#48 Mooch, the 84-40 Crowd

During the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution in the United States workers were not treated very well, nor paid very well, nor did they have very safe jobs. Nevertheless they were jobs. Workers were paid $0.15/hour and had to work 14 hour shifts, 6 days a week. People worked 84 hours a week and made $12.60 on their paychecks on a "minimum wage". But people were happy they had a job. People worked for a living no matter if they came home tired and perhaps hurt and they were happy to have a job. People worked without unions and contracts and without job security and they were happy to have a job. No workman's comp, no benefits, no 401ks, no stock options, and people were happy to have a job. Children sometimes had to pick up the slack to make ends meet for their families, and they were happy to have a job. People had to work without health care and they were happy to have a job. And by the way, no one asked the government and other tax payers to take the bill. They were dignified and earned their living.

Today? People get paid $7.25/hour and do not want anymore than 40 hours a week. They make $290 a week at minimum wage at McDonald's. People get paid $30/hour at some factories without an education and bring home $1200 a paycheck if they are in a union. They have job security with unions (even if they are lousy workers). They get benefits. They have options with their retirement funds. Children no longer work which means competitive wages for adults, driving up the minimum wage. Those who have full time jobs have health care. But the main difference? People aren't happy they have to work.

Sure, child labor laws are for the better and wages would be great if we could keep them up. Sure, jobs are safer and most are secure. Sure, labor unions got some of these things done for the American worker. Sure, retirement funds are a great asset in our old age. It all seems golden.

Health care for all would be great but health care is not a right. It is a privilege. Neither the Declaration of Independence nor the Constitution proclaim it as a right. We have dug ourselves a hole (thank you FDR, America's first socialist president) for the last 70 years and expect others to give us stuff. Many things we don't deserve and then get mad when we do not get it. We have lived off of each other for too long. We have expected to get higher pay for remedial work and don't take jobs that only pay minimum wage and complain we are out of work while the immigrant is "stealing our jobs".

If we don't get the things we want, it must be other people's fault, especially George Bush's fault. Thank God, Barack Obama came along to get us out of this mess. All we have to do is give our paychecks to him and the government and we will all be okay. Somebody will pay for all of us. Because let's face it, we are a country of moochers.

#47 High, How Are You?

Results from the latest poll are astounding. Last month the question of the use of marijuana was asked.

• 37% said that marijuana should be legal and allowed to use with no restrictions whatsoever.
• 22% said that marijuana should be allowed but for medical purposes only.
• 22% said that marijuana should not be allowed but the punishment of possessing or using it should only be a misdemeanor.
• 16% said that marijuana should not be allowed no matter what and it should be treated as a felony.

This means that 59% of the people who voted on this poll agree that marijuana could somehow be part of the American society one way or another or that it is not hat big of a deal if it is in the market somehow. This isn't the most scientific poll created but this happened to be the largest total of votes that this site has ever had in it's first year of existence so these numbers can be trusted more than any other poll so far. if we would take these numbers across the US it would mean that 177 million people think marijuana is not that big of a deal. What makes this number even more staggering is that most of the people who come to this site are Christian (90%). An assumption about those who think it is okay to use is that they are the ones who have probably used or are using. If you add these assumptions up that means that many who are Christian and attend church are getting high and are using drugs. It's no wonder why churches have to water down their message for this generation. They can't reach them because they can't understand it while they're high. Yes, this is the extreme view on this topic but unfortunately where there is an extreme there is truth. We have many people in our churches getting high. So what?

Many people will say there are positive effects of smoking marijuana. But most of those are for medical reasons only while sites like this one: http://www.ehow.com/about_4596355_positive-effects-marijuana.html can't truly be trusted because they are one-sided and are probably voters for Ralph Nader. And anyone who votes for Ralph Nader has to have their head examine anyway. Nevertheless, Ralph, keep running for president, please. If you would like more honest results about marijuana check out this site: http://www.nida.nih.gov/infofacts/marijuana.html.

The point of this whole argument isn't about the positive effects or negative effects. Probably because anything and everything can have an equal amount of them if we try to find them hard enough. The main point of this paper is that anything that will change who you are, whether it be physical, emotional, mental, or spiritual can be the wrong thing to do. People say that marijuana has less effects on the body than coffee or is less addictive than caffeine. That is not the point. Those who use caffeine or coffee won't steal from their friends to get another cup. Most who use caffeine will not lie just to get another fill. If someone is on caffeine it doesn't mean that if they get an overload of it that they will stop functioning in the real world. It would be better if a doctor before a surgery would drink coffee than having them smoke a joint.

The worst problem out of this drug is that it is another way of escaping reality. It is another sign of the society that we live in; one that can not deal with how things really are. It is another action of people that leads to abuse of their bodies. A great line from a song by the Christian Metal band Bride called Psychedelic Super Jesus goes like this:

• We get high to remember and take a drink to forget.

People get real. Life may stink sometimes but that's because people give up too easily. The old saying of when life gives you a lemon you make lemonade is no longer followed. It's more like when life gives you a lemon make Mike's hard lemonade.