Might makes right

It starts out easy enough, with questions like:

“How do you spend your free time?”

Initially the responses are simple and natural enough, and in my case, they begin with some variation of the following…

“Either you put on lipstick in preparation for this meeting or your lips are just that beautiful color.”

It’s just that my mind seems to run down that path. Eventually, I get bored with the game, there is no competition.

When it doesn’t matter, which is to say, almost always, I love to lie. I like to think of it as calisthenics, it encourages quick thinking, necessitates flexibility.

The other day I went to the drug store near my studio. I often go there to pick up supplies like sunflower seeds, hard candy, greeting cards, cell-phone accessories and the like.

I didn’t want to bother with the credit card if all I had to buy was an ironing board cover. I was going down the aisle and it was the first time I noticed that they sold five-gallon buckets.

Like any God-fearing American, I like me a 5-gallon bucket.

White, clean, brand new, it was a dream bucket. There was ample room to get all of my purchases inside, so I could forego the bag. I also bought a movie, some ice cream, and the aforementioned ironing board cover.

I walked home swinging my new bucket, and probably grinning. Whatever the movie was, I had every intention of watching it while eating coffee ice cream. Once I unloaded the bucket, I noticed that there was a definite dearth of ice cream.

I took the receipt and headed back to the store. When I got there, the people who had helped me knew what I was there for.

While I was walking over to the cooler I looked the cashier in the eye as I was telling her about an 11 year old girl who lives with me looked in the bucket when I got home and said “Where the fuck is my ice cream?” I went on to tell how she stared me in the face and said she was going to stab me if I didn’t get her ice cream before The Suite Life of Zack & Cody came on.

I took the ice cream back to the studio and watched Batman.

I know why I like this. I can pipe up when I think I have something to say, and I can say what I wan without repercussion.

Once more, same as before [original context HERE]:

Power of censorship???/?
who has the power to censor a book or newspaper? nobody right? but where in the constitution does it say that?

31 minutes ago
3 days left to answer.

The first amendment of the constitution is very clear on the things that GOVERNMENT cannot do. All of the bill of rights is the same way. They are limitations on the power of the government, not the people. They are ten precious reassurances to the people that any federal body shall never abridge these things.

There are a couple of things here to consider. The bill of rights, the first ten amendments to the federal constitution, refers only to what the federal government cannot do. The tenth amendment; ‘The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people,’ is specific, and precise. Just like the rest of the document;

The first amendment, ‘Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.’, only controls the federal law-making body. Specific and precise again.

The Bill of Rights specifically does not limit the states, or individuals from doing what is outside the purview of the federal government.

So, that being said, you would have to look into the law in your state, but I think it is a roundly accepted matter of course in the writing of state constitutions that people would have the right to be free of this type of tyranny.

The same can NEVER be said of the individual. An individual always has the right to censor a book. They can tear out a page, cross out a passage, or boycott the book entirely. They cannot go into a bookstore and do the same to the books in stock. That would be destruction of private property, and that is already against the law. They cannot go into a library and do the same thing, because the books there are held in public trust, and therefore destroying them is also against the law already.

That is all thing one, i.e. the government is subject to limitations such that they are never able to censor any book or writing or speech. On to thing two:

Effective censorship.

If the same guy mentioned above that crossed out the passage where the dish ran away with the spoon in his own book, didn’t want anyone to read it, he would indeed have a number of options to make sure this never happened.

He could buy the publisher, and take the book out of production. A perfect example of his exercise of free enterprise. Nothing to be done about the books already printed, though. Hmmm.

He could organize a protest that would surround and berate anyone who wanted to buy the book at the store, or check it out of the library. And by rights he should. The whole dish-spoon infidelity has gotten out of hand.

Eventually the public outcry would be so strong that the store would want the book off their shelves to appease the people bothering their customers, and the library is subject to funding pressures that put decision-making power in the hands of people voting in the city council chambers, and, by extension, the community.

Done correctly, and within the laws and standards of the community, this is the perfect expression of his right to peaceable assembly. Anything outside that is already against the law.

Conclusion: The government has no right whatsoever to limit the ability for the electorate to read what they like, and the individual has rights limited only by their imagination.

This is what they had in mind when the language for the constitution was chosen, chewed up, fought over and rewritten. They got it right and defined the longest standing governing document IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD.

Please think about how this example is different from what you see and think in the world every day. Read the constitution and above all, think for yourself

I was doing a search a while ago. I wanted to know how to do this or that specific thing, so I put the terms in my search window, and got a response.

Someone asking the exact question on a message board. I usually don’t have any luck with message boards since you almost never find the answer, and asking a question there means waiting for a response.

Maybe it is just a glossy, candy-coated version of what I am used to seeing, but there was something there that caused me to start reading the questions posted and even writing some responses.

It was fun. They have a bunch of catagories, and you can read questions about what you are interested in, and write replies to things you might know about.

It is HERE

I wanted to share an answer I just posted. [Original context HERE]

If you know me, you know I am versed in this subject, and have learned from my foibles.

Excuse or genuine? He broke up with me?
Here’s what he said: “Listen, it’s not like I don’t like you or anything cause I do it’s I don’t think I should be dating anyone right now. I guess its just bad timing. Really it is nothing to do with you. I think you’re a sweet heart. It just wouldn’t be fair to you if it got real serious.”

This came out of the blue after about a month of starting to see each other. And he has been really down in the dumps the past week or so because of lack of money, school, and his job. But it’s still a shocker to me after telling me he was so into me and called/texted nonstop all the time when we weren’t together.

This happened 4 days ago…and todays my birthday. Haven’t talked to him since, although he did sent me a msg saying happy bday. Thoughts?

1 hour ago
3 days left to answer.

When a thing is new and exciting, it is easy to put aside the goals you have set for yourself. You are prevented from seeing the road ahead to your own future when you have this great and wonderful thing right in front of you to look at.

After a month there may have been a realization of what it means to be in a relationship at this point in his life; the commitment of time and thought required, and specifically in a relationship with you. Admit it, there is that thing you do that bugs people. He is a person, no matter the glassy stare when he looks at you, he sees your flaws, they just don’t matter to him. Not much, but they are there

There is a very big pride element here, one that I don’t think is often considered by women. If you hadn’t said that he was down because of money concerns, then I would have guessed it.

You are in a precarious position. He is feeling unworthy of your attention, and too proud to tell you why.

My suggestion:

Maintain skirting contact. Text him when you have something to say, not to get him to say something.

Be exciting. You could never be in a better light than when you are happy. Do the things that make you happy, and he will naturally be attracted to you when he is of a mind to, so will everyone else around you.

When he does make contact again, which I predict he will, don’t jump in with both feet. After he figures out what he needs to be doing to function in a relationship, he will still need the space to implement his plan. I guarantee that he will have a plan. He won’t approach you again until he does, and if he is into you, then you will be part of the plan. If there is a connection between the two of you, then you will be a part of the reforming of his life.

Last thing, and this will serve you all through your life, in matters of love, home economics, and pet ownership. Do fun things together. Free things. Go for a walk. Collect some rocks. Explore behind or underneath some icon of the landscape in the town where you live. Create new personas and wear them out to the mall [try a German accent, people will think you are a tourist and give you stuff]