both the "guilty" as well as the innocent.

Those that believe that it is "kill or be killed" are truly blind, for they aren't utilizing the gift of their human mind, but instead are behaving as if their mind has been subverted and has instead been taken over by their lower animalistic instincts.  That is why some of the worst fratricidal atrocities are performed by those that have had their minds addled by drugs or drink or their minds somehow have become damaged or mesmerized, for to take the life of your brother and to not recognize it as such, demonstrates a callous disregard that all come from the exact same First Source, and that therefore every life taken, takes us further away from where we need to be going.

The Fourth Amendment and the Automobile Exception

The Supreme Court in 1925, ruled in Carroll v. United States that because automobiles are highly mobile, that a warrant is not required to search a given vehicle, if the police have reason to believe that the vehicle contains evidence of a crime, or contraband of a crime. In short, this meant that while driving a vehicle, the right of the people to be secure in their persons and effects, are subject to being violated, without a warrant needing to be issued, simply based on the "probable cause" that a given crime, has been committed, as determined by the police.

This decision, was somewhat remarkable, in the sense that cars were at one time, commonly referred to as "horseless carriages," signifying that there was a time when the normal means of transportation was the utilization of horses, also highly mobile, in addition to the fact that horses could be attached to carriages, making them readily capable of transporting contraband or other goods, so that, at the time of the writing of our Constitution, the mobility of man from one place to another, was often conducted utilizing a form of transportation, that was highly mobile, i.e. horses.

Since this Supreme Court ruling there have been additional rulings, in regards to warrantless searches of automobiles, but fundamentally the Supreme Court decision as determined in 1925, stands as is, which permits warrantless searches of vehicles, based on probable cause as determined by the police, still being the law of the land.  The substance of this law as enforced in America, is that, by definition, anytime that a given individual desires to move from one place to another, that person, is subject to being stopped by the police and subject to a search of their vehicle as well as to their own person, all under the guise of "probable cause," of which, the police, can essentially pull over anybody for any reason, under the color of law, so that in effect, "witch hunts" are authorized by this statute, and the Fourth Amendment, for all practical purposes, is null and void.

The upshot, though, is that the Fourth Amendment, could have easily dealt with the issue of the mobility of man, by making it part and principle of its Amendment, of which, it did not.  In addition, during any part of a given person's mobility, a person will begin from one destination and arrive at another destination, so that, the police or other governing authority obviously still have the ability and capability to see and to notice all and everything done out in the public view from such transportation, so as to thereby create an actual probable cause of real actionable information, that a specific warrant can therefore be generated upon.

The reasoning behind the automobile exception becoming law, is that because automobiles are mobile, therefore, an exception must be made in order to stop a crime in process, or to interdict contraband, all under the logic that this has to be done, before the vehicle travels away and therefore is able to offload the contraband or to remove all vestiges of a crime that has been committed, but in point of fact, police essentially use the automobile exception, to violate the people's Fourth Amendment rights, under the guise that they need do so in order to stop crime and to punish criminals.  However, in practice, what is established is a police state, in which the people are never secure from unreasonable searches and seizures, because the police have not been troubled beforehand to find probable cause and have not been issued a warrant specific to the place and thing to be seized. 

The mere act of driving in one's vehicle, the equivalency of riding one's horse, should not now, and should not ever mean the removal of the protection to be free from arbitrary searches conducted by the state against the individual.

The 4th Amendment and your Cell Phone

The 4th Amendment states in part: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures ….no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause …and particularly describing the place to be searched."  In today's world, there are two common devices that people use on an everyday basis which have extremely personal information about an individual that the police should as a matter of course, not be allowed to search except under the most stringent conditions as well as under strict controls, and those would be our personal computer and our cell phone, but in fact, the police are eager, overeager to search both, which presents to them a wealth of very personal information about an individual, of which, the vast majority of that information is not germane to the case at hand.  This information is so personal and the viewing of such so invasive, that it is fair to say, having gathered all of such data from a given person's cell phone is somewhat akin to vacuuming information directly from a given person's brain.  That is why, if there is not specific legislation passed which restricts and monitors carefully such activity by our policing arm, the present situation will go from bad to worse.

The most important thing to get across, is that cell phones are essentially for many people, a detailed diary of their activities on a very specific minute-by-minute basis, of which, such information, should never be allowed to be freely accessed by the police, because, by definition, the searching of such information, is a massive net, scooping up literally everything, which includes all sorts of reams of data, which are not specific to any probable cause, and not distinct to an alleged crime that the police would have, it is, instead a great opportunity for the police to go on a personal fishing expedition, which then will create the potential to find a probable cause to fit a crime, ex post facto.  So too, such information, can easily be stored, classified, and mined, so as to be available to the policing force, information that will allow the police to open up investigations or to do additional research for future crimes or for their own data collection interests.

A cell phone in the hands of the police, without any oversight by a strong independent party on behalf of the people, is a huge disservice to the people.  That is to say, perhaps a reasonable accommodation for a search of a cell phone can be created, in which, first the police get a warrant issued upon probable cause and signed by a judge, that specifically lists the information that they desire to search for on that specific cell phone, and rather than the police doing such a search, that search could be done instead by a third party, in strict conformance with the search warrant instructions, so that only such information that specifically fits within that warrant is presented to the police, and all other information, is never provided, never saved, and never reviewed by the policing authorities.

If, on the other hand, the police are allowed to search a cell phone without oversight and without constraints, implicitly or not, or undetected or not, than the country will essentially create two worlds, one in which, those that collect and access information can permanently know everything about you, but you, will know nothing about them.

Like for Like

People like to overcomplicate life, so as to create all sorts of avenues and alleys that meander all over the place, that thereby go back and forth, as well as up and down, even though anyone of any real sensibility can clearly see that the destination desired is actually just straight ahead.  For instance, think about this very carefully, if someone is rude and disrespectful to you, and you respond in kind, does the situation actually get better or does it get worse?  Or consider if someone slaps you across your face, and you respond in kind, does this bring peace and satisfaction to each party, or does it get worse? 

In point of fact, all things being equal, if you hit someone, they will hit you back.  Of course, most of the time, things aren't equal at all, so that when you hit someone, and they don't hit you back, it isn't really correct to believe, that they somehow have recognized that you are right and that they therefore deserved it, though that is possible, but often they want to retaliate but do not have the resources to do so at the present time, or, at a minimum, they strongly desire to pay you back in kind, with an action similar to yours, if they can only find the necessary tools and the right time to do so.

The above suggests what should be fairly obvious to all, that a destructive war that kills and maims many, while also destroying infrastructure, and creating all sorts of havoc, will, in and of itself, not bring lasting peace.  In fact, for the side that has been defeated by such, it will bring a certain resignation, signifying that they cannot overcome their opponent, but hardly recognition that war has somehow enlightened these people that they were in the wrong, and therefore they will now live peacefully with their erstwhile opponent.

There is a basic truism, known implicitly by all, which simply states that if you want more of the same, than all you have to do is to keep doing the same things that you have been doing, and you will expectantly get the same result. If, on the other hand, you want change, real fundamental change, than one of the parties, must make a change on their end in order to effectuate a different result.  So that, those that conquer by the sword, must at some point, truly turn their swords into plowshares, and having done so, they will find that their mindset and the things that they do, day-by-day, will materially change from what it once was, into something more pacific, making for a more tranquil world.  Of course, there are many that argue against this same point, indicating that a nation or a person must always have a strong defense at a minimum, in order to protect oneself from dangers, foreign and domestic, but mankind has tried this very same thing, under all sorts of different names and reasons, for millenniums, and to what effect, has all this accomplished?

In short, on the most fundamental level, you cannot end violence with more violence, though granted violence is very good at ending another person's life, or taking over another country's sovereignty, but having conquered through violence, this has created the seeds of yet more violence.  To end violence, therefore, you must stop the act itself, and by doing that, by refusing to take up arms, by refusing to respond in kind, you may indeed lose your life, or even lose your country, but ultimately there will step-by-step, be birth real lasting peace, for like will, as surely as the morning follows the night, bring forth like.

The Declaration of Independence: A well thought out Political Action

There are all sorts of protests done formally or not, on a business level or not, on a personal level or not, on a political level or not, in which, those that are protesting haven't really developed fully what they are protesting about.  That is to say, they are protesting about something, they are upset about something, but that certain something that they are protesting about, they haven't really considered it all the way through, taking especially into consideration more than one perspective and what it really is that they ultimately want from such a protest, if they are successful in it.

If we take a careful look at our Declaration of Independence, we will see that this protest and this proclamation, is carefully constructed in such a way that its petition covers all of the bases needed to make the succinct appeal to the people of America, that there comes a time when enough is enough.  This is accomplished by clearly stating that the colonists must dissolve their political bands from Great Britain because that government that they are presently under is precluding them from the certain unalienable rights that all are entitled to, and further to the point that having been denied such, that the people have a right to re-assembly themselves as a separate people entitled to the safety and happiness under a government of the people that supports these things on behalf of the people.  Still, the Declaration continues on, and actually appeals to the world at large, to verify the justice of their claims, in which, the colonists then list specifically their complaints against their present source of trouble.

All of the above demonstrates the correct structure of a true and virtuous political protest.    That is to say, whatever your protest may be about, that those that protest should first repeatedly try to come to a successful resolution with those that they have raised their objections against.  If that then fails, and further to the point, if the petitioners are being denied certain unalienable rights, than they have a right to petition to a higher independent council, specifically listing what has been denied to them, along with the reasonable efforts that they have made to resolve such, and thereby demanding satisfaction for their complaints.  Then, having accomplished each of these steps, the petitioners are ethically entitled to take all the prudent and necessary measures that will permit them to secure the very things that they have been wrongly denied by their opponents.  Having said that, if must be stated, that those that have not taken these appropriate steps, but instead have resorted to creating havoc or riot without having first thought through the entire process do not typically have legitimacy for their actions and their protests lack the firm foundation of a protest done with reasoning aforethought.

There are many times and many issues that people may come across in regards to personal, or business, or political events, of which they are upset, sometimes with great justification, but it isn't correct to respond by such with anger, rather one would be far better served to first understand the complete issues involved, express thoroughly to others those issues, along with petitioning such issues in front of a fair and independent tribunal for their judgment, and then to respect that decision, if soundly reasoned.  Too often, however, for too many people, our protest is really about just selfishly having our own way, for right or for wrong.

On Constitutional Government

The Executive Office, that is the President, upon being elected by the people, through the electoral vote, takes an oath of office, in which the President states: "…and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."  Both Houses of Congress, elected by the people of America, take their oath, which reads in part: "…that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic…"  Both of these above oaths make it clear that the executive branch as well as the legislative branch have a faithful obligation to protect and to defend the Constitution of the United States.  What these oaths do not say, and what these oaths do not mean, is that the Executive and legislative branches must at all times and for all reasons, bow down to the judicial branch of the government, that is the Supreme Court, and thereby abide by all of the Supreme Court decisions, no matter how inimical or how misguided they are to this Constitution, of which these nine justices are appointed for life, and are not elected by the people of this great country.

There is a clear and present danger of ceding the laws, the interpretation of laws, and the execution of laws into the hand of a small privileged tribunal, of which if a simple majority of such justices believe one thing against a minority that believe it not, it then becomes for all intents and purposes the law of the land.  An interpretation such as that, would effectively eviscerate both the executive branch as well as the legislative branch, for if the judicial branch is left to its own devices, so that they, alone, through their human judgment, decide what is or isn't a law, what is or isn't permitted, what is or isn't the appropriate interpretation of the Constitution, from their viewpoint at that time, no matter their inherent prejudices and misjudgments,  than the people have no effective voice, the executive does not really carry out the laws of the land, and the legislature does not make laws, for if the judicial branch is permitted to not only to interpret law but to essentially make and carry out new laws, than that judicial branch is the de facto ruler of the land.

In point of fact, the oaths taken by the executive as well as the legislative branches, clearly show that the judicial branch cannot now, nor shall be permitted to ever be the sole determinate of what is or isn't law, and what is or isn't the correct interpretation of Constitutional law.  This isn't to say, that the judicial branch is by definition, a danger to the people, or an enemy of the state, for the justices of that court, have made many just interpretations of the Constitution, however, this same court, over an extended period of history, has deliberately subverted the Constitution in critical points of law, so as to have even aided and abetted enemies of our civil government.  For instance, the infamous Dred Scott Supreme Court decision of 1857, which stated in part under the dubious reasoning that because slaves were considered to be property, that such property, was still considered to be the property of the owner, no matter whether the State had outlawed slavery or not, or whether the territory did or did not permit slavery, so that to take such property from the owner of such when in a territory or State in which slavery was illegal, was a violation of their Firth Amendment due process clause, which was a sectarian decision unsoundly reasoned and wrongly decided.

So that, it can be said, for those that believe in judicial supremacy, that the Dred Scott ruling was clearly the law of the land, fortunately, within this country there were legislators that refused to disavow their Constitutional oath, and in 1860, with the election of Abraham Lincoln, this too meant that the executive branch would not permit an erroneous interpretation of the Constitution to destroy this country, so that the southern interests despite prevailing in the judicial branch of this country, knew that the voice of the people through their representative government would not be subverted or controlled by a pernicious judicial decision, and so they rebelled.

The First Civil Rights Act

Most people are quite familiar with the landmark Civil Rights Act, ratified in 1964, along with the Voting Rights act, ratified in 1965. The Civil Rights Act essentially precluded segregation from all places of public accommodation, in addition to creating the legal teeth of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that barred discrimination against employees on the basis of race, religion, national origin, or sex.  Additionally, the Voting Rights Act was passed to prohibit literary tests and other assorted restrictions essentially precluding blacks from voting.  These new laws were the beginning of the end of State sanctioned discriminatory practices as well as the elimination of overt discrimination in America.

As great as the passage of this above legislature was, history, tells us, that after the North defeated the South in our Civil War, along with the passage of the 13th through 15th Amendments, in and of themselves, this should have created the equality and freedom, that those previously enslaved had been denied, for the 13th Amendment, abolished slavery, the 14th Amendment stipulated that all persons born within America were citizens of America, and the 15th that all citizens had the right to vote.  Yet, despite these noble amendments, the effect of these amendments, especially in the southern states, ended up being far short of the desired effect.

Therefore, in 1875, the original Civil Rights Act was passed, which stipulated that all races shall be equal in the face of law, that all races shall be entitled to equal access to all public places, and that all citizens shall be qualified for service as a juror. In 1883, however, the Supreme Court weighed in on this Civil Rights Act, and in a vote of 8-1, effectively nullified that Civil Rights Act, more or less washing their hands of such legislation, by arguing that this Act was unconstitutional.  Once that decision was made, Southern State Constitutions were amended in such a way as to deliberately discriminate against blacks so as to take their voting rights away by creating conditions that were discriminatory against blacks, while favoring whites, so that the voting rolls of all Southern States eviscerated from their rolls, the vast majority of blacks, that had won the right to vote, via the 15th Amendment, as the States set forth their own revised rules which negated it.

All of this meant, for the Southern States, who rebelled against their legal government, who first took up arms against their National government, and then made this country to suffer through an incredibly bloody and damaging civil war, that although they lost on the battlefield, that although they lost their institution of slavery, that they would, despite Constitutional Amendments, despite a Civil Rights Act, be able to take those of a different race, and while no longer being able to legally enslave them, to discriminate against such, with almost total impunity within those States, so that enslaved or not, they would be permanently oppressed, in servitude, and treated as a permanent underclass, in fit, form, and function.

This meant, as history has shown, time and time again, that mere words on paper, flowing or not, righteous or not, have no real effect, if the words are not backed by the full faith and power of the National government, that means what it says, and does what it means.

The Power of the Word: No

Most people have a desire to get along with others, to please others, and to, in general, obey others, for a lot of reasons, some well thought out and some not really thought about at all.  But, it is wise to remember, that you have been gifted with your own mind, by the very same Creator that has gifted all with free will, and that the greatest usage of that free will, is to utilize it in a manner that provides the greatest service to others, as well as to yourself, in which, the truly wise understand the value of, as Shakespeare told us, "…to thine own self be true."

While people get into trouble for all sorts of reasons, if one takes an honest look, at decisions and things that they have done that gave them the most trouble, a significant amount of that time, there is blame that lays not so much exclusively at their own door, but blame that rests somewhat with someone else, that deceived us, tricked us, used us, or took advantage of us, by suggesting or pressuring us into making a fateful decision that resulted in very negative consequences, and pretty much our fateful decision, started not with the word: "No", but rather with the verbal word "yes" or mere silent acquiescence to their demand or request, even though, many times, within our mind, it cried out to us, that the correct answer, was indeed, no.

We have friends, parents, bosses, teachers, and associates, that we deal with day by day, but these people, in authority or not, our peers or not, are not perfect within themselves, and while many are good people with good advice, there are many more that are just plain wrong in what that they do, in what they suggest, in what they ask or request or demand that we do.  It is those times, we should utilize the free will given to us, to stand strong, and to not give in to what we either know to be wrong in the first place, or to the temptation to do something that we suspect is wrong, or to unthinkingly just do it, when we should actually think it through.

The decisions that you make, day by day, define you as a person, those decisions, badly influenced by others or not, are still ultimately your decisions, in which you will have to take the responsibility of such, so that, while it is true in order that to make progress one has to move, not every step is the correct step to take, for some steps are on the wrong path, or in the wrong direction, and further to the point, the goals and desires of one person may be diametrically opposed to the viewpoint of another person, for they are not you.

Therefore, have the courage and the strength to make a stand, and to thereby walk away from what appears to be wrong, or at least, give yourself time to properly consider it, or to even consult with people of respect, rather than hastily make a decision that you may well regret, sooner or later.  The very best time to do the right thing is at the beginning, when the decision must be made, of which, in life, in general, learn of the power and usefulness of saying "no", for the dead go with the flow, but the living do not necessarily have to.

Injustice and Justice

There are on any given day a multitude of unjust decisions made on formal and informal levels, and the people making those unjust decisions know it, but still they do it, knowingly.  They do it, for a lot of reasons, one being that they do not have the courage to do the right thing, that is to say, for example, seeing someone that is suffering from racial baiting, in which there are others that are aware of it, but all fear to interfere with it, for they fear that they will suffer for their interference no matter how direct or indirect.  So too, there are laws on the books that are applied in unfair ways so that certain people are discriminated against, clearly demarking a society in which some are more "equal" than others, yet, those on the side of the line in which they benefit from such discrimination, are often afraid to voice their viewpoint, for they appreciate on some level the fact that they are treated better and with more privilege.  Then there are laws and societal norms which precludes being just to one's neighbor, because within that clique, within that societal norm, to do so, would bring dishonor to the family name, therefore that is not the way things are done, so hence you won't do the right thing.

The bottom line, though, is that there is never a time not to do the right thing, there is never a time not to do correct justice, there is never a time not to be fair, and there is never a time not to recognize that all mankind are created equally by our Creator.  For when we state that the time isn't right for justice, and that the time isn't right to be fair, we imply, or more than imply that when certain conditions are met, and these conditions always seem to be in flux, then, and only then, will we do right.  This type of thinking is corrupt, for either something is right, and it is right -- right now, or it is wrong right now, wrong in the first place, wrong forever, and wrong to keep doing.

The incomparable Theodore Parker stated that: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.” The very reason that the arc of the moral universe is so long to begin with, is because mankind is so stubborn in providing justice to their fellow man.  Especially irksome, are do-gooders, which preach one thing, but practice another, stating to the oppressed people all over, that their time will come, but not now, as if justice for all, would upset the entire universe and make for a world that is worse than it is, already. 

The bottom line for politicians and the people that they represent is this, Constitutional government has been the law in America for over two hundred and twenty five years, through civil war, domestic disturbances, and other wars, and still justice is miles and miles away.  Clearly, those that run this country, those that are our legislatures, our executives, and our judges, do not and have not read or comprehended fully the Constitution of this country, nor the Declaration of Independence. For if they had, they would, for a certainty, do the very things, that would make this a country of the people, for the people, and by the people, with liberty and justice for all.

The Spirit and the physical

Imagine a world in which there are dinosaurs, monkeys, guerillas, alligators, and all sorts of animals, a world that you are aware of but not part of, yet, you find the world to be so fascinating that you desire to visit it, but you have no physical form to do so, because you are spirit, and because you are spirit you are free to incarnate into physical forms and to thereby experience physical life, its limits, its fascinations, its dilemmas, and so on and so forth. 

Tempted,  you go aheadand incarnate, and at first, incarnating into physical form is something that is done as a mere sideshow, because you are consciously aware that you are spirit, but as you incarnate from this animal to that animal, from this thing to that thing, you begin to lose sight of who and what you really are, which is spirit, and more and more begin to find yourself becoming to believe that you really are exclusively that physical thing, subject to physical laws, subject to the lusts and needs of a physical body, subject to all the limitations of material life, but in a perverse way, enjoying the thrill of that experience, the power of being able to take from other animals, the excitement, the everyday drama, and the thrill of physical form.

Yet, on the downside, your physical body suffers harm and damage, it ages, it experiences cold and heat, hunger and satiation, victory and defeat.  In addition, whereas once you were free to disincarnate from one animal to another, now, your spirit is somehow encased within the physical, and for the most part, forgotten, so that, whereupon the death of that physical form, there is a momentary confusion, as to who and what you really are, before the scales fell off of your eyes, and you know that you are as you always had been, spirit, but your spirit, itself, feels unclean, and unworthy to join itself back with the First Cause, for having lived a life as an animal, you had taken on the characteristics of an animal, of selfishness and of aggression, which are inimical to the attributes of spirit.

This meant, that you felt a need to correct what had gone wrong, thereby having a strong desire to re-incarnate back into animal form, not to continue along the path that you had been on, of pure animal passion, but to take the animal, and to evolve it into something that it had not previously been, so as to make that animal, not only more sentient, knowing right from wrong, but to make the animal more sociable, less selfish, and more in harmony with the First Cause.

Unfortunately, while there were those in spirit form that felt the urge to reform and to uplift the animals that they had incarnated into, there were many others, that felt no need to do so, whatsoever, so enraptured in physical life that they had become, that they preferred not to change a thing, to ignore that still, small voice, and to do the things that gave them pleasure, or power, or satisfied their material lusts and desires, so that, this material world, once a fascinating paradise, became instead a battleground, of which this battleground continues until this very day, good v. evil, right v. wrong, selfishness v. unselfishness,  on and on, but the end result will be to come back to how it was, in the beginning.

The industrial revolution and labor

There was a time when the only thing helping human labor to produce goods and foods, were various beasts of burden, but in the late 18th century, mankind began to make and to utilize machines, primarily powered by coal, of which these multitude of machines were able to help produce power in order to manufacture textile products, in addition to manufacturing machines specifically for agricultural and textiles, as well as tools to help extract more coal, and to aid in the creation of transportation systems such as railroads, of which, once the industrialists began to fully understand just how much vital production that could be achieved by utilizing new power sources as well as utilizing machines to help in the creation of products, previously done entirely by hand, the industrial revolution, literally changed the day-to-day conditions of western civilization.

This meant that societies changed from being primarily agricultural societies, into creating the need for cities, so as to have the economies of scale and efficiencies of labor, machinery, and transportation, working cohesively together, which in aggregate, made societies significantly richer than they ever had previously been before, so that the everyday products from food, to travel, to housing, to farming, to clothing, all became much cheaper and produced at unheard of scales. This, also, created the rise of the middle class, because products needed managers, sales people, infrastructure, logistics, and all the other things that make up an organization, creating a labor force that was able to assert itself through fits and starts to receiving reasonable accommodations and pay, in return by doing so, the manufacturers of such received a reliable and productive work force.  So that, in effect, societies inexorably changed from being basically the noble class or its equivalency, along with a relatively small class of lawyers, clergy, doctors and such, with everyone else being day-to-day laborers or artisans, into the need for skilled laborers utilizing the machines so as to make products, maintain them, and to coordinate all this so that the entrepreneurs of the age could make good money.

This rise of the middle class during the industrial revolution, was not then, an anticipated event, or even necessarily a desirable thing, it was more part of a happenstance of the age, for the industrial revolution, was not really driven by a need or desire to uplift the human race as a whole, but fundamentally was built upon more profit, cheaper product, bigger scaling, better transportation, all so as to have a bigger market share, and the desire to make more money through the usage of machines,  in lieu of human labor.  What occurred, through the industrial revolution, however, was a change for the vast majority of laborers, from previously having to make their money solely through their physical labor into a new workforce, that utilized machines guided by the hand and mind of man so as to produce more product more efficiently than had ever been done before.

We now live in an age in which the sophistication of machines has grown so much, that these modern-day robotics, have become truly a force unto themselves, replacingoften times, scores of humans that were necessary for earlier versions of such machines and robots.  Today's robots are so sophisticated, so precise, and so consistent, along with their ability to work 24/7, that this negates the necessity for a huge swath of blue collar workers to work alongside them, and are a clear and present danger for the necessity of the current infrastructure of white collar middle management, leaving basically only the requirement for laborers that are minimally skilled, or laborers of highly specialized skills, whereas the upper management of such, reap the monster share of enormous financial benefits from these robotics.  Everyone else, (e.g.) the former middle class, which has had a tremendous run of good fortune, since the onset of the industrial revolution,  are now trending towards dropping into subsistence levels, where their future are ones of lifetime indebtedness and of treading water, for the age of robotics needs them not.

The Economic Debt of the Four Horsemen

It's difficult for anybody to really fathom exactly what one trillion dollars represents, for in the everyday way of things, we have a good conception of a million dollars, but a trillion dollars is so far beyond that, it seems unfathomable, but it is very real and it definitely exists.  First off, a billion dollars is a thousand million dollars, so a thousand millionaires would be worth in aggregate one billion dollars.  This then means that one million millionaires would be worth in aggregate one trillion dollars.  While there are plenty of millionaires, there are less than two thousand billionaires in the world, and the man with the current highest net worth in the world, is Bill Gates at about $86 billion dollars, which is less than 10% of a trillion dollars.

The white horse is the student loan debt which is estimated to be $1.31 trillion dollars, of which, this debt has increased from a fairly reasonable amount of just $90 billion dollars in 1999, to its current debt load of over a trillion dollars.  All of this debt might be okay, if the United States, over the last generation had spent an inordinate amount of money to produce a country of geniuses, but that isn't true, whatsoever.  The higher education con-game, has extracted billions upon billions of dollars primarily from financially unsophisticated young adults so that they have mortgaged their future to a debt load that in many cases is incredibly oppressive to their budget, with a lot of these students having either no degree, that is, they didn't even complete their collegiate courses, or a graduate degree that has been of little or no worth to them.  While it seems fine, to pay the money now to get the education that will make life better, the price of education is exceeding too high for many, and basically is a virulent form of exploitation of the young.

The red horse is credit card debt, in which marketwatch.com states that we have: "$1.021 trillion in outstanding revolving credit in June 2017."  Those banks and other banking type institutions that issue credit cards do not see such as some sort of beneficial favor to consumers, but as a way to make money off of consumers, in which, their preference, of which there is an abundant amount of people that fit this description, are people that are forever behind the proverbial eight ball, so that they must use credit cards in order to either make ends meet month by month, and/or are tempted to spend money that they don't readily have in order to get something that they would like to have, now.  This allows those banks to charge a princely finance charge, along with other assorted penalties and fees for those that short-pay their monthly payments or are late, of which those financial fees along with financial interest charges, are a rich source of revenue for the banks, for the cost of money to the banks is negligible but the cost to consumers is stratospheric.

The black horse is automobile debts,  according to qz.com, the "US closed out 2016 with just shy of $1.2 trillion in outstanding auto loan debt," of which these loans to consumers have never been longer in the length of time, that is to say, whereas five years was the maximum amount of time for an auto loan, thirty years ago, in today's auto loan world, according to time.com, "…less than 35% of us take out financing for five years or less," indicating that never has the length of time for auto loans been longer than it is at the present day, despite the fact that the interest cost for said loans have been at historic lows for the last decade or so.  This indicates clearly, that for far too many people, they are lured into purchasing far too much car, by what appears to be low or reasonable monthly payments that go on forever, while starting further and further away from the real equity in their vehicle, because the amount that they owe exceeds the actual worth of the car upon purchase.

The pale horse, is mortgage debt, and this horse visited us not so long ago in the years 2007-2009, and despite changes made in the mortgage world, to verify employment, to sell to credit-worthy recipients, for higher down payments, and so on and so forth, the bottom line in the mortgage business, is that the more loans that are generated, the more potential profit and fees that are generated, in addition to the fact that mortgage originators often off-load their loans to the quasi-governmental guarantee organizations, known as Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.  The amount of mortgage debt in America is currently over $14.5 trillion dollars, yet, it wasn't until 1977 that mortgage debt first crossed over $1 trillion dollars, and this current amount of debt is probably within months of exceeding the highest amount known on record which occurred in 2008. 

These four horsemen, are all under the most extreme danger of any sort of normalization of interest rates, that is to say we have been living in an interest rate environment in which the borrower of such, especially those of excellent credit, have never paid lower interest rates, but the Federal Reserve has slowly begun to raise their rate of interest to a more traditional higher rate, and should this continue, each of these four horsemen, will find that being the borrowers of such, that they cannot and will not be able to stay current on their payments, leading not to a more severe version of recession that was suffered through just a scant ten years ago, but an outright depression or even a collapse of our monetary system as we currently know it.

America's Three Estates

Before there was a French revolution, the monarchy of France was divided into three basic Estates.  The First Estate was the clergy, which not only owned a significant amount of land, but paid no taxes on their income or their land, but instead collected taxes from their constituents so as to maintain their status as well as to pass onto the monarchy these taxes as a form of tribute. The Second Estate were the nobility, which also owned a significant amount of land, and in an era in which wealth came from the land, owned the hunting and fishing rights of their land, as well as the agricultural resources, so those that worked such land, or had need of such land in order to hunt or fish, paid a fee, or were taxed, or paid a percentage of their produce to these nobles, for the privilege of using their lands.  Everyone else in France, not part of the monarchy, or the First or Second Estate, made up the Third Estate.  The Third Estate, was essentially the commoners, which made up the vast majority of the population, who essentially subsidized the first two Estates as well as the Monarchy, as they were the ones that paid the taxes needed for the regime, provided the soldiers for the regime, paid fees to the regime, and owned, if they were fortunate, small tracts of land, and were virtually never upwardly mobile, so that becoming members of the first two Estates was typically a forlorn hope.

In today's America, each year, we devolve further and further into Three Estates.  The order of such in America, is different than was France, in the sense that the First Estate, are not nobles, but the business owners of our largest mega-corporations, in which, such corporations, through the corruption of our tax laws, pay corporate taxes at such a low rate, for instance, as reported by cnn.com, Apple paid in 2014 in the European Union "… a tax rate of just 0.005%.."  In addition, the highest executives in these massive corporations, prefer their compensation not in paid salary but in stock options, so that they can postpone the tax man till such time as it is most favorable for them, which precludes them from being taxed at the ordinary income rates which are considerably higher, but instead are taxed, at the much lower capital gain rates, or possibly even escaping taxes, depending upon the moves and maneuvers available to them. 

The Second Estate in America, is our religious organizations, that do not pay property taxes, nor do they pay any federal, State, or local income taxes, so that churches that own their own property do not contribute to their community by paying taxes on their property, but in theory, contribute through their contributions and investments made within the community in their charity and services as provided, of which this money comes from the commoners of their community.  Additionally, the pastor of a given church, is provided with a very nice tax perk, of being able to deduct from the pastor's income, a housing allowance, so that if a given pastor earns $40,000, but has housing costs, of $30,000, than their effective income tax is based not on their $40,000 income, but on the much lower number of $10,000. 

The Third Estate in America, is everyone else, though they may own their own homes, own their own small business, have other investments and things of worth, all are subject to the full taxation authorities of federal, State, local, property, and any other assorted taxes that are charged to common Americans. Of course, within that Third Estate some people are doing much better than others, but in aggregate, as each year marches on, the Third Estate must carry more and more of the burden of the nation, which is why the middle class has been struggling just to maintain its own over the last two generations, and why we seemingly have a permanent underclass, that will never get out from under.

Education and Morality

While education has many purposes along with being of immense value for the improvement and advancement of society, the most fundamental thing that any good education must address is morality and thereby one's perspective of life itself.  That is to say, it's great that through teachers, application, books, tools, classes, discussions, thinking, and so on and so forth, that we can bring forth to each succeeding generation, better engineers, better scientists, better doctors, and better educated people, but it isn't good enough to simply have smarter people if they have little or no moral compass to correctly steer their life upon, for the greatest danger in any world, isn’t any particular individual intent upon evil, but a particular individual that is well schooled, charismatic, ruthless, driven, and persuasive, that thereby has the ability to lead many, many people to do evil things against the good of society.

There are many people, for whatever vacuous reason, that believe that there isn't a known truth, or that truth is relative, or all sorts of basic philosophies built upon deceptions and falsehoods that persuade them to believe whatever convenient thing that it is for them to believe, yet, just studying children as they interact and play, clearly shows that there is one very basic truth that all are ingrained with, and it is this truth, that we should always keep front and center.  For instance, when one child bullies another child, does the teacher encourage this behavior as being something that should be emulated; or when one child refuses to share with another child, does the teacher applaud such behavior; or do teachers encourage and admire liars, cheaters, hatred, and disruption?  The very basic answer is no, because most people believe intuitively that life should be fair, equal, just, and that we should deal with others with respect and courtesy, yet, looking around at how often adults interact on a business and personal level, indicates that many people have put aside such concerns in order to get ahead, or to get over on somebody else, or to just be selfish, for the most basic truth of them all is that we should treat others the same way that we wish to be treated ourselves.

It is imperative within any education system, supported and aided by the state, that proper morality and ethics be taught to children within that system, and further should continue to be taught to those that then attend higher education.  It isn't good enough to simply tell people that certain things and certain actions are wrong, for children are inquisitive, and adults question just about everything, so that, there needs to be an interplay, which allows students to begin to understand empathy, other perspectives, as well as the importance of integrity, honor, reciprocity, and respect.

It's unfair to expect that people will do the right thing, if they don't really know, if they don't really understand, if they don't really comprehend, what the right thing is to do and why that is the right thing to do in the first place.  That is why any educational system that lacks the fortitude to teach basic morals and to impress these upon their charges, has failed those students.  Our educational system has an inherent obligation to teach children how to think, and within that thinking, why it is important to think things through and to thereby do the right things, for if we can't accomplish that, we shouldn't expect the world to become a better place.

The misuse of handcuffs

Police routinely use handcuffs when arresting people, no matter if the person is pregnant, wounded, injured, a child, suffering from dementia, or even if they are dead.  The basic police procedure of handcuffing everyone so that the police don't appear discriminatory to anyone, is nonsensical, for there are a lot of really bad reasons to handcuff everyone indiscriminately, along with the most fundamental problem of them all, which is, many people that have been arrested should not be handcuffed with their hands behind their back in the first place for they pose no flight danger, no physical danger, no conformity danger, and have offered no resistance or have not the capacity to offer resistance or trouble to the arresting officer.

To say that all crimes, or alleged crimes, fit the exact same mold, so that all those that are arrested for crimes, should be handcuffed is stupid and unacceptable, for there are many crimes that have absolutely nothing to do with violence whatsoever, in which, these people have shown no predisposition for violence, aren't acting violent, are physically weak, are vulnerable, are a female, elderly, or very young juveniles, and they should not be handcuffed unless circumstances clearly substantiate the exception to the obvious.

The handcuffing of arrestees has not a lot to do with the actual need to control an arrestee but has a lot more to do with police asserting their power to control, to humiliate, to hurt and to belittle the arrestee.  The fact that a particular person has been arrested in the first place, has essentially turned their life upside down, but to add pain and punishment because a criminal charge has been made against a given person, does not make that person, guilty of that charge, in addition, with most people, if you treat them with respect and dignity, they will treat you the very same way back.

While, certainly there are times that necessitate handcuffing a suspect, and while it is pertinent to take into account, the size and strength of a suspect, their mental state, whether they are a fugitive, and so on and so forth, it isn't right that handcuffing suspects of all stripes and types is considered to be routine or policy, because, it really is a form of street punishment meted out by the state through its policing authority, against suspects that have been convicted of nothing, and have yet to be found guilty in a courtroomof their peers, though they are handcuffed as if they are guilty of something.

The police like to talk about safety, in particular, they imply that handcuffing of suspects is necessary to protect the public, to protect the person being arrested, and only as an afterthought as a protection for the arresting arm of the state, but the truth is that handcuffing suspects often isn't necessary, adds unnecessary tension to the situation, is deliberately cruel to the suspect, and a form of punishment for those that have been convicted of no crime.

The policing authority of the state is supposed to serve and to protect the citizens of that state, bur their actions of treating citizens as if they were animals, in need of restraint through the indiscriminate usage of handcuffs, reflects their contempt of those citizens, who have an inherent right to be free of any punishment and to be free of any coercion, until they have been lawfully convicted in a court of law, for those that are arrested but are never convicted of any crime, yet suffered through being arrested, embarrassed, inconvenienced, harmed, and handcuffed, never do receive any recompense from the policing arm of the state, other than the stamp of disrespect they received by that policing arm when they were first handcuffed.

The deathly spiral of the impoverished that are left behind

America prides itself of allowing its denizens to move from place to place, from town to town, from city to city, from State to State, so that, just becauseyou currently live in a safe neighborhood, or a decent neighborhood,  or an okay neighborhood, or a great neighborhood, doesn't necessarily mean it will always be that way, as though, in theory, things always get better, because there are certain specific neighborhoods in which things don't ever seem to get better, rather, they inevitably get worse, and sometimes a lot worse.

For instance, whether it is labeled correctly "white flight" or not, when a given neighborhood for whatever reason has a traumatic change in its perspective, or demographics, or work force, the cascade of changes affecting such a neighborhood can have an enormous impact upon those that are left behind.  That is to say, neighborhoods that have more money, neighborhoods that have more income, neighborhoods that have more wealth, neighborhoods that have more net worth, are typically going to be neighborhoods that have a surrounding infrastructure that supports that material fact, so that the parks will be better and safer, the policing of such will be more professional and competent, the schools will be better, the infrastructure of stores, shops, libraries, hospitals, roads, and so on and so forth, all will also be better.  This signifies for those neighborhoods, that living in such a community will be pleasant, for it is, by definition, a nice place to live.  On the other hand, when all these things are going in the opposite direction, the very opposite thing will happen, which means that the neighborhood and all the peripheral things that go with being in a safe and nice neighborhood, will be appreciably worse and trending strongly to that downward spiral.

This means, when, for whatever reason, there is a perception that the racial mix of a neighborhood is considered to be trending towards intolerable, or the religion of new residents is suspect, or the look and behavior of residents seems uncivil or uncomfortable, or there has been a notable closure of a means of employment, or the infrastructure of public places is suffering from disrepair, that those that are most perceptive, or perhaps more correctly considered most selfish, will, if they have the means and wherewithal, begin to plot their escape and removal from their current living situation into a neighborhood that they find more suitable.  This would be okay, except for this very important reason, which is, if the neighbors that first leave a neighborhood which appears to be on the downswing, are those neighbors that have the most money, that have the most wealth, that have the most education, that have the most means to move out and they do indeed move out, than the residents that are left behind are in aggregate, less of all of these material things, making the neighborhood not only appreciably poorer but also far more vulnerable to dire consequences.

In America, it seems far too often, that is always easier to build something new or to start anew, rather than take what is already in place and to thereby take the necessary steps to fix it, or to repair such, before it becomes too late to mend it or to replace it.  Communities in which the economic opportunities have been eviscerated, in which the school system has become second-rate or even worse, in which the policing is seen as the problem and not as a service, and the residents have devolved into apathy, or incivility, and fear and discord are part and parcel of such a community, aren't going to be communities of people that are good neighbors, but instead are going to be communities of neighbors that have become an underclass which is under-served, under-cared for,  and left behind as the losers in a game that they didn't even know was being played.

A Decade of super low interest rates

The Federal funds rate is the interest rate that a depository institution (e.g. banks) lends funds maintained at the Federal Reserve to another depository institution, and this rate since October of 2008, has not been higher than 1.5%, and currently resides at 1.25% as of October, 2017, after being quiescent at 0.25% for over seven years, indicating that for the last ten years, the United States along with other nations, has had an historically low Federal Funds rate, which is completely abnormal to the history of this rate from previous decades.

While there are many ostensible reasons why the interest rates have been so low for so long, the most prevalent reason given by mainstream media is because of the financial crisis, specifically the housing mortgage crisis and the collateral debt obligations (CDO) created in order for banks to profit, only for the buyers of such to discover that many CDOs were essentially toxic, leading to the severe discounting or outright default of these CDOs, along with the material assets (e.g. houses) plummeting in value, effectively making these mortgage loans significantly higher than the revised intrinsic value of such homes, plunging the loaners of mortgages along with the buyers of CDOs to the brink of a catastrophic meltdown.  The Fed felt that they had no choice but to effectively drop their Federal Fund rate to essentially zero, so as to postpone and to stave off debt which already could not successfully be serviced to the lowest level that could be created in the hopes that by doing so, this would allow debtors to get their house in order.

These super low interest rates did reduce the debt service load for many debtors, so that debts that would have cost billions of dollars more to service, were essentially transferred from the debtor to those that had monetary assets (e.g. savers), so that those that previously parked their money in Certificates of Deposit (CD) or other cash-like instruments, while still having such available to purchase, discovered to their dismay, that CDs rather than paying their somewhat traditional 5.25% were instead now yielding 0.25%. 

This would imply that in today's new super lower interest rate environment, that it has never been better to be a debtor than a saver, which is true to a certain extent, and that extent basically only is accurate for those that have excellent credit and large monetary assets, for those people and institutions can receive loans at rates previously unheard of for any appreciable length of time, and thereby leverage up their investments so as to make money via real estate or equities or other financial maneuvers.  On the other hand, while debtors find that servicing their debt has been significantly reduced, the problem that they still have is the fact that they have debt that they cannot seem to escape from, for debt can never be paid back, if the debtor cannot generate the income or growth to pay such debt back, and if the assets, if there are any, used as collateral for such a debt, are worth less than the debt, indicating that the creditor will not wish to foreclose on such a debt, for there is little or nothing to collect, but rather the creditor will desire tokeep the debt open forever, continually bleeding their debtors, so as to at least receive something, for if and when, the creditor has to write off what are uncollectible debts, than the creditor has lost that asset for good.

A decade of super low interest rates are a reflection that the economic growth rate in virtually all western nations is very low, that the debt load within these nations is already so high that higher interest rates on debtors would wrought financial disaster, and that therefore continual low inflation, low growth, and an overall precarious financial situation is the norm, for the balance sheets of nations such as America, shows a monstrous debt load, increasing yearly, with absolutely no fiscal plan to deal with it, so that the creditors of American debt, recognize that interest rates must continue to remain low into the foreseeable future, or a worldwide recession will occur, or much, much worse.

Advertising and that pleasurable feeling

"Just the facts, ma'am", has little or nothing to do with advertising that consumers are inundated with each and every day, no matter, the medium that they engage it with.  That is to say, while advertisers could spend an inordinate amount of time listing all the reasons why consumers should pick their particular product over a competing source or an alternative source, fact by fact, they seldom bother to do such.  Rather, advertising is much more about trying to create an emotional connection between the consumer and the product that is actually being advertised, so that facts for the most part are put aside, especially since facts for a given product, as in its particular effectiveness, are often illusive, transitory, and not necessarily true, so rather than being caught making claims of some dubious veracity, advertisers find it far more lucrative and successful to advertise in a manner that invokes good and pleasurable feelings in an audience. 

For instance, most everybody wants on some level to be liked, or admired, or respected, and other attributes of that sort, because it makes them feel better about their validity and about themselves.  Advertisers are well aware of this need for self-validation, so they make it their purpose to advertise products that will make you feel that if you own such, you will feel better or more accomplished about yourself.  So too, advertisements are a way to take a product and to make it appear to be something that if you are able to own it, your status rises because you have it.

While advertisements could make it their point to appeal to consumers in both a logical and straightforward manner, they recognize that they are far more successful in selling products to consumers through emotional tie-ins, that tap into the inner yearning and desires of consumers, so that by partaking of a certain something,  this will enable their customers to be part of something that helps to make them feel better and more complete about themselves, which is often why advertisements through their imagery and music, construct a storyline in which the real objective of the story is for you to want to capture that emotional feeling of the narrative.  This means, for people that are enraptured by a particular advertisement, that they will want to purchase it, because they believe that by doing so, they will add that feeling to their persona. 

What many people fail to recognize when they speak of the "necessities" of life, is that everyone already knows that they need food, water, shelter, and so on and so forth, but they also consider necessities the things that will allow them to within their social milieu, to hold their own, and advertisers are able to exploit this over and over again, so that people feel strongly that they must have certain purchases in order to conform and to affirm that they are part of that social group, or even, beyond it, even though, from an objective standpoint, they really are not. 

So that, the real reason that there is so much advertisement in the United States, isn't because the advertisers are trying to provide necessary pertinent information to their audience base, but rather, to make people feel that they need this specific product in order to feel good about themselves and/or to demonstrate that they have achieved something of real status by virtue of their ownership of that special product.