Dreamrail

Customer Service in America

Ok, so you say this is old news. Well, maybe it is at that. I still am often amazed at the level of customer service at retail markets all over America.

The most glaring is probably the local grocery store. These places used to jump for the customer. Bagboys hopped to action and checkout clerks worked their butts off keying in all those dollar amounts. Today, they don't have to key and the best bagger left in the world is me. We have two major outlets in my local market. One is full service and one lets you bag your own. I find that I save a little money at the place where I do the bagging, but would gladly go to the other and let them bag if only their full service wasn't worse than the acknowledged partial service at the other store.

"Paper or plastic?"

That's the extent of personal contact. Then the bagger and checkout clerk talk to each other as she swipes items by the scanner. Both stores have the same scanners in action. The full service one can't get through my order without the key question, "Do you know how much this costs?"

Somehow the lower service store never asks that question. My answer is always, "Yes I do. It's forty-nine cents."

They sometimes believe me.

After bagging two hundred dollars worth of groceries, the bagboy asks if I need help out. I say, 'No, but my food does."

Anyway, at some point people should recognize which parking lot is always full. The low service store is packed.

I go to the bank and I'm the only customer in the lobby. I walk in past the roped-off cow line that they needlessly have set-up. There are two tellers behind the counter and neither looks up. One finally speaks, "The line starts over there."

After getting over the startling amusement of her statement, I move over there and she takes care of me.

Next time in, I go through the right motions, eventhough I am again the only person in the lobby. I walk up to the open window, directly across from the teller, not more than three feet from her. She is busy with some paperwork and doesn't look up. After a minute, she calmly walks away. I'm alone.

When she returns she says, "Can I help you?"

"Yes, I need to transfer money between two of my accounts."

She hands me a withdrawal form and says, "You'll need to fill out one of these."

"They never make me do that at the other branch," I tell her.

"This is how we do it here."

I take the form and step over to the counter with the pen-on-a-chain, and fill out my new form. Meanwhile a lady comes in and gets my spot in line. When I go back, I notice she has five bags and they're all marked with the full-service grocery store's name. I wait ten minutes while she makes the commercial deposit. There is another lady behind the counter, but she's the drive-through teller with no customers and she can't help me unless I go get in my car.

I leave, get in my car, and drive to the other branch.


These are true stories and they happened last week, and they'll happen again the next time I try these locations. They represent customer service as we've come to know it. Do you have such stories of your own?

Number Three
Noise - When Did It Become Allowed????


So, I’m walking through a parking lot to a restaurant, and a horn sounds behind me. I turn to look; it must be somebody I know.

Sound familiar?

When a horn honked it used to mean, ‘hey!’ Either somebody was saying ‘hello’ or ‘look out!’ or ‘wake up jerk.’ No matter what they meant, it was a call out – it was a ‘hey!’

I guess it’s still a ‘hey.’ Hey, I’m locking my car and have one of these remote gadgets on my keychain that allows me to do it without actually going to all the trouble of putting my key in the slot. Too bad it makes noise.

No problem. My real question is what will we do now to warn somebody? I’m going to stop looking when a horn sounds. It’s just somebody locking their car. Bam! I get hit in the ass, because I didn’t look.

When did all this noise become ok with everybody? I finally get to the restaurant and sit down, getting comfortable and a phone rings. It’s a normal ring style, so everybody rummages through their pocket, their purse, the diaper bag looking for a phone. Five people flip them open and say ‘hello.’ It wasn’t for them.

Well, it was for one of them and she talked like she was in a wind tunnel – ‘Speak up!! I can’t hear a word!! Must be a bad connection!!’ Must be a dumb ass in a metal roofed building. Give it up.

A song starts playing. It’s not a good song, not one from the oldies station. It’s the Superman theme or Star Wars or Rocky or something like that. This time two people go through their purse, pocket or that handy diaper bag, flip their phones open and one is disappointed.

“Hello! No, speak up!!”

“Tin roof, jerk.” Wait, I said that out loud.

Now, I’m back at work and this tech guy comes in my office with a question about the help request I put in. He’s talking along, and all of a sudden I realize he’s no longer talking to me. “Yeah. I can be there in a few minutes. Hey, I’ll call you back.”

What’s up with that? He has one of those tiny phones strapped to his right ear. You can’t even tell when he answers it and shifts his conversation. “Get out of my office with that thing.”

It didn’t ring, didn’t make noise. I shouldn’t complain? I’m complaining about the noise he made in the middle of my conversation.

So……shut up.

Ten Things Flat Out Wrong – Number Four

TWENTY-FOUR HOUR INFORMATION GLUT


I love sports. How could I imagine a better thing than the creation of twenty-four sports shows to provide all the information about every game being played anywhere in the world? It is hard to imagine.

Not only are the games covered, but I get in-depth recaps, interviews with the stars, fan on the street comments, and let’s never forget, hosts and reporters who think they are the main event.

The reporting of the news becomes the important aspect when these guys are on the screen or the radio for hours at a time. They are stars of the airwaves; they interview each other; they try whenever they can to actually be a part of the news itself. You may have noticed I started to use the word ‘news.’ Well, sports is news, but everything I’m talking about applies to local news, world news, celebrity news and weather news. It’s all the same today – twenty-four hour access.

The coach of the world champion Chicago White Sox got in a media argument with a reporter last week. There’s no question that the coach made some comments that were out of line, he should have known better. He said things he had to apologize about later, but didn’t apologize directly to the reporter, in fact insisted on not apologizing to him. There were comments made by the reporter about his not setting foot in that clubhouse until some changes were made. What went wrong with his thinking? These are, after all, the world champs and currently one of the hottest teams in baseball. They don’t care if this guy shows up again, leaves the city, stops reporting on baseball, or quits the business altogether.

But, he may stop going into their clubhouse.

He is no longer reporting. He is part of the news now. He is one of the stars of the new entertainment of sports participatory journalism. It is everywhere, with television shows committed to sports participatory journalists interviewing each other and discussing current events amongst themselves for public display. They are the stars – sometimes athletes are not actually amongst them.

I went to a basketball game and during the first timeout the cheerleaders ran onto the floor. This is normal and has been since as long as I can remember. The cheerleaders performed a routine set to music; I noticed it had nothing to do with the game or their team – and then climbed into a little pyramid. When they got done, they all put their hands up and had this strange look on their faces. They started waving their arms up and down, the timeout was nearing an end. That look on their faces remained.

I realized they wanted on ovation. It is akin to actors taking a bow. It had nothing to do with the game, the players or anything – except them. They were the show. We were supposed to clap for them, and the crowd started to respond, they got some half-assed applause.

“They think they’re the show,” I said to my wife.

Anyway, they join the journalist as part of the package, not compliments to the package, not cheerleaders for their team, but they are their own deal. This is their thirty seconds of fame.

There are a multitude of television shows about celebrities. Each of these have a star or two who themselves become celebrities. The same for hard news reporters who come from so-called news shows that have a weekly hour long program dedicated to one subject or sometimes a couple. They are often seen on the celebrity shows along with their celebrity hosts. And then there are inserted reporters. What are these? We have always had war correspondents. Some of the most respected reporters did that. Now we have inserted reporters who become celebrities. When they are on, we’re not seeing footage of the war with them describing action. We’re seeing them. We’re watching reporters back home interviewing reporters who are inserted amongst the action.

If something real happens to one of these people, they make all the shows (except maybe the sports shows) – (unless they’re an athlete) – (or married to an athlete) – (or dating an athlete). They may also not get on the cooking shows (unless they’re….well see above for athlete).

Why does it matter?

Two quick reasons. First, I notice that with hard news, certain subjects come around every so often. Date rape is one. This is a terrible crime and I watched as television news tried hard to reveal the acts, the motivation, the things to watch out for, and then saw they were running a week-long series on it. That’s great.

It’s great until I noticed their big movie the next week was about date rape. They used the news shows as commercials. It used to be that we got thirty minutes of news, and they had to work hard to get it all in. Now they have plenty of time to select what they think is news. That is very close to creating news, being part of the news and unnatural selection.

Second and most important, we get bombarded with very personal stories about people that didn’t want to share their lives. However, in today’s world it is justified if it is newsworthy, which often means if it will cause people to watch and make money for somebody.

We get year-long missing person information about somebody on a vacation island or a yacht. Whether or not a plug is going to be pulled becomes the product of a death-watch, with every comment spread world-wide. If somebody loses a child to an automobile running a stoplight, we have reporters racing to the scene to ask parents, uncles and neighbors how it made them feel. We’ve got to fill the news over a twenty-four hour period.

Let’s back off a bit. Maybe tell us something to help with our lives. It’s become reality entertainment at other people’s expense. Here’s hoping that you’re not in their shoes anytime soon.

Number Five - Managed Health Care

PPO, HMO, Managed Health Care…..who’s doing the managing? Doctors? Hospitals? No. Lawyers? Maybe. Insurance adjusters? It would appear so. Two days stay normal for a given procedure, so get them out. My doctor isn’t on the plan, so what do I do? Change doctors to meet insurance requirement. It’s happening every day. Here’s what I fear:

Obviously, the following is a dramatization. Any resemblance to the truth is merely fictional and probably a few years premature.

The elevator doors slowly opened and Elana entered the long hallway. This section of the hospital maintained a quiet that appeared to be marred only by shoes on the glistening waxed tile floor. Nurse’s shoes, those of rubber sole, composed an ensemble to orchestrate music that became the last to ever be heard by those dying at the far end of this very same hall. Elana followed the young nurse with blonde hair and baritone feet. She could see three more women staggered down the hall ahead of them, each with their own sound, their unique tone, and strangely unified cadence. She followed in silence, so not to interrupt the music that may be heard by someone beyond one of these doors for the final time.

At the last room on the left, before the double doors that lead away from this ward, she stopped and pushed the door only part way open. Room four hundred held her father, held he whom she had waited for, he who now passed precious time. She stood hesitant, for what seemed hours and continued to listen to the death march being orchestrated endlessly on the glazed tiles behind her. She tried to see what conditions lay ahead through the nearly open door. She braced herself, as always, slowly pushed on the heavy wooden door until it retreated into the room, and finally, she entered.

Standing next to her father’s bed, looking at the monitor that he supervised, Elana found the familiar face that belonged to Alan Pendergrass, the lead prognosticator, the decision maker, the man with a plan. He turned to her as she walked into the room, adjusted the sleeves of his oversized black suit, opened his tight, gaunt mouth and finally said, “Hello.”

The word ‘hello’ sounded like it had been bellowed from a canyon to Elana who had heard no one speak in several hours. It shattered her frame of mind, and destroyed the attempted artistry being displayed by otherwise oblivious musicians with their shoes and the buffed floor in the nearby hall. It beaconed to Elana a message, a hint, almost a requirement that she must in turn, speak.

“How is he doing?” She asked the question that she has asked a hundred times before, and avoided looking to the monitor by which she could ascertain her own answer.

“He has come down to his final ten,” Mr. Pendergrass answered while looking at his own shoes, leather shoes, expensive shoes. He looked up again, studying the monitor once more, the glow of the display giving his face a pale green tint that Elana had seen before and as always, raised goose bumps along her arms.

“They will go fast then?” She asks of his remaining lot.

“I’m afraid so. We will need to collect the monitor right away. Please pardon that I stay with you at his side.”

“Is there nothing I can do?” Elana asks.

“We have searched his records very thoroughly miss. I’m very sorry, but there nothing any of us can do. He has run out. You knew he would eventually.”

“Yes, but the doctors said that given enough time, he could heal, he would heal.”

“Time. If only time could be dealt out like water. I’m sorry. He just ran out.”

“Yes. I said I understand, but I don’t have to like it.”

“No. I mean, he really just ran out. The meter shows zero.”

Elana looked first to the monitor, then to her father’s face, and finally understood what had happened.

“My God. Where is the doctor,” Elana asked. “We have to get a doctor.” Her calm voice had turned to a scream.

“The doctor has nothing to do with this,” replied Pendergrass. “Your father’s insurance ran out, his money ran out. You know that.”

He then began to disconnect the monitor, remove his company’s connectors, and unplug the meter.

“The Longchamp Health Insurance Agency has other customers to assist.” he offered Alana an explanation. “My services will be needed immediately down this very same hall.”

“But this isn’t right.” Elana fell into the chair, her hands to her face, not sure where to turn.

Mr. Pendergrass, having completed his disconnect saw Elana’s anguish, and informed her, “I have the final say in the matters on this floor. The doctors would just drag these things out. They would offer procedure after procedure to sell their wares.”

“Yes, but what if they did some good?”

“Who would pay?” Alan Pendergrass left the room pushing his meter stand holding the equipment that had monitored Elana’s father since his accident.

Elana sat in the blue plastic chair at the foot of her father’s bed. Her legs were clamped tightly together, and her feet were planted on the shining surface of the floor below to keep her from falling over. She could still hear the squeaky wheel on Mr. Pendergrass's monitor stand as it obliterated the harmony of the hall. She could no longer hear her father’s faint breath, no longer see any movement of the sheets atop his torso, no longer sense his presence in the room. He was gone.

**Portions of the above work of fiction were previously published in Nth Degree Magazine.

Number Six – We Are Very Fat

One out of four people are fat. You don’t like that? Fat may sound harsh, but it’s the subject here. If you feel better saying one out of four weigh more than ten percent above their proper chart line, that’s fine. To keep things simple, I’ll just say they’re fat.

Now that we’ve agreed on twenty-five percent, I’ll throw in a statement made by experts: Two-thirds of all Americans are overweight or obese. Yeah, one-fourth was hard enough to swallow; now I’m asking you to digest two-thirds.

Consider another thought now: We are quickly approaching the point where four million Americans weigh more than 300 lbs. and half a million of that group are over 400 lbs.

I’m not just tossing these statements out, but I’m not going to varify them either. I don’t think I know four million people, let alone four million fat people. Check around the internet for articles in newspapers and facts released by the medical associations around the country. You’ll see these things repeated over and over: four million really big people walking around; twice as many as during the 1970’s. Sorry, maybe they’re not walking around so much as sitting around.

Why would this happen?

Abundance sums it up. In America we have an abundance.

There is no need to define abundance, no real reason to identify the item of abundance. It is about everything. Think about it. If a guy has enough money to open up one of the fast food chain stores in your town, does he have to think about where the food would come from? What if he can’t get his hands on that much beef, chicken, or potatoes to feed the masses? Where would it all come from?

No problem. This is America. We don’t have to worry about that semi-tractor-trailer rig showing up with a zillion hamburgers and forty million bags of fries. It shows up as long as the bill is paid. I haven’t really gotten serious until just then. Think about this for a minute. It is really something that makes us different than most of the people on this earth.

If we have the money, somebody will pull up and drop off food. There is no thought process that goes, “I wonder if there is enough for them to bring me some.”

This is America. There is not only enough. There is abundance.

You don’t have to own a fast food place to realize this. Pick up your phone, get the number of a local pizza joint. There are probably a couple numbers under a clip or magnet on the front of your refrigerator. As you are ready to dial, do you ever wonder if they’ll have enough pizzas tonight to bring you one? I never have. In fact they say something like, ‘hey, you know if your order a second one it’s only seven bucks.’

“Great! Can I get a third for another seven?”

“Sure, dude. Get as many as you want.”

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Seven – Americans Are Encouraged to Work With Half Their Brain

What’s that mean? I’m not talking about the old axiom that we only use a small portion of our brains, and most of it goes to waste. That does add in somehow, and it makes my summation even scarier. I’m saying that tasks that used to take all of our attention to accomplish are now being done with us only applying half of our attention. We’re trying to do too many things at once, and it’s not because we’re doing things better; it’s quite the opposite.

The best example I can give is with our driving habits. Every day I see outrageous acts perpetrated on our highways and city streets. The worst thing is that the people don’t even appear to have realized what they’ve done. I have almost never used my horn. I bet I’ve owned cars that I never honked the horn in. Now, I find myself using it at least once a week, if nothing else, then just to wake somebody up.

Have you ever been driving someplace very familiar, say home from work? Now, you’ve gone this route a thousand times, and one day you’re distracted. You find yourself almost home, and realize you can’t remember the past two miles. It scares you a little bit; you sit upright, shake it off, and go on. It’s a funny feeling, but it does happen from time to time to all of us.

Now, you realize at some point that you can bring this memory lapse on. Simply reach over and play with the radio. Do a manual search to find just the right song for your daily commute. Hit the scan button. Not right. Hit it again. OK, have you done this and then you’re not sure that you stopped at that last light. Did you get into the correct lane?

You probably did, but you were only using half your concentration on driving. The radio, however, only requires you to listen. You don’t have to think about what you’re hearing; you don’t have to develop a response.

Imagine if that radio were a cell phone stuck to your ear.

I have recently honked my horn, because some lady was just chatting away and going merrily through a red light. She gave me dirty look, I’m sure she was wondering why I honked. She had no idea what she had done wrong.

Those are the easy ones. You see them running red lights, you see them going out of turn at stop signs, because they haven’t really concentrated on where they fit in the procession. You may give them an extra wide berth as they back out of a parking spot, cell phone held in one hand, wheel with the other, eyes rolled back in their head like a zombie. They back out and everybody around has to remember that part about defensive driving. It was all about this guy.

Well, lately I honk. In response, that guy gives me the finger.

The final subtle point, and the one that I fear relates to other aspects of modern American life is tougher to describe. But, I’ll try.

I see people, equally men and women. This isn’t about women drivers. It’s all drivers, it seems. These particular people have slowed or delayed reactions and movements. They are talking on the cell phone, smoking a cigarette, drinking coffee, and driving. I really think it only takes the first – back to talking on a cell phone while driving.

They turn into a parking lot, and they’re going very slow. It seems forever for them to get off the road. So far, this one doesn’t cause me to honk, but I’m getting there. They almost coast around their turn. I’m waiting for one to stop, and not realize it. These same people are the ones who don’t go when the light turns green. Now, that’s always happened. I’ve done it. I’m talking about people that are on their phones, and their eyes are pointed straight toward the light, it turns, they see it, it doesn’t register. Most of their mind is occupied with the conversation they are having. I do honk at this guy now.

Then, you’re going down the highway portion of the commute. It’s a four lane highway, two going each way. That provides a right lane for those that want to take their time, and a left lane for people more like me. I want to get home before dark.

I pull up behind the guy in the left lane, who is driving along-side the car in the right lane at exactly the same speed. He doesn’t want to pass. Seems like he might try the right lane. He doesn’t notice me. He’s on his phone. I get on his bumper. He speeds up a little. He gets past the car in the right lane, and stays in the left anyway. He’s still on his phone and he’s forgotten about me. I pull into the right lane and pass him, giving him a dirty look as I go by. He has no idea why.

Then there are the people who stay in the left lane because they have to turn left eventually. You know them. That left turn may not be for ten miles, but there is no chance that they’ll drive in the right lane and go through a risky lane change. You know why? I’ll tell you. They have never applied enough of their attention to driving to learn how to use their mirrors, or look back and make a lane change without it being risky. We probably are better off with them not doing it. They don’t know how. They have been allowed to get away without concentrating on driving.

Ok, those are driving examples, but I think it applies to many things today. I think people are working this way. Think about jobs around you that require high detail, and things being done with high accuracy. Is it still happening? Are people remembering to return calls, answer emails? Do you get a response when you ask, ‘did you get my message?’ that looks like they’re not really sure?

Concentration is an art, and we’re not practicing it today like we used to. Start honking your horn.

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Number Eight:

Turning our backs on illegal immigration is flat out wrong. So is turning our backs on the illegal immigrants.

The current immigration issue is a tough one. They’re telling us there are about ten million people in the country without proper documentation. That’s the real problem, right? The documentation. I mean we need the people. We rely on the people. Keep in mind that I’m only talking about illegal immigrants throughout this piece.

I’ve heard the argument that if they all went home, or back to the place they left, we would be in trouble. The one-day walkout didn’t really do much; everybody didn’t participate. There weren’t enough involved, and it only went on for one day. Businesses simply shut down some production, or closed their doors for that day. They could take it. The argument in question rests its case on the idea that there are businesses paying less than minimum wage to illegal immigrants. What would happen to them if they could no longer do that?

If the illegal immigrants were gone, or even if they obtained proper documentation, these companies would be required, or at least more inclined to pay a higher wage. The government would become involved at that point, because they know the person is here and working in our country. This greatly complicates the issue. It’s no longer just about ‘go or stay,’ it’s about legal or illegal residence. If they get their legal permit, they may be fired, because their employer would have to pay minimum wage.

That is flat out wrong. How do we fight it?

There’s been some reason we haven’t dealt with this for decades, so maybe this is it. If they were required to pay higher wages, companies would take production out of the country. They could go into Mexico or Central America and get the goods produced while paying wages well below our minimum standard. The alternative would be to raise prices. Would we stand for that?

My argument is that eventually we will, but a sudden burst of deportation would create a groundswell of rightful remorse, and anger. Some would be angry at the treatment of people; others would be angry at the higher prices, relocated production, or closed businesses. Some would be angry at all of the above. The truth is that almost everybody would be angry about something.

So what can the government do?

Here’s one idea. When I hear talk of amnesty, I think of a permanent forgiveness. It doesn’t have to mean that. It can be something other than a slap on the hand, and don’t do it again.

What if everybody in this country without legal documentation or actual citizenship is given one year to take care of it? That’s a great deal of time to simply go to an office and get a signed paper. The only real reason it should be spread over a year is to not flood the government offices.

This raises several serious questions in your mind. First, what about the problem of forcing wages, and therefore prices, relocations or closures up? The documentation they would be given would be special documentation that would not require any immediate change by an employer in regard to pay. The wage would remain an issue between the employer and the employee, just as it is when hired under illegal status. For this one year period, the government would not pursue this information. They would only require that temporary work papers be issued.

This would allow immigrants to sign up and not be in fear of losing their jobs. It would still create a situation that may be difficult for all of them to follow. It sounds easy to us, but in poorer remote situations, getting to the government office to sign up for something can be difficult. When the language is strange, even learning what to do can cause trouble. Therefore, the emphasis would be on the employer.

Forms would be available on the internet, or hard copy and anybody who wants to hire an illegal immigrant, or continue to employ one, would be required to get that person to the office and get him/her documented. At the end of this one-year amnesty, the employer would be fined if it isn’t done.

There is the twist. Don’t blame the immigrant. These business owners and employers are citizens who started a business under one charter or another and they have all agreed to uphold the laws of the land. Isn’t it time we make sure they do. In this case, they’re not being told what relationship or pay-scale to work out. They’re just being told to get their employees documented and make sure they are legal. If they don’t do, fine them heavily. A slap on their hands won’t work. It would have to cut into their profits in a way that hurts.

You see, our own citizens are the ones breaking the law. They know they shouldn’t hire people in the country illegally. The resolution has to start with them – WITH US. Why do we always look in the wrong direction? If we didn’t provide illegal jobs, immigrants wouldn’t keep coming illegally.

After this one-year period, when we hopefully have a high number of immigrants signed-up, we will start a time table to get them working toward the current standard documentation or citizenship. This could be done over a five-year period. At the end of that window, all of the temporary cards issued during the one-year amnesty would terminate, and everybody would be expected to be legal, with a zero-tolerance on illegal immigration then imposed.

Businesses would have to pay based on United States minimum wage requirements. You thought they were going to get off the hook all together?

No. Somewhere, the nonsense has to stop.

We can’t continue to run the country based on things that are flat out wrong. Even though it will result in higher wages, we have laws in effect for a reason. I hope I’ve opened a few eyes as to why the immigrations laws are ignored. It’s about money. We allow businesses to pay low wages just like third world nations. It’s easier to get away with when it concerns an illegal immigrant.

Who are they going to tell?

This leads into how to stop it from continuing. Immediately, we have to stop the illegal traffic at our borders. It has to end somewhere, sometime. We may need to review our procedures that allow people to get in legally. Maybe, these laws are bad, and sit at the core of this whole problem. I’m not sure about my opinion on that issue, but I do know that if it’s illegal, it should be illegal. Don’t just continue to let it happen.

As we tighten up security at the borders, we start the one-year amnesty for people that are already here. Deportation isn’t really an option. We would create a humanitarian crisis, and we really would impact our own businesses and the prices we pay for goods and services. The best we can do is create a system to allow easy and non-punished documentation.

We hold the businesses responsible. They help anybody they intend to employ to get their temporary documentation. At the end of the year, they will be the ones fined. It will be illegal to employ undocumented workers, and the employer will suffer. Only then will the individual be compelled to become legal.

Then after five years, these temporary papers terminate. Everybody must be legal by today’s standards. Every employer must pay minimum wage. Keep in mind, all of these things are laws today anyway. They’re breaking the law by not paying minimum wage. This deal is a break.

With immigration curtailed to some extent, we will then eventually have a deficit of people to hire for the jobs available in the country. This is a good thing. It will cut unemployment and reduce the welfare rolls. Then, I believe we can once again offer businesses the opportunity of lower priced wages. Welfare reform.

That’s a whole new issue, but once we have business owners searching for new sources of lower income employees, what if they were only required to pay the welfare amount to employ a capable person in the system. There would simply be a timetable to convert this employee to regular employment status. During that time, they would be learning a skill and the employer would be getting a break by paying a lower wage. And the government would not be paying the bill. That’s us folks.

At the end of that timeframe, they would either determine to hire, or give ample notification that they aren’t going to hire, and the newly trained person would have an opportunity to find a job. During that time, not only would he/she receive training, but also workplace and social skills, references, and the knowledge of how to talk to a potential employer.

Even if they aren’t hired during that round, which would possibly mean welfare again, they would again be required to work at one of these jobs and use the skill they learned or learn yet another. It’s better for everybody when people are productive.

See how one problem relates to the next? Better yet, see how one solution may help to resolve the next problem?

Number Nine - Who is enemy number one? The battles we choose — rather, the battles our politicians choose are flat out wrong.

They decide who our enemies are and they plan the fights accordingly. They appear to choose enemies that they think we can defeat fast. It must be fast; it can’t take long; the attention span of the American people is about eight days – max. Who would they choose to fight if they had the nerve to go fight a difficult fight?

It’s not that I’m claiming our current battles aren’t difficult. They are tremendously difficult, and most of our leaders are steering clear of them. They don’t endorse our battles, and they want us to forget that they did way back when we engaged in them. Why won’t a single one of them stand up and say, ‘we have bigger threats to worry about. We need to focus on defeating our greatest enemy. We must set an agenda to lead us out of the fear and the misery caused by our enemy.’

To me, that sounds a little like JFK setting an impossible agenda to reach the moon by the end of 1969. It seemed important at the time, and it started a spending escalation that seemed to catch Ronald Reagan’s eye later on, when he used space again to cause Russia to try to keep up with us. Turns out they went broke. Was that the plan? That one declaration by Kennedy when he told the world that the United States would set foot on the moon by the end of the decade stands out. In fact it stands alone.

Why aren’t agendas set to accomplish things today? They may take five, seven, ten years or more, but what if they are worthwhile agendas that could create leadership platforms viable for more than eight days? The bigger battles may take a while. Our leader couldn’t declare, ‘mission accomplished,’ after a few short months.

Please take just a few seconds to listen as I get back on track. I asked at the top of the page, ‘who should we fight.’ Or rather, ‘who would our leaders choose to fight if they had the nerve?’ It gets down to determining who our biggest enemy is today. We know of the thousands killed by guns, either domestic or terror every year. War takes lives every day. Murder rates climb and drop; car accidents take thousands of lives. Who or what should we fight? Cancer takes over half a million American lives a year. In 2006, it is estimated at about 570,000 deaths in the United States. We’re talking within our own borders this menace is killing our people.

Have you heard a politician stand up and say, ‘We are going to provide the funds needed to destroy Cancer by 2015?’ I’m giving some extra time here. It could be 2010. Somebody could say, ‘By the end of the decade…’ We’ve heard that before, and it cost a lot of money, but we did it. Getting to the moon wasn’t as important a mission, but it was a very difficult task that took committing the resources and manpower to make it happen. I believe we fall very short of attacking our true worst enemies.

Ask our leaders if the United States government is spending as much money to fight Cancer as it spends to fight Iraq.

Ask our leaders if it’s a battle they want to win.

Ask our leaders ‘who is killing more of our citizens every year, every day.’ Ask them if they don’t realize we have an enemy within our borders that will kill half a million of us this year.

Then ask them how much money our government invests in finding the cure. It’ll sound like a lot. Then compare it to the military, to spending for destroying, defeating, then rebuilding Iraq. Just ask one to stand up to the task. Ask one to declare, ‘By the end of the decade, we will…….’

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TEN - Wrong things are allowed when the government sees a buck.

I drive by smoke stacks on steel mills; smoke still bellows, the same black soot that we were told would be gone twenty years ago. It’s all OK. Those companies are required to pay fines, sometimes a fine for every day. That’s what I hear. How much of a fine I wonder? As a wise little man once taught us, “Just enough to make them go - ‘Whoa,’ but not enough to make them go - ‘WHOA !!’.” If the fine’s too steep, they’ll clean it up. Then they’ll stop paying the fine all together. Who wants that?

That may be just my opinion, but then this is my article. I’m entitled. Speaking of being entitled, who isn’t these days? The media entitles every one of us, and our politicians aren’t smart enough to figure out who’s yanking their chains. Have a disaster today, and what’s the story? ‘We’re entitled to better than this.’ That’s the story.

Forget about the disaster. It doesn’t count. You can’t blame nature. The government didn’t protect me, rescue me, feed me fast enough, move me, pay me, clean me. They owe me. Just ask Katie. She flew down here just to put a microphone in my face, tell me how badly wronged I’ve been, and then asked me what I think about it. I think it sucks.

The politicians came in, pointed at each other, and said, ‘We need a full fledged investigation into these wrongdoings. We owe these people answers.’ That’s politics. Four billion dollars later - oh wait, I’m not talking about that disaster, I’m talking about the pandemic - we’re going to prove that we can handle a disaster. Let’s get the press together and let them ask questions about the approaching pandemic.

The big question, ‘We have heard that seventy percent of the allocated funds have not been spent yet. Why aren’t you spending this money?’ They promised to spend it real soon. Can anybody tell me what a pandemic is? I missed the explanation. I’m sure it’s just me not understanding one more thing we all should be worried about. It’s not nearly enough to panic over an impending epidemic and the woes it will bring to all of us, our families, businesses, our health and quality of life. Now we have pandemics coming and the government got billions in special allocations. We better spend it quick or we won’t get more.

Remember hearing about jails being overcrowed? Even local jails were bursting at the seams. Patients laying in the hallways, not enough beds for everybody? Wait, those were hospitals. Forget that. I’m talking jails. Have you noticed that the talk of overcrowed jails has gone. Local governments realized it was good for business. Stop complaining. In fact, build a new jail on funds promised by bringing in prisoners from other counties, other states. Maybe we can put other country’s inmates in our jails some day for ten thousand a month. If it only costs forty dollars a day to house an inmate and the state next door will pay sixty dollars a day for our jail to take him, do you expect us to turn that down? Send us your criminals. We are a crime friendly state, and to prove it we’ll build a new jail for your prisoners to live in. The government makes money. What’s it do with it?

Obviously, we don’t really have crime friendly states. I recently followed a case where a young girl was raped and killed and for a week or so there were no leads. Then a neighborhood man was arrested. Turns out he might have done some harm to women before. Oh yeah, he had killed one and raped two. Been convicted of both. He was twenty-nine years old and somehow lived next door to the woman who died.

Can that really happen? Happens fairly often. Once would seem to be too much, but then again, we bargain crimes down. It costs a lot of money to go through with long trials and all. Who would pay? Would you? _______________________________________________