I found myself on a website that offered a 4-question quiz that would reveal what famous Leader/General I am most like, so, of course, being the inquisitive control freak that I am, I took the challenge, and I'm exceedingly surprised I've garnered the leadership style of - TA DA! - George Washington, out of a pool of possible leaders, some of which are, Omar Bradley, Wesley Clark, Robert E. Lee, Ulysses Grant, Napolean Bonaparte and Patton, of course. Without further ado (drum roll) the following is the synopsis of my leadership style:
George Washington was not only the first president but also an accomplished general. Against daunting odds, Washington launched a guerrilla war that lasted for six years and ultimately drove the British from the colonies. At many points during the conflict, the army was close to disintegrating. But through Washington's force of leadership, the colonists succeeded and he established a model for future American military leaders to follow.
General Washington was known for his cautious, measured, and highly successful generalship. Understanding that conventional war against the British was useless, he waged a well-planned guerilla campaign. He was also skilled in diplomacy, both as a politician and in his military career. He elicited French help in forcing the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown. Also, he deftly negotiated the relations between military and civilian authority. Personally, the first President was reserved. But he won the love and respects of his troops — and nation.
Now, if I could only get the nation to realize this, I would be King! ;>
Washington DC March 29-31, 2007 (Thursday-Saturday)
Come participate as a packed lineup of nationally renowned academic/public figures and Liberty leaders publicly examine and question the damaging policies and practices of our Government that are threatening the survival of our Constitution, our Republic and our Liberty.
Most importantly, the conference will further explore the Foundation's ground-breaking legal research and constitutional activism regarding the profound, but little-known First Amendment Right to Petition.
This Right, and the corollary Right to enforce the Right to Secure Redress by withholding taxes holds the promise to correct much of what ails our nation. The GML 2007 conference will focus on the broader application of the Right to Petition to address numerous areas of constitutional abuse by our government.
Beyond the speaker packed agenda the conference will include two evening dinner events and a large public Right-to-Petition vigil at the White House based on the en masse protest scene from the feature film, "V for Vendetta." It is hoped we will have at least a 1,000 costumed "V's" standing in peaceful defiance of despotism, awaiting a response for our Petitions for Redress. (note: Costumes preferred, but not required for this event)
The conference will also feature a 1/2 day workshop where a significant set of activist tools will be unveiled for WTP Congress Coordinators and those that desire to become one.
Well, I must say Friday was a good day for those who feel the North American Union envisioned Super-Duper-Pooper-of-a-P lan Super Highway straight up from Mexico to Canada has been put on hold by the Senate. -oo- Whoa, they grew some! Who woulda thunk?!
(CNSNews.com ) - Labor union leaders are claiming another victory on Capitol Hill, after a Senate committee voted to block President Bush's "reckless plan" to open the U.S. border to "unsafe" Mexican trucks.
A Senate Appropriations subcommittee on Thursday blocked funding for the pilot program announced last month by the Bush administration. The panel passed an amendment that requires the U.S. Transportation Department to publish details of the plan and to allow time for public comment.
The operative words being "allow time for public comment".
Right now on C-SPAN2 at the National Press Club the American Freedom Agenda is being introduced and discussed. They are inviting ALL AMERICANS to fight for our FREEDOM. Go watch program on C-SPAN.
I wrote that I'd post further information and although it's not much, it gives you something to go on, okie-dokie?
I believe Truth is about to be "hatched" in many corners of our universe because the timing is right. Of course, I could be wrong. However, yesterday I watched a C-SPAN program hosted by Bruce Fein, prominent constitutional lawyer, talking at the National Press Club under the banner Conservative Coalition on Presidential Abuse, asking for all Americans to support the American Freedom Agenda, sponsored (?) by Richard Viguerie, Chairman of ConservativeHQ.com Forum with the following guests that I can recall: David Keene, Chairman of American Conservative Union , and former congressman Bob Barr, who also has a blog over on NewsBulls*, tricksy titters. which is very informative and if you join you get your own blog there as well. The gist is, this group wants to return to real conservative roots and are pushing for re-education of our Constitution, Bill of Rights, 2nd Amendment rights, etc., as they inform Americans of the present presidential and judicial abuses. They don't think most Americans understand these *are* abuses of power and they want to remind Americans that the .government works for us. Bruce Fein enumerated all the current presidential & executive abuses on a huge chart for all to see. Quite impressive. The new group stressed that it's going to take all Americans to effect the changes we want for ourselves, but we all need to become better informed as to just what it is we're fighting for - what our rights are as Americans - what we need to do to now - and how they can help us take back our country! The group intends to do something about it. But as usual - we'll see.
We'll see, all right, just what Americans are willing to do, for themselves, their children and grandchildren as far as taking our country back from the globalists who want to strip us of our nation's sovereignty, jobs, dignity, and goodwill towards all men. Please do your part.** Thank you.
*NewsBulls is uniquely set up so I hope you'll trot over there for a look-see I've joined, and you can see what a blog looks like before you set it up, here . **There's more of Us, than there are of Them. ;>
Today we learned The Blame Falls Gently Off La Plame according to this is IT blog article posted earlier in the day by William Branigan of the Washington Post, which has been mysteriously replaced with one by Amy Goldstein of the same newspaper, using the original, earlier Branigan link and his article can no longer be found on the original link. Hmmm... what's up with that? Perhaps the Washington Post felt it necessary to replace Branigan's more objective rendition of Valerie Plame's testimony with one more biased and favored by the Wite House? I watched the testimony myself and as far as I'm concerned, she put to rest the charges leveled against her by .gov shills. I was flabbergasted the Associated Press apparently sanctioned a headline, "Plame Sheds Little Light in Leak Case" article written by Julie Hirschfeld Davis today because, if anything, Valerie Plame, under oath, cleared up, shone a light on, and put to rest the lies being promulgated to discredit her and her husband, ex-Ambassador Joe Wilson "for publicly disputing President Bush's assertion that Saddam Hussein was on the brink of acquiring a nuclear bomb," and the lies that she wasn't a covert operative at the time she was outed! "Plame's testimony on the covert nature of her job was buttressed by a statement that Chairman Waxman read at the hearing's opening which, he said, was approved by Gen. Michael V. Hayden, the CIA's director. The statement said that Plame worked in a covert capacity at the time of Novak's column and that her employment status was classified under an executive order."
The Baltimore Police arrested a 7-year-old tyke who was riding a motorized dirt bike on the sidewalk, arrested him, handcuffed him, and took him in for booking. Nice work, Baltimore; practicing your Gorilla tactics on little, defenseless tykes on bikes. Make you feel more like men?!
Well, laughter *is* the best medicine, and, I, PopUpCommontater, am living proof of this. Here, let me illustrate just one example of this proud boast :) Years ago, I managed to slam my head in the car door -oo- No small feat here, and it's quite all right to laugh, as that's exactly what I did while riding up the elevator to my 12th floor office suite. Ohhhhh, I had a grand time picking out people in the elevator car, looking them straight in the eye, and announcing in a peppy-perky sorta way with an eat-sh*t grin on my face, "HAHAHA,I JUST SLAMMED MY HEAD IN THE CAR DOOR! HAHAHAHA." This, followed by an outburst of hysterical laughter. Those poor people didn't know what to say, really, but I could tell they were concerned by the worry lines between their brows.. and I guess the blood dripping down my face didn't help matters much. But, up, up, up, each floor, someone gets off, and as soon as the door closed, my head would pop up like a jack-in-the-box, "HAHAHA, I Just Slammed My Head In the Car Door HAHAHAHAha!" I managed to stagger into my office and collapsed on the sofa, laughing. My boss came out, took one look at me slumped on the sofa, laughing hysterically, and promptly knew something was wrong! <smirk> After his, "what the h*ll is wrong with you?" I started off on my story about how I'd stopped at the 7-11 on my way in, and somewhere between walking out of the store and finding myself coming to in the car, I vaguely remember slamming the door shut. Only my head was between the car door and the door frame as I was getting in. Allegedly, mind you. Apparently, there were no witnesses. But, anyway.. WOW. Imagine my surprise! hee hee. I don't remember how long I sat there, but it couldn't have been very long, as somewhere in the back of my mind (what was left of it, I guess), arose the fact one doesn't aHrrife in Jaaa-ACK's office *LATE*. I managed to drive from the 7-11, which was adjoined to the same service road/parking lot of my office building, okay? I vaguely remember after getting out of my car going up to the first person I saw in the parking lot and asking, "AM I ALL RIGHT!?!" along with the affectations of a car backseat window bobble-head. The man said, "I don't think so. You're bleeding." I remember his fearful frozen face with his shoulders keeping his ears warm, before I turned towards my building, and did what felt like skipping up to the door, revolving door, mind you, and going in, and round and round, because I couldn't find a way off of what I was sure turned into a merry-go round. Finally, I fell out of the revolver and schlept up to the elevator door to stand among a group of wanna-be riders. All eyes were on me. It was only when once I was *in* the elevator I started my mantra of "I-just-slammed-my-head-in -the-car-door-HAHAHAHAHA" routine. So, by the time I relayed all this to Jack, he says, "C'mon! I'm taking you to the Emergency Room!" And off to the ER we did go.
Apparently I had sustained a concussion (surprise!), the bleeding gash atop a huge bump on my forehead/hairline was treated, and I was sent home to recuperate - with the stern instructions not to go to sleep for 12 hours or so. (I think.) I remember dragging myself up the 3 flights of stairs to my apartment - because it took 3 days (or so it seemed :). I got myself something to drink, as I always do first thing coming in the door, and then threw myself onto the bed and promptly fell asleep (of course!)
I don't know how long I'd been sleeping when the phone next to my bed woke me up to the sound of a woman's voice on the other end, yelling me "go see your doctor immediately, we just found a tumor on your head x-ray!!" Well! Can I say I was stunned. I had never been told so professionally before (NOT), BY PHONE, that I had a brain tumor, thank you very much (/sarcasm).
It was many doctors later and 3 months of panic before finding out what was this tumor. And the news came just in the nick of time, too. It would be a week's time before I was to depart to England, and I had built up enough stress & anxiety over this brain tumor news, that I just knew I would probably lose it on the plane somewhere over the Atlantic ocean. Claustrophobia comes to mind. Not wanting to risk flipping out on a plane especially, without the courtesy of an adjoining room to gather my composure and freshen up before doing so, I was about to cancel my trip, altogether. I finally got the news that what they felt was a pituitary tumor, was in fact, what's called empty sella turcica, which means I'm really an airhead. Not really, but it's assumed by many :) My "empty" sella turcica has fluid in it and leans on the pituitary gland which in turn causes hormones, or whatever, to be sort of unregulated or expressed too much, not enough, not at all.. whatever. It has messed me up in a number of ways and I can't go deep sea diving anymore (like I did to begin with..huh?).
I *know* I got through this ordeal by the grace of God and my uniquely honed sense of humor. Handed down to me by my mother, the Lucille Ball look-alike, both in physical and emotional make-up. It was through her use of humor, looking at things from the sunny-side of the street, undying optimism and strength that got our family through numerous crises and unpleasant circumstances. She taught me & my sibs that we could get through any hardship, tragedy, personal trial or tribulation, if we had faith in God's power, used humor to soften Life's blows, and not take ourselves too seriously. After all, we're really nothing but a fart in the wind - in the scheme of things ;>
I took the fear I was feeling about the prospect of needing brain surgery, to figure out how I'd wear my hair after it grew out, and whether I should tattoo little middle fingers or chain links around the burr holes. And I vacillated on what combo of colors I'd use on my Mohawk. I wrote out my last Will & Testament, bequeathed stupid little things to family and friends, i.e., accessories to a particular person whose spontaneous remark upon seeing the prized possession was "Egaaads, that's atrocious!" "That's the ugliest thing I've ever seen....in all my life! Seriously!" "You're actually going to sit next to VeryImportantPerson turd wearing THAT on your very person.n.n.nyyyUK!" They all got their "special pieces" with corny little notes attached to them revealing the fact I could have sold the piece for, let's say, $100,000, but because I remembered their kind remark about the piece, I wanted them to have it - with a gentle reminder that a lot of extremely dear and sought-after ice & heirlooms looked like crap <snicker> And I wrote those never-to-be-mailed letters expressing exactly how I felt about a particular person, but threw them away immediately when I learned the good news my number wasn't up, when I should have hung on to them for later Revengeful Purposes. heh heh
All this being said, facing bad news is not easy and many slips back to fear are made. But staying positive about an outcome and applying faith that God heals and is in control of Life makes for a better state of mind to face uncertainty and the unknown. There will always be people who are doing better than us, but there's also people who have it a lot worse than us. I heard or read this years ago that if everyone in the world could take their troubles, problems and woes, throw them into a World Pile but take another from the same pile, most people would decide to keep the ones they have because they've learned to live with them, to cope with them, to rise above them best they can. The idea of taking on someone else's burdens is a scarier prospect than dealing with the ones we already have. But no one gets through life without burdens, be it physical or mental. So, I think it's better to be a good model of how to handle Life with dignity, hope, and faith, as an example for others to emulate. That way, we actually are doing something for our fellow Man. This is what's meant by giving others Hope by a different, better, saner way of doing things. Humor is the glue that holds Life together in goodwill. Towards other men. Let your smile/laughter be that invitation to others to hope for a better way.
Angels fly because they take themselves lightly. (G.K. Chesterton)
Plato's remark that "Even the gods love jokes." must be correct, for the value of laughter is recorded in sacred scripture. For example, the Koran states that "He deserves Paradise who makes his companions laugh." By the fourteenth century, the healing power of humor was recognized by the medical community. An important French surgeon, Henri de Mondeville (1260-1320), wrote, "Let the surgeon take care to regulate the whole regimen of the patient's life for joy and happiness, allowing his relatives and special friends to cheer him, and by having someone tell him jokes."
However, extensive research on 'laughter therapy' did not begin until after the New England Journal of Medicine published an article by Norman Cousins in 1976. Later, in 1979, this article became the first chapter of his book, 'Anatomy of an Illness.' In it he explained how he was diagnosed in 1964 with ankylosing spondylitis (also known as spondylitis, AS, or Bechterew Disease). The disease usually results in acute inflammation of the spine and can affect other areas of the body as well. Norman Cousins' case was so severe that he was given a one in five hundred chance of recovery and a few months to live.
Realizing that negative thoughts and attitudes can result in illness, he reasoned that positive thoughts and attitudes may have the opposite effect. So he left the hospital and checked into a hotel where he took mega doses of vitamin C and watched humorous movies and shows, including 'Candid Camera' and the Marx Brothers. He found that ten minutes of boisterous laughter resulted in at least two hours of pain-free sleep. He continued his routine until he recovered. Thus, he proved that laughter is the best medicine, and pointed the way to mind-body medicine.
William Fry, M.D., professor of psychiatry at Stanford University Medical School and expert on health and laughter, reports the average kindergarten student laughs 300 times a day. Yet, adults average just 17 laughs a day. Why the difference? Are we too uptight, too tense? Do we take life too seriously? Isn't it time we learned how to relax? We don't stop laughing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop laughing. So, if we want to fly like the angels and share in their happiness, we'll have to follow their example and take ourselves lightly.
Our five senses are not enough for ideal living. We need to use our sixth sense: our sense of humor. Humor isn't about merely telling jokes; it's the way we view the world. We can be sincere about life without taking it so seriously. We can laugh about our mistakes and pain. Louis Kronenberger explains: "Humor simultaneously wounds and heals, indicts and pardons, diminishes and enlarges; it constitutes inner growth at the expense of outer gain, and those who posses and honestly practice it make themselves more through a willingness to make themselves less."
The brilliant American humorist, James Thurber (1894-1961), described humorists as follows: "The wit makes fun of other persons; the satirist makes fun of the world; the humorist makes fun of himself, but in so doing, he identifies himself with people - that is, people everywhere, not for the purpose of taking them apart, but simply revealing their true nature." The wellspring of laughter is not happiness, but pain, stress, and suffering. Socrates pointed this out when he taught, "The comic and the tragic lie inseparably close, like light and shadow." So, we should be thankful for our suffering, for without it there would be nothing to laugh at! When we laugh at our woes, they dissolve, or at least become bearable, so that we arrive at peace and happiness. As the pragmatic philosopher and psychologist, William James (1842-1910), said, "We don't laugh because we're happy, we are happy because we laugh."
What's the reason behind this article? Simply to point out the benefits of laughter are too numerous to ignore. Now is the time to resolve that we will consciously make an effort to laugh frequently throughout the day. Of course, as we do so, we will laugh with people - not at them. We will laugh at what people do, not at what people are. We will laugh not only to lighten our burdens, but those of everyone we meet.
The many benefits of laughter 1. When you make fun of yourself, you disempower those who would make fun of you and disarm possible confrontations.
2. Laughter dissolves tension, stress, anxiety, irritation, anger, grief, and depression. Like crying, laughter lowers inhibitions, allowing the release of pent-up emotions. After a hearty bout of laughter, you will experience a sense of well-being. Simply put, he who laughs, lasts. After all, if you can laugh at it, you can live with it. Remember, a person without a sense of humor is like a car without shock absorbers.
3. Medical researches have found that laughter boosts the immune system. The study of how behavior and the brain affect the immune system is called psychoneuroimmunology. Though still in its infancy, this science is rapidly gaining much attention as mankind strives to understand the mind-body relationship.
4. Laughter reduces pain by releasing endorphins that are more potent than equivalent amounts of morphine.
5. Humor helps integrate both hemispheres of our brain, for the left hemisphere is used to decipher the verbal content of a joke while the right hemisphere interprets whether it is funny or not.
6. Laughter adds spice to life; it is to life what salt is to a hard-boiled egg.
7. Develop your sense of humor and you will find you are more productive, a better communicator, and a superior team player.
8. Everyone loves someone who can make them laugh. The more you share your sense of humor, the more friends you will have.
9. Humor brings the balance we need to get through the turbulence of life comfortably.
10. Laughter is even equivalent to a small amount of exercise. It massages all the organs of the body, according to Dr. James Walsh.
11. A sense of humor can help you accept the inevitable, rise to any challenge, handle the unexpected with ease, and come out of any difficulty smiling.
The most wasted day is that in which we have not laughed. Don't wait until you are sick before you begin practicing laughter therapy. Start today by renting comedy classics from your video store, borrowing humorous books from the library, attending comedy clubs or watching comics on TV, and exchanging jokes with family members, friends, and coworkers. If you are visiting someone in the hospital, why not bring funny greeting cards and humorous books instead of flowers?
I'll end on a personal note. Every time I'm out on a cloudy day with a group of friends, I'm the first person to know when it starts to rain. Do you know why? Because I'm bald!