my father said, "There is dignity in all labor"

My father drilled into my brain that there is dignity in all labor.  I often chuckle when I hear the Talking Heads and right wing talk jocks declare that socialists and leftists are all looking for a free ride.  My dad was a member of the Communist Party back before Truman made it a crime to belong.  After that Dad was a Liberal/Progressive/Radical.  My family all worked at whatever jobs needed doing.  For us three children there was no such thing as "boys jobs" and "girls jobs".  I washed, dried, cleared the table and swept the floors along with my two sisters.  "Be sure you do a job you will be proud of", was all my dad would say. 

As a visually impaired kid, I managed to figure out which end of a lawn mower was the handle, and I mowed many lawns and pulled many weeds to earn spending money.  During summer vacation I picked tons of beans and strawberries, along with Pie Cherries, Raspberries, baling hay.  Some of my greatest lessons in life were learned from the older laborers in the fields and in the factories. 

But we live in a culture that turns up our collective noses at "Common Labor".  By gosh, we're just to Middle Class for that sort of humbling.  That would not do at all.  It would make us "Working Class", and by golly that isn't us at all.  So we "allow" illegal's to do our "dirty work" and then spit on them for their effort.  A fine Howdy Do.  But we have to do it in order to show the world that we are risen above the working class. 

I recall, at the ripe old age of 17, a blind man coming to my door to teach me typing.  I was recovering from eye surgery.  "You could go to college free", he told me. 

I was shocked.  "My people pay their own way.  We don't take handouts", I snapped.  And that from a young budding Radical! 

Curious Carl

 

When will we ever learn?

 

Ted, I actually chuckled over the idea that you feel that folks on this list(Blind Democracy), think America is Liberal. 

Politically we have been moving further and further Right, until the Middle of the Road is somewhere East of Nixon. 

But I agree with Miriam.  It doesn't matter what way the nation leans politically.  There many Liberals who would slit my throat for a dollar and there are Conservatives who would stop to help me out of the gutter. 

Moral integrity was never based on Liberalism or Conservatism.  Just take a quick tour down our nation's history.  It was under a Liberal administration that Japanese Americans found themselves incarcerated.  What was all that about?  Were the Japanese Americans more likely to turn on their fellow Americans than were the German Americans?  Gee, could skin color have something to do with it?  Did it make it all right because Americans did not rise up in protest?  Did our tolerance of slavery make it okay?  Just because we went along with Jim Crow, was it morally right?  Was it Liberals or Conservatives who butchered their way across the continent, claiming their victims to be "Savages"?  

Liberal, Conservative, Communist, Socialist, Radical, Far Right, Far Left, all are just meaningless labels masking the real truth.  We are a violent people. 

Not just Americans.  They nailed a Peace Maker to a cross over 2,000 years ago just as surely as they shot a Black preacher on his hotel balcony.  Even though I use labels, they disgust me because they cover up and allow us to wave them about like badges of honor. 

  I have no idea what the politics of Sheriff Joe Arpaio are, nor those of the folks who keep him in office.  But I know that he is not of my people.  My people are citizens of the Planet Earth.  We do not judge on color, or accent, or wealth, or age, or intelligence.  Each human soul is a brother or sister.  We treat each with respect.  And we expect the same treatment in return.  Parading folks about in pink diapers and mocking them is not respectful.  Bragging about it in public only proves that the braggart is ignorant.  Bullying only breeds bullies.  But after thousands of years we still have not learned our lesson. 

 

Curious Carl

No woman chose to be a woman....but I can't prove it

I do know that no woman chose to be a woman.  It just sort of happens somewhere during conception.  And many women do not choose to become pregnant.  When I was a young man, poor women did not choose to carry babies to term.  They did so because they feared the butchers who performed back alley abortions.  Rich girls chose to visit some aunt in France or Sweden.  They left home with round bellies and returned home slim...and alone. 

Personally, I hold the Church responsible for all the starvation and brutal abuse suffered by unwanted children.  Support or Abort.  But then the Church prefers to stand by and allow many of us to suffer while exiting this Life.  The Church really gets off on suffering.  Maybe they're still trying to get even for the fact that their Savior was nailed to a cross. 

 

Curious Carl

On fighting Terror at the expense of Education

 

In addition to the basic corruption of education in America, blind children are definitely being left behind.  But they are not alone.  Despite the efforts to raise the level of education in America, minority children and those living in poverty are being underserved.  If we insisted that our public schools be on a par with the private schools used by the wealthy, we would be one step in the right direction.  Of course the problem of education goes much deeper than merely providing smaller classes, modern facilities and the latest in teaching materials.  Teaching children to believe in themselves and in their ability to fully participate in America would be a basic beginning.  Then we would need a nation that really truly offers equal opportunity to all. 

Oh well, perhaps after we finish making America safe from Terror we can begin to examine our own problems. 

 

Curious Carl

I'm a Citizen of Planet Earth

The Phoenix is a mythical bird who throws itself into the fire, only to rise and live another 1,000 years. 

There is absolutely no connection between the bird and the city of Phoenix, Arizona.  The proof is that the city is no where near 1,000 years old.  Even if it is looking like it's falling into the burning cauldron. 

 

Sheriff Joe is not Uncle Joe(Stalin) reincarnated.  Sheriff Joe's prison camps pale by comparison to Uncle Joe's.  And so far as we know, he's not ordered thousands of illegal's put to death. 

 

And despite hints to the contrary the American Council of the Blind(ACB) is not endorsing Arizona's heavy handed immigration law by holding our annual convention in Phoenix. 

 

Since I consider myself to be a Citizen of the Planet Earth, I view any effort by nations to control who can come across their boarders as doomed to failure.  We must seek broader solutions to ending human misery. 

 

Bickering over whether or not to meet in Phoenix, or to attend convention if it is held there, is only going to impact ACB.  We could continue to squabble until we are so polarized that we forget the many worthy programs needing our support and attention within ACB. 

 

Personally, I am opposed to declaring people illegal.  If we read our history books we would realize that this approach has been tried over and over without success.  It's time to look for more humane solutions. 

But I will not put ACB in the middle of this global battle.  We have work to do.  We are a long way from reaching our goals. 

Curious Carl

Jarvis Plan for Air Travel

 

It wasn't that long ago that I proposed the Jarvis Air Travel Plan.  Remember?  We all strip down and clamber aboard the plane while our baggage and clothes are shipped in a second carrier.  At the conclusion of our friendly flight, we don our clothes, unless they went to Timbuktu, and we're on our way safe and secure.  Sure, we know a little more about our fellow passengers than we wanted to know, but we're alive! 

Well my nay-saying friends.  We are one step closer to the Jarvis Plan.  Enter the airport's new full body scanner!!!  Let the world see if your mother's words will come back to haunt you.  "Don't wear ragged underwear.  You never know when you might be in an accident and rushed to the hospital".  You don't want the entire world looking at your dirty underwear.  But even mom couldn't have known just how true her warning was.  But it's not the ragged underwear that's going to embarrass dear old mom as she stands there 

with her baggy boobs and saggy butt exposed for all to see. 

Would it surprise you if I said that I cheer this new development?  Hey!  Let's move right along to a full MRI for each passenger.  Make the lines longer, the employees ruder and English as only a marginal option. 

Make the seats smaller, too.  Without clothes on we won't need quite so much room.  And get rid of those flight attendants.  Replace them with a pre-recorded message.  All passengers must watch while the pilot and co-pilot board, wearing parachutes.  The warning light tells us that in event of any attempt to seize or damage the plane the pilots are out of here and you're on your own. 

 

Then, maybe then we will figure out that we're better off staying home with our feet firmly planted on the ground. 

We'll do our business from our home offices and turn our yard, front and back, into vegetable gardens.  We might even plow down those ugly super malls and turn them into farms.  How novel! 

Some of us might actually live above our place of work.  Some of us might walk or bike a short distance to our place of business.  We might try our hand at manufacturing things.  Really.  This used to be a popular activity in the olden days. 

We would leave the airways open to all Terrorists to flit about blowing themselves to Kingdom Come and dreaming of the prospect of 72 happy virgins. 

 

Curious Carl

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We have met the enemy and, he is us. -- Pogo

The Jarvis Voting Plan

I wonder if Pete Peterson draws his social security?  But never mind.  Here is another Jarvis Voters Plan. 

Since we're having a hard time getting folks to understand that it is actually money that elects and directs congressfolks, perhaps we need to establish a more honest method of voting. 

In voting for the candidate of your choice you may place one dollar in the tin cup marked by his/her name.  Two dollars earns you two votes for him/her.  As you already have guessed, the candidate with the largest number of one dollar bills will be the winner.  This means that if you really like someone, you may put in just as many one dollar votes as your purse can afford.  Sort of like voting for American Idol.  You enter lots of votes and  believe that you may have tipped the election.  Then the final count comes down and you learn that your little pittance was like spitting in the wind by comparison to the votes stuck in by our First Class Corporate Citizens.  . 

Oh yes, the other neat thing about this latest Jarvis Plan is that the winner takes all.  All the cash.  That's right.  And the best thing is that with all this money the winner will already have a head start on next election. 

  Curious Carl

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We have met the enemy and, he is us. -- Pogo

Thoughts regarding the successful blind woman who snubs Braille

While I'm not in 7 figures I want to quickly assure you that I am a most happy, contented blind man. And I think that I am successful.

My only objection to the woman in the article was her decision that Braille is dead. Given her income she could hire Eleven pipers piping, and Ten lords-a-leaping, to sit and read to her every day. But she has a very self centered attitude if she believes that her success entitles her to decide for you and me regarding our use of Braille.

As for my somewhat less than several million dollars a year job, I am self employed as a rehabilitation teacher. For the past 15 years my wife and I have served older blind and vision impaired folks on the Great Olympic Peninsula. In April I will become 75 years old. Prior to self employment I worked for the Washington Department of Services for the Blind. I taught food service management, Braille, physical education and taught classes in adjustment to blindness. Later on I was the program administrator of the Orientation and Training Center. I also was assistant director for field services.

All of these positions called for some type of personal communication. And I don't mean just talking to myself. If I had followed the advice of my VR counselor back in 1965, I would not have learned Braille and would most likely ended my working life in the machine shop at the Lighthouse for the Blind.

This successful woman has no idea just how much damage her flip comments can do. Parents don't want to admit that their little darlings need Braille in order to compete. Why, lookie there! Miss Millionaire is blind and she's doing right well for herself.

Let's see, help me count. How many blind millionaires do we know? I mean once we count Stevie Wonder.

And what do we tell the kids who are headed for the 70% unemployment roles?

Hmm, looks like my time on the soap box is up.