If You Want to Better Understand Me

If you want to better get to know me and the type of person that I am, check out this story:

Morning Edition, March 28, 2008 ·

Julio Diaz has a daily routine. Every night, the 31-year-old social worker ends his hour-long subway commute to the Bronx one stop early, just so he can eat at his favorite diner.
But one night last month, as Diaz stepped off the No. 6 train and onto a nearly empty platform, his evening took an unexpected turn.

He was walking toward the stairs when a teenage boy approached and pulled out a knife.

"He wants my money, so I just gave him my wallet and told him, 'Here you go,'" Diaz says.
As the teen began to walk away, Diaz told him, "Hey, wait a minute. You forgot something. If you're going to be robbing people for the rest of the night, you might as well take my coat to keep you warm."

The would-be robber looked at his would-be victim, "like what's going on here?" Diaz says. "He asked me, 'Why are you doing this?'"

Diaz replied: "If you're willing to risk your freedom for a few dollars, then I guess you must really need the money. I mean, all I wanted to do was get dinner and if you really want to join me ... hey, you're more than welcome.

"You know, I just felt maybe he really needs help," Diaz says.

Diaz says he and the teen went into the diner and sat in a booth.

"The manager comes by, the dishwashers come by, the waiters come by to say hi," Diaz says. "The kid was like, 'You know everybody here. Do you own this place?'"

"No, I just eat here a lot," Diaz says he told the teen. "He says, 'But you're even nice to the dishwasher.'"

Diaz replied, "Well, haven't you been taught you should be nice to everybody?"

"Yea, but I didn't think people actually behaved that way," the teen said.

Diaz asked him what he wanted out of life. "He just had almost a sad face," Diaz says.
The teen couldn't answer Diaz — or he didn't want to.

When the bill arrived, Diaz told the teen, "Look, I guess you're going to have to pay for this bill 'cause you have my money and I can't pay for this. So if you give me my wallet back, I'll gladly treat you."

The teen "didn't even think about it" and returned the wallet, Diaz says. "I gave him $20 ... I figure maybe it'll help him. I don't know."

Diaz says he asked for something in return — the teen's knife — "and he gave it to me."

Afterward, when Diaz told his mother what happened, she said, "You're the type of kid that if someone asked you for the time, you gave them your watch."

"I figure, you know, if you treat people right, you can only hope that they treat you right. It's as simple as it gets in this complicated world."

That last line is me, plain and simple.

"The Closing of the American Mind" by: Evan Thomas

Evan Thomas recently published an article in Newsweek entitled "The Closing of the American Mind".

According to Thomas, the partisanship found throughout American politics is based not on Republican vs. Democrat spectrums, but rather on the differences between political junkies and everyone else.

As a self-proclaimed political junkie, I agree.  There is a problem in the American system- people care more about sports, video games, and plain TV shows than about politics.  People do not pay full attention to politics.  This apathy comes from many sources: a lack of time, a lack of information, a negative view of politics, an idea that political life does not affect one personally, other things to do, or a view that one is satisfied with the status quo (highly unlikely now).

Our political system is now being run by those who give a damn about politics.  Following the Iron Law of Oligarchy, our federal government is now being controlled willingly by elites- those who gained the votes of their fellow elites, the only people truly caring enough to vote in elections.

This election has been a call for change in America.  Not only for change in the Iraq War, American foreign affairs, healthcare, Social Security, immigration, etc., etc, but also for change in the partisanship that is plaguing American politics.  However, as Thomas notes, the only way for this to be possible, is for more people to get involved in the political process.  We need this partisanship between the political junkies and everyone else to end and for everyone to become involved and knowledgeable about politics.  So America, get up, stop playing XBox 360 and register to vote!

"Common Sense"

Thomas Paine wrote "Common Sense" to denounce the British rule over the American colonies.  Paine's basic argument was that it was "common sense" for the American colonists to rise up against the British and to declare independence.  Paine asserted the idea that governments should be based on the sovereignty of the people as declared in a written constitution that includes a system of checks and balances.  Paine stated that Americans "... have every opportunity and every encouragement before us, to form the noblest and purest constitution on the face of the earth.  We have it in our power to begin the world over again".

After the American Revolution and the failures of the government set up under the Articles of Confederation, the United States Constitution was created at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia.  This Constitution formed the basis of the "perfect Union" of the United States of America, a government that still lasts today.  Effectively, the creation of the United States under the Constitution made the world over again, as Paine predicted.  It is this Constitution that has been the basis of other democracies founded throughout the world.

Americans have the ability to change things in the United States and in the world.  There are so many problems: millions of people living in poverty, a lack of affordable health care, corrupt governments, disease, genocide, nuclear weapons, terrorism, war, failing economies, global warming, dictatorships, the cost of college, and increases in crime.  Americans can lead the change to solve these problems.  Americans "have it in our power to begin the world over again".  It is time for everyone to stand up and declare that an adjustment in the world needs to be made.  However, it is important for Americans not to view themselves as all-powerful.  This position of world aggressor gets American interests nowhere and it does not gain any allies.  It hurts the United States and the rest of the world.  Americans need to lead a complete transformation- socially, economically, and politically- along with the help of the rest of the nations of the world.  Americans need to make America and the world better places to live, safer places to live.  Let's take this opportunity to return to Paine's "Common Sense".  Get up America and be prepared to change the nation and the world.  This is our time, our life, our nation, our world; let's leave our mark!