Video: Republicans Attack Health Care

A Video that says it all. Video: Republicans Attack HealthCare

Call your senators and tell them we deserve the same health care they have. Stop the hypocrisy and predatory corporate Health Care. These are the same people who brought the American people Enron, Blackwater and the mortgage/banking ripoff/debacle. They only care about making money for their shareholders and paying their CEO's obscene amounts of money.

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DANGEROUS CONCEPTS - NIHILISM THE PHILOSOPHY OF MEANINGLESSNESS

NIHILISM

Nihilism, the pragmatic operating philosophy of virtually every government, corporation and research university is a belief in disbelief, is a philosophy of meaninglessness, including the too self-defeating assumption that might makes right.

Like many disasters, Nihilism began with the finest of intentions. European scientists between 1880 and 1920 were seriously examining the earth and the universe for clues about matter and life. They peered outward toward the stars and galaxies with better telescopes and inward with microscopes, to learn many cosmic truths. Researchers like Planck, Mach, Koch, the Curies, Freud, Bohr, Darwin and Einstein used a new way of looking for knowledge. They called it the scientific method that stressed facts rather than faith. They were right of course. I don’t want to cross the Pacific Ocean in an aircraft designed according to the undisputed brilliance of Thomas Jefferson.

Secular nihilism developed out of Prussian brutality and became deeply embedded in fiercely secular German universities. It was a major tragedy as Herman Hesse had his character Heller say in his great existential novel STEPPENWULF, the brutal beast that walks upright (man). Hesse was a member of the lost generation that came of age in the bloody trenches of World War I - the generation that lost faith in European institutions for deceiving the people so badly. Heller lamented -- There come times when entire generations are trapped between eras --not knowing what to believe -- whom to trust in their search for life.

In other words, be careful what you choose to believe because the following nihilistic, scientist, pragmatic, opportunistic assumptions are crippling to human health.


SELF FOCUS - Rank the following in order of their destructive potential in your life.

1. Humans collectively form a resource to be shaped as needed by government and business, rather than being persons to be cherished because of their intrinsic worth.

2. Human spirituality is an ancient superstition rather than a normal aspect of existence that Frankl called the spiritual unconscious.

3. In seeking human progress, the successful completion of important projects justifies any and all methods used to reach society's goals.

4. The earth is a resource to be developed whenever and wherever desired rather than the home of life as we know it.

5. Each nation's rulers in government, commerce and science should be trusted to do what is right because they have better knowledge than the people they command and control.

6. Because life is the result of a great cosmic accident, individual lives and families are basically meaningless unless they serve the state or some profitable purpose.

7. Persons who do not fit into the pragmatic views of an industrial society are worthless and expendable as North American Indians were when they could not be enslaved.

8. When enough persons and organizations become opportunistic in their philosophy of operations, doing what they can get away with, taking everything they are strong enough to keep, a secular miracle occurs in which the entire society finds greater satisfaction.



BEYOND SECULAR NIHILISTIC PRAGMATISM

In the early days of World War II, when Japan's politicians were developing political ties with the Nazi's of Germany, Lithuanian police teams were enthusiastically rounding up Jewish families for shipment in cattle cars to the death camps that spread like terrible tumors across Europe. The Japanese Baltic counsul was Sempo Sugihara, an unpretentious little Foggy Bottom type civil servant who never dreamed of challenging the powerful movers and shakers who were leading his country toward disaster in a war they could not win. When this perfect office clerk, who even ate his lunch at his desk, discovered what the cruel anti-Semitic Balts were doing, he exploded in indignation and resolved to do better than his government who'd ordered him to assist the Nazis every way he could.

Sugihara established a secret escape route across Russia on the Trans-Siberian Express Railway to Shanghai and to Hong Kong. He forged passports and visas, lied to Lithuanian and German officials with his bland Asiatic smile, used money from his office accounts and sent thousands of Jewish families to safety despite the increasingly shrill protests from the Tokyo office. When he was finally dragged home in disgrace, wearing chains, he declined disemboweling himself in a ritual suicide for disobeying orders. It was not until years after his heroism that I discovered that Sempo Sugihara came out of the community of Nagasaki that deliberately stressed ethical values and responsible choices. Just to keep the record straight -- that was the community the U.S. Army Air Forces, in which Jard served, vaporized at ground zero with the second nuclear bomb.


SELF FOCUS - Rank the following in their order of importance to you.

1. Develop and widely use throughout your life and its activities a sound philosophy of service that creates first class citizenship for all who help you succeed, through an equitable sharing of the physical, psychological and philosophical rewards of commitment.

2. Strive for a sense of belonging in supportive communal groups by gathering women and men into small, intimate teams such as business growth centers, clubs or training classes, through which they find consistent satisfaction by accomplishing meaningful tasks or sharing satisfying activities with people who are important to themselves personally.

3. Draw all the people into the decision making processes of the group, for then the decisions become their own choices rather than something imposed by outsiders who don't really understand what is going on in the trenches where the real work is being accomplished.

4. Establish ways of dealing with stress and conflict before the organization becomes dysfunctional and suicidal because the vested interest groups prefer personal possessions, power and prestige far more than group purpose, performance, productivity and profits.

5. Empower persons to mature by sharing responsibilities and rewards. Avoid open-ended assignments that burn out men and women in a few years, by rewarding self-development and creativity, and by sharing the emotional results of being a true member in a good team.

6. Master the principle of human motivation -- it's a fact that people seek the relationships and continue the activities that reward them personally, while rejecting attitudes, activities and relationships that cause pain or fail to benefit themselves consistently.

7. Keep communications open by refusing to let a few fearful or greedy persons in some chain of command block the flow of vital information up or down for their own reasons, since collectively, the members of a group have total knowledge of what must be done to consistently succeed.

8. Set the stage for people at all levels of organizational responsibility and reward to find consistent satisfaction by connecting personal fulfillment to organizational greatness.

9. If you haven't the knowledge and wisdom to achieve through serving society in some area, have the decency to get out of the way and stop harming a group of good people who deserve better of life.

EXISTENTIAL FRUSTRATION

Disaster in the form of existential or life-style caused frustration overwhelmed an old rural parish some years ago as a traditional way of life collapsed and a community fell apart due to twentieth/twenty-first century social and technological stresses. The farming community had been hard hit by drought, a serious decline in land values and a slump in commodity prices. Some church members were losing their sense of identity while others were living on the edge of financial disaster. Many kids were leaving and few in college were interested in returning home to farm. A brisk drug trade developed when some people tried to cope with their stresses chemically and two or three committed suicide when the stresses grew too great. Major changes had been frustrating the rural community for some time, even before the bland old pastor died and his assistant retired. The community’s spiritual, economic and social anchors were dragging and many people were frightened. When two new new priests arrived, they tried to adjust to reality by shifting with the times but unfortunately, that antagonized those fearful members who yearned to return to the past.

The young priests and nuns not only taught traditional religion, meaning to some of the people only what occurred within the walls of the sanctuary during worship, but also the virtue of demonstrating faith and love in the outside society. They wanted the people to understand the dozen debilitating American wars since World War II in spiritual terms, to ask their politicians why they were committing financial suicide in the name of faith and patriotism. The priests and nuns wanted their people committed to civil, legal and financial rights for minority people and to be generous when feeding, clothing and educating the poor migrant children who'd come north to labor in their fields. The leaders were trying to keep the church alive and attractive to the next generation by asking the people to openly discuss values that had always been irrelevant to faith as practiced in the long static community. As the farm economy faltered still more and farmers and merchants fell into trouble, some of the more frustrated and aggressive members of the parish started a campaign to get rid of the trouble-makers who challenged them. Thus, they assumed, they could return to the good old days. They didn’t understand that old traditions and ideologies succeed only in the times and situations which they evolved. One elderly member told me:

I don't even recognize my church anymore and I hate it! These priests are changing everything I know and love. Did not the holy fathers in Rome assure us for fifty years that fighting Commies was God's will and that we would be blessed for our loyalty to America and the church? Why is God punishing us now?

The fearful leaders didn't understand the law of unintended consequences. One paranoid group felt there had to be an evil plot of some kind causing their pain and some men formed a local militia to drive off the villains. Quarrels and fist fights broke out at the altar during communion and in the chancel after services. The priests were harassed at all hours of the day and night with obscene phone calls. Several cars were sabotaged and a church bus was burned and the nun principal of the parish school was forced off the road by a group of cursing militia-men in pickup trucks waving shotguns.

Both priests eventually resigned and Bishop Roy Blocker refused to send out replacements.

He said, no one trying to serve God should have to undergo the harsh judgments and treatments their priests and nuns did. The parish was no longer a community in Christ.

The church had always been a sanctuary for the several hundred farm and village families who worshipped together but it couldn't keep the world at bay in changing times. The anxious and alienated members of the parish crippled the congregation rather than adapt, when the only way they could survive was through accepting change and dealing with new circumstances. After he reopened the church, Bishop Blocker explained;

For centuries we brought our people up in a static and unchanging church atmosphere. We prided ourselves that as God’s church nothing ever changed. We were eternal. We still believe in the unchanging revelation that God made in Christ. But while God hasn’t changed, everything else has. Unfortunately, there will always be some persons who neurotically need more certitude than we can legitimately offer, a certitude that Jesus himself didn’t have in Jerusalem’s garden of olives when he questioned God’s mission for his life.

Thist is true spiritual bankruptcy suffered by many that is caused by the existence we choose or have forced on us by society. Lest you think that too strong an example of alienation, during the week this anecdote was first written, Jeff Rolvag, our handsome and charming next door neighbor hanged himself from a basement rafter not thirty feet from Jard’s desk. He had hidden his existential alienation very well but he certainly isn’t alone in his frustration and the aggression or apathy that follows.

SELF FOCUS -- Have you seen situations in families, schools, companies or communities when life style created frustration causes conflicts?

PERSONAL FULFILLMENT ASSESSMENT

Use our Personal Fulfillment Assessment to assess your Life's Meaning and Belonging.

READ EACH OF THE FOLLOWING STATEMENTS AND THEN CHOSE THE NUMBER THAT MOST ACCURATELY DESCRIBES YOUR FEELINGS ABOUT IT.

             SELDOM                SOMETIMES                    OFTEN
1. I am satisfied with the way my life has a sense of purpose to it.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
2. I have reasons to be enthusiastic about life and my place in it.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
3. I study to learn better ways of achieving the good things I should be doing.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
4. My life is free of trivial activities and shallow relationships.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
5. I plan my activities with positive attitudes and high expectations.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
6. My life follows my master plan for living wisely and wed.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
7. My work seems a mission I should successfully complete.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
8. I work at meaningful avocations in order to help other people.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
9. I have satisfying relationships with both men and women.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
10. I act on the fact that I have the freedom to mature spiritually.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5

Add your score and enter it here. MEANING ______

CONTINUE WITH THE STATEMENTS BELOW.

             SELDOM                SOMETIMES                    OFTEN
1. I experience a sense of awe about life.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
2. I feel compassion for people in trouble.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
3. The women and men with whom I work contribute to my life.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
4. When my family, company or community has trouble I help out.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
5. After a long trip I enjoy returning to familiar surroundings.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
6. I participate in sports and entertainments appropriate to my age and shape.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
7. I spend time with friends and relatives I love.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
8. I vote and/or work for political candidates I trust.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
9. I expect people to be ethical and honest when I deal with them.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5
10. I try to make the world a better place in which to live.
            1                      2                      3                      4                      5

Add your score and enter it here. BELONGING_______

To plot your score, mark the MEANING score at the corresponding height on the vertical scale and the BELONGING score at the corresponding distance from the left on the horizontal scale. Then, extend both lines into the square to the point where they cross. Mark that spot for it will reveal the level of your satisfaction compared to the men and women who have used this scale in past Fulfillment Seminars. A score of 30 points vertically and horizontally registers average satisfaction. A score of 10 is low satisfaction and 50 is high satisfaction.

SATISFACTION SCALE

M        50 (high)

E

A

N        30 (medium)

I

N

G        10(low)        30(medium)        50(high)

B        E        L        O        N        G        I        N        G

Visit fulfillmentforum.com for more information about our free psychology self help ebooks, psychology courses and life style seminars about making you life count, relationships, marriage, spiritual freedom, world class leadership, career growth, parenting, influencing others - free ebooks and articles.

PATTERNS THAT AFFECT PERFORMANCE - Mini Quiz

As Except From The Book" GRACE UNDER PRESSURE"

New Era, Greater Challenges

Leon Trotsky, the old Soviet ideologue, is not widely respected by large numbers of business men and women, but he made several statements that bring into focus some of the major challenges faced by managers in an era of constant turmoil. During the confusion of the Russian Revolution, the Old Bolshevik said that anyone who wanted only to be left alone in peace to do his work had chosen a terrible time in which to be born. He also concluded that trying to reorganize a society was much like trying to revitalize a cemetery. Trotsky was correct on both counts, for deep within all kinds of organizations is the desire to keep things as they were when the members first learned them. We do indeed want to preserve our vested interests without interference or loss. Many people live with the illusion that humans enjoy change. The fact is, however, that we seldom want important things to change unless the benefits are immediate and personally valuable. Even when there is an obvious advantage to changing, many people have difficulty adjusting to new circumstances and relationships.

For example, the sports and entertainment industries have produced many athletes and performers who were unable to successfully handle sudden fame and wealth. In many business and professional organizations, rapid change can have similar disruptive results when people are forced, frequently against their will, to deal with resources and relationships they resent. Many resist for so long that the organizations are destroyed as the great English historian, Lord McCauley, explained. He wrote that every great civilization, nation, noble family, corporation and community eventually commits suicide by creating so many selfish, vested interest groups that it cannot adapt when great changes occur and the entire group must adapt swiftly or perish. He went on to reveal that while there are always hungry and younger societies waiting in the wings to take over, all but one or two of the twenty two civilizations that left their footprints on earth, collapsed from their own internal contradictions and conflicts.

Managers and professionals like dentists, attorneys, and physicians, who are responsible for leading their employees to achieve together, are frequently the causes of many problems in their own organizations. They yearn, often unconsciously, to continue working through the concepts and skills they learned in the beginning. They do so because changes in relationships, techniques, and responsibilities force us to rethink ideas we already mastered, and to adapt when it seems obvious that we usually want others to do the adapting in our organizations.

For example, several years ago, when the decline of large automobile engines became obvious, one young manager was called to a meeting where he was told that his test group would be evaluating the reliability of the Chrysler Corporation's new power plant for domestic sales. When he asked about the engine, he found it to be a massive thing that produced more than 300 horsepower with commensurate fuel consumption. He protested that the competition was adjusting to rising fuel costs by developing fuel-efficient engines and that Chrysler should be doing the same thing. His manager immediately pinned him to the wall and told him to keep his mouth shut and follow orders if he wanted to keep his job. The young manager thought about the potential consequences of resisting change despite fuel costs and soon started a career in another industry. And Chrysler's small automobile came on the market with an engine and transmission built in Germany because the massive V-8 engine was an anachronism that few customers would buy. To this day, General Motors and Ford are having trouble manufacturing automobiles that American customers will purchase and Chrysler has bonded with the Mercedes Group of Germany.

Of course we all understand, at least at a gut level what resistant to change has cost our automobile industry in our current crises. Although we may not realize it is a deeply rooted human trait unless the benefits are immediate and personally valuable.

The resistance to change that so complicates the work of managers and supervisors is much more than a conscious determination to keep things as they were in the past. According to scholars like Konrad Lorenz and Carl Jung, our resistance may well be rooted in the evolution of humankind, in the development of Western Civilization itself, and in the manner in which work groups have long been led in our society.
As our civilization grew in size and complexity, humans developed the technology needed to prosper and the interpersonal relationships necessary for success. In other words, our ancestors created both the hardware (the resources) and the software (the relationships) of achievement. The hardware included tools, weapons, clothes, etc. The software included the psychology and the philosophy needed to work successfully in groups, to distribute rewards equitably, and to avoid unnecessary conflict within each community. We must still balance the use of software and hardware if our organizations are to prosper as our competitors do in Europe and Asia.

In many, if not most, cases, an organization begins as an entrepreneurial enterprise that prospers in that form as long as the founder uses both good hardware and software to serve clients well. In time, the small organization grows beyond the ability of the entrepreneur to control everything, so either the transition to professional management is made or else the company stagnates upon the death of the dynamic founder. However, it has only been in the last few decades that we have come to understand that there is a drawback to professionally managed organizations that do not change as society changes. For example, when an organization becomes so complex that people feel lost in its activities, confused about its objectives, and resentful of its impersonal approach, the organization has peaked. At that point, to become optimally successful, the management team must regain the community spirit that has so frequently been destroyed through the development of impersonal systems, a division of labor, and the rest of the Industrial Engineering/Harvard Business School approach.

In communities where men build ships for their sons and nephews to fish in or fight from, quality is never a problem. When people are hired to build products -- or small parts of products for a faceless consumer market, or for managers they do not know because they are away soaring like falcons in a deserted forest, quality and productivity are certain to be consistent problems. And therein hangs a tale for ambitious managers and supervisors who believe there is a better way to work in their organizations.

Avenues To Success

Business has become too complex to believe that profit alone is the measure of how well an organization is serving its clients and utilizing its employees. Joseph Juran, the quality specialist who, with W. Edwards Deming, gave Japan the tools they needed to prosper with small inventories in their production organizations, has blamed our leadership failure on the finance specialists of our organizations. In their pursuit of short-term profit, they neglected the quality and productivity that would have created long-range growth for their organizations. In all fairness, the finance wizards were only doing what their owners hired them to do, and since they seldom had any production or service experience, our performance calamity caught them unawares. Unfortunately, the belief that the bottom line rather than growth is crucial was accepted by the smaller organizations of our society as well.

A more reliable measure of success that far transcends the quarterly statement is a manager's ability to increase productivity and quality enough to capture more of the market without a proportional increase in expenses. Scholars like David Tansik, Edwin Flippo, and Peter Drucker report that we have come as far as possible without a restoration of creativity, a rebirth of the human element in our organizations. And that is the last thing many executives who would like to treat employees as inventory want to hear.

We must remember that we suffered our massive leadership failure while using the best administrative systems ever devised. Unfortunately, these were never enough and certainly more troublesome than inanimate resources -- while our less sophisticated competitors around the world harnessed the human strengths that can make many organizations strong, vibrant and productive!

Fortunately, the behavioral sciences, especially the research of psychology and sociology, have matured past traditional concepts to identify and teach methods that can restore to any organization the achievement that it deserves. An entire nation did that after the most disastrous defeat in its history. Japanese men and women at all levels of responsibility worked very hard to reach what first seemed to be impossible goals. They were forced to rebuild an industrial civilization in which ninety percent of its significant cities had been burned to the ground.

Obviously, I think that the time has now come when a great many Western managers must learn how to better lead their organizations’ relationships to increase productivity and quality.

To succeed in the post-cold war business climate, each manager must best utilize the organization's hardware and software, the resources and relationships to produce goods or services that will serve the market well. This means that few companies will become optimally successful without a conscious dedication to service through its products and its people. To do that well will require that each manager and supervisor learn as much as possible about human personality, productivity, and motivation and use the new concepts effectively.

SELF-FOCUS
Write a short paragraph telling how you would distinguish between those elements the author calls the hardware of production and the software of achievement in your organization.

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