Concerned in Sulphur Springs

Dear Concerned,

I should be Ok for the near future. Dieing though has been on my mind. We all die my friend. dying is nothing. But when you die, that can be important. There is so much I have to do before and so little time. Dying so often comes at an inconvenient time. I have much to do before I go. I would pray that we all have the time to finish that which is important to us.

Unbelievable

Dear Unbelieving,

A number of years ago, I was at a corporate seminar on political correctness and the glass ceiling. One man and one women were selected for an exercise. The winner of which would get a major promotion. They had a line of 25 middle-aged, overweight men bending over and dropping their pants to present their rumps for kissing. The winner was the one who got furthest down the line without quitting. At this point the woman quickly organized a committee to talk about the hindrances of the glass ceiling and the obstacles placed in their way. Meanwhile the man is half way down the line, kissing every cheek and slipping his business card in every crack. Now I do not know if I was embarrassed or just full of testosterone laden pride but I was certainly red faced. A few years later a survey showed that all of the major promotions went to men. The conclusion was that discrimination prevented women from climbing the corporate ladder. I blame this whole glass-ceiling problem on the practice of door holding. Women are used to having doors held open, they get served first at restaurants, they get to leave elevators first. It’s hard to move from that mind-set to kissing a huge line of old asses to get the promotion. By contrast, men are holding the doors and getting served last. Its not a big step then to drop and pucker, so men are more conditioned for managerial success.

On second thought I may have been suffering from sunburn from spending to much time on the golf course sucking up to the boss.

Concerned in Sulphur Springs

Dear Concerned,

At this point, with the information I have I’m not sure. I was thinking about risk versus uncertainty. Risk suggests measurable probability. Uncertainty is when likelihood of future events is simply incalculable. Uncertainty is when you don’t even know what you don’t know. Uncertainty is humility in the presence of ignorance. I keep hearing about theory and reality and I cannot help but think we get them mixed up. Uncertainty, that’s what is going to come back, time and again and bite us in the ass. And I state that as a certainty. “Or is it just a risk?” The only thing constant is change and my life has changed dramatically these past weeks. Thankfully, some for the better and some for the worse. I’m rambling aren’t I? Hopefully I’m going to be OK and I sure appreciate you asking. I will have more to say about it in the near future so watch this space.

Throughly Confused

Dear Confused,

I’ll give it a try but bear in mind this is only one mans opinion. Picture the country as a wagon with 10 citizens riding in it and 10 citizens in harness pulling the wagon. That is the approximate representation of the current breakdown of our taxpayers. It is now 50/50. Half the country works and pays taxes, half the country contributes pays nothing and lives on the other half’s money. The working half are getting tired and slowing down. Soon 1 or 2 of them are going to give up and climb on the wagon. When that happens the entire thing will grind to a halt. It has already happened in CA. IL. NY etc. The elected officials there are scrambling to blame this on someone else and at the same time dreaming up news ways to scam the few working out of more money. That is the juncture we find ourselves at. The pullers are tired and finally asking what in hell is going on. You see, the problem is that 50% of our citizenry is sucking on your tit and keeping these clowns in office.

The line item veto is one answer and term limits are the other. We need people in office concerned about doing right for this country instead of worrying about getting re-elected.

Start with the next election, deliver the resounding message that you have had enough and refuse to return the incumbent to the office. We need new blood and honest blood. Part of the answer is to throw the bums out and hope the next group gets the message. Finally we are delivering the message.

Throughly PO’ed

Dear PO’ed,

I’ve followed the argument in the paper. Can I assume you are talking about the asbestos and multiple bathroom thing? If you are, I have a couple of thoughts. First the criteria for bathrooms, the code says if you are in a small store, like the Chamber one bathroom is OK. If you are in a little larger area the code says you have to have two bathrooms. What does the code say about the huge stores, for example Lowes and Walmart. I believe the code says that two are OK. Same as the small storefront downtown, so logically I can assume the number of bathrooms is not dependent on the square footage as the city states but rather on an illogical decision made by some faceless bureaucrat and adopted by our city without thinking. If you argue the point you are referred to the board of variance for a ruling. Don’t hold your breath, they are not going to think about it and recognize the absurdity of the situation. Their argument invariably is that they are looking after your best interests, protecting you and the public. But enough, these are nothing more than illogical, arbitrary rules set up by an unthinking bureaucracy. Change the rule, you can do that. Change the way the rules are enforced, you can do that. Pretend you care about us, we can understand that.

On asbestos, I can understand the concern but again I do not like the reasoning. If you bought an existing operating store and did not change anything you would probably not have to fix anything. But if you renovate, Katy bar the door. Here come the rule guys. In either case the risk to yourself and the public is the same, but in the first case nothing has to be done. Go figure I cannot.

One more comment, about the uneven enforcing of the codes. It appears that if you are bringing something to the city that they want, you will have far less trouble than a business that they do not feel is appropiate. Just an opinion, but they seem to have an unspoken agenda and never honestly put all of their cards on the table.

The only answer is to throw the bums out and hope the next group gets the message.

Uneasy in Sulphur Springs

Dear Uneasy,

At this point, with the information they have given us, I would vote a resounding no! All they have done so far is make needy, whinny noise, we need, we want , we have to have etc. At a minimum, I would like to see a dispersal budget for the 48M. What in the hell are they going to spend that much money on? I’m talking about a detailed plan of expenditures showing where the money is going to go or are these people just infected with the Obama disease. I would like to know why the existing school properties are not adequate and what will become of them. The SSISD has a history of abandoning or giving away property. It’s our money, not theirs. You can make up your own mind, but I would not hand that much money to any group of people who could not re-sod a football field with two do overs. I’m sure that I’ll have more on this later.

Dear Masses,

I don’t often hear from the masses so I’ll attempt a little brevity. Due to the recent economic crises, stock market crash, budget cuts, rising unemployment, unstable world conditions, the cost of insurance, electricity, petroleum, and taxes of all kinds, I regret to advise you that the Light at the End of the Tunnel has been turned off. My sincere apologies if my answer costs you breakfast and I’m sure that any day now The Bamster will apologize for the inconvenience.

Dear Embarrassed,

I’ll take a shot at it. Sucking up to the bosses is a time honored weasal tradition and an excellent way to keep your job in companies that foster that type of behavior. The technique has been around since the dawn of humanity when the first cave dweller said to his tribal leader, ” You make good fire. Me could never make fire that good. Your club is the biggest.”  Thanks to evolution,  we have gone from butt sniffing to butt kissing and the seeds of capitalism were sown. I hope this helps?