DAILY NEWS

I rarely watch CNN or Fox News because they don’t just report the news; they bore you to death with it. When the latest Malaysian Airline’s plane went down, CNN had sunrise to sunset coverage of it. They paraded us through an unending list of retired pilots, air traffic controllers, and anyone else who has had anything even remotely to do with airline travel, all with their expert opinions on why the plane went down. Often there are conflicting testimonies, and that adds even more to the drama, as now we have on-air arguments between the so-called experts. Shades of Jerry Springer. They will bring back stories of airline disasters—some that go back to the time of Emilia Earhart—for examples to talk about. They will show us maps of the ocean floor, and bring in weather experts to talk about wind shear and updrafts. All of this just makes us more confused than ever.

They like to show pictures of the grieving families of the victims, asking them all kinds of questions about how they are dealing with this, and what could the airlines have done different, and if they are planning on suing anyone. They bring on the traveler that missed the plane, because he overslept, to talk about karma. They want to know if people think President Obama is insensitive since he never made a trip over to support them; and if four battleships sent from the United States, at a quarter of a million dollars a day, are enough to show sincerity in the ongoing search. They will bring on forensic experts to talk about bodies decomposing, and if people suffer much in a plane crash. Then, one day they find the black boxes and they tell us it will take two years before they will know what happened. By that time, we will have forgotten about it and will be intrigued by a new disaster. Yeah, you’ve got to love the newsies.

Political campaigns are always a hoot if you bounce back and forth between the two stations. One is the Republican’s poster boy, and the other is about as liberal as you can get. Me, being in the middle, I’m not sure which way to lean. I know now that Halliburton is not trickling down any of its money to me, and I also know that we’re about one more government program short of busting the bank. I had the following example shared with me a while back. Let’s say you have an adult child who has twenty thousand dollars in credit card debt. Each month they pay only the interest and add a few more hundred dollars on the principal. What’s your advice for them? Go on charging? Or maybe try to get your fiscal house in order? To be fair, both parties spend way too much money they don’t have, and someday the chickens are going to come home to roost. Is it going to affect me? Probably not, because I’m old, but I have three kids and eight grandkids that it will affect. I feel bad because they didn’t make the decision to spend all this money and not pay the bills.

PBS seems to have good news coverage. You won’t find any babes there in short skirts, or pulpit beaters preaching hate messages—just the news—straightforward. They don’t find any reason to embellish it one way or the other. Or, if you want, you can do what more and more people are doing by just not watching it, and letting the news come to them. I think that’s going to be my choice.

NINE REASONS NOT TO BE A COP AND ONE REASON WHY.

                                                                                               

                        

I write this for all of the bad publicity, police officers have had lately, at the expense of a few. In all of my years of public safety, I have known many police officers, my son included. I have found the overwhelming majority of them to be dedicated officers but like all jobs that serve the public, there are a few who shouldn’t be there. But when one slips through the cracks, they all have to suffer for it. Name any other occupation that is this way. No one hates a bad cop more, then another cop.

1.  To be a cop, first you will need a degree from a college to be considered. Upon graduation you will need to pass a skills course, psychological tests and be lucky to be hired at one of the few jobs that open up each year. There are often hundreds of applicants for one job. Most likely you will spend months or years waiting for a good position and in the meantime you will work part time at jobs as security officers for private firms or as community service officers for local police departments, with, little or no benefits.

2. When you get your first job it will most likely be in a small town department, where you will work alone most of the time, at a much reduced pay schedule from bigger cities. Your chance of working the day shift is almost 0. There are no holidays in police work. It’s a 24/7 job, 365 days of the year.

3. Working your way up the ladder, to bigger, better jobs, in bigger departments will require much relocation and often up-rooting your family.

4. Most people don’t really like you most of the time and they see you as a threat or someone who is just looking for a reason to pinch them for something, when in reality most police officers look the other way a lot. They don’t like confrontation any more then you do. They’re not out to make your life any tougher then it is.

5. You will have to go to people’s homes when they are sick and hurt but yet your medical knowledge will be that of an advanced first aider.  You will be bled on, puked on, spit on, infected with God knows what, to bring it home to your family. You will see suicides, murders, child and spousal abuse, and decomposed bodies.

6. You will get to confront people high on drugs and alcohol acting out. They will be irrational, sometimes violent, and sometimes with weapons but you will have to use extreme restraint or be criticized for it by the public and the police administrators, who have to answer to the public and ultimately the council. Politics abound.

7. You will have to go to accidents and try to do your best to keep someone alive until more qualified help arrives, while the drunk who caused the accident wanders away. In a worst-case scenario you will get to go to someone’s home, at three in the morning and tell them that their son or daughter is dead. Then you get to go home and look in on your own sleeping kids, your spouse and go to bed and try to sleep.

8. You will carry a gun but you hope and pray everyday that you never have to use it because you know that taking someone’s life is something you will have to live with for the rest of your life. If you are ever shot, you will most likely be ambushed and there is no amount of training that can prepare you for that and little you can do to stop it. You will be shot for what you represent-- not who you are.

9. When you retire--- and if you stick it out that long-- you will have thirty years of memories of things most people will never see or experience, even once in their lifetime. It makes for such sweet dreams.

10. This is the good one-- not like the rest. Every once in a while you will find a lost child or talk a husband and wife into loving each other again, instead of fighting. Maybe you will do C.P.R. and save a life. Rescue someone’s dog off the ice, talk some sense into a run away kid or get someone into a treatment program or just give someone a ride to a homeless shelter on Christmas Eve or give them five bucks for a meal. Yes, every so often you will feel good about your job. Yes, number 10 is what keeps cops going.

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POPE FRANCIS

                                               

On more then one occasion, I have listened to Pope Francis speak, and all I can say is, “What a breath of fresh air.” There are over a billion Catholics in this world and for one of the first times in my fifty-five years of being one, there seems to be a man at the top who truly cares about, not only the church he leads but those outside of the Catholic Church too. Gone is much of the hard line rhetoric that the church has engaged in, in the past, and here with Francis, are those conciliatory gestures meant to soften that rigid stance and seem more sincere to all of us, in a fast changing world.

There is an old saying that “you can catch more bees with honey then vinegar.” I think Pope Francis recognizes this and in his embrace of the poor and seemingly unfaithful he is saying, “I’ll take the high road here and if you will listen to me, I will listen to you.” I think this gesture when he became pope, in taking the name of the beloved Saint Francis, in of itself, was meant to say to the Catholic leaders and the faithful. “I want my papacy to be more about love and caring, and not just promoting and governing the Catholic Church.” St. Francis of Assisi was the epitome of serving others and in reality, he, a humble Friar was never ordained as a Catholic Priest. He didn’t need that kind of support to become what he was. He simply led by his own quiet, humble, example and Catholics and non-Catholics alike revere him and now the leader of the church, is emulating him.

The popularity of this Pope provides the real evidence that this is a man for all people and not just those who pledge obedience to him because he is their leader. When I was a young man I was the oldest of eight children. My father continually warned me that I needed to set a good example for my siblings. That they looked up to me and they would copy me. Pope Francis knows the world is watching him too and he is setting that example we all need to follow. Influential leaders are hard to find in this world. When one does come along that seems to have many followers and even some with no spiritual connection to him, it is heartwarming indeed. It shows that people still recognize and will follow someone who seems sincere and gives them hope for a better life.

As for the Catholic Church there is always room for improvement and Pope Francis is doing that. Weeding out waste and inconsistencies. Challenging Cardinals, Priests and Bishops to clean up their act and remember what their true vocation is all about and policing those who have gone astray instead of hiding them. It is doubtful that the Pope will orchestrate much change in the rules the church lives by. Those rules are the bedrock of a religion that has existed for over two thousand years. But before this Pope is done we may all have a better understanding of why the rules can’t be changed and not—“just because I told you so.” We also may have a better idea of why people are leaving the Catholic faith and how to interest them again. But the biggest thing that may come out of all of it is, starting a dialogue between other faiths and people without any faith, because we will never understand each other, until we get to know, love and respect each other.

Submitted by Mike Holst 14042 Big Pine Trail Crosslake MN. 56442 218 851 0386

OUTSIDE INTERESTS

When I was a young boy, my father gave me a list of do’s and don’ts, things he never wanted to catch me doing. Dad wasn’t a tyrant who would beat me within an inch of my life if I disobeyed him. He never threatened me; he just told me “Don’t let me catch you doing this.” He never told me why, and I never asked. I must admit, there was something about him that told me I had better do as he said, but as a kid I had no idea what it was. I also must admit that I was tempted by my peers to test him, but something told me not to. Later in life, when I had a son of my own, I thought about this mystical power he had held over me, and wondered why I was so afraid to challenge him. Was it fear? I thought. No, it wasn’t fear I reasoned, it was just respect. Then as I got older I thought, “Why should I challenge him? The things he told me not to do were not that important. If he felt those things were bad for me that was good enough for me.” He didn’t have to be important for me to respect him. He was my dad and that was reason enough.

I did respect my dad for many things. He never became rich or famous, nor was he the president of anything. When he died, he left his bills paid, and his reputation intact. He always worked hard, mostly out of necessity to feed and clothe his large family. He treated his family as if they were the greatest things that had ever been bestowed on him, and when you break it all down, he was right. He never had anything happen to him that made him want to toot his own horn, but he was quick to talk about the successes of his kids.

I think of the young man down south, a while back, who threatened to kill his family and shoot up his school. I think about it, and wonder what it was that made him rebel like that? From all that I read about the case, his parents were good people, and it was something in society that steered him so wrong. What a travesty when outside influences rob us of our children. When you try your best, but your best isn’t good enough to overcome the scourges of society. Unlike those who lose a child to an accident, his parents will suffer every day for the rest of their lives when, most likely, it wasn’t them that let the boy down—it was the world he lived in.

We should be ashamed of the things that exist in this country under the guise of personal freedom. Selfish, mean people who want to profit with no regard for anybody but themselves; they care little about your son or daughter. They will introduce them to drugs, pornography and prostitution. They will take the life you created and ruin it; and when they are done with him or her, they will find someone else to ruin. All it takes is one tiny crack, in the armor of your kid’s defenses, for them to sneak into their underdeveloped minds and make an honor student into a killer. A kid, who could have grown up to find a cure for cancer, will now rot away in prison.  It’s done every day of the year, and more and more. We live in constant fear of what our kids are being introduced to, that’s beyond our ability to keep them from getting involved in.

NEW YEARS 2015

                                                             

I wish that I could write a message to everyone that would be full of flowery and optimistic verses, based on a world that has seemed to come to its senses. What I have witnessed in the past year, and within my own make up, at being a realist, throws cold water on those thoughts and we are a very troubled world indeed. But I refuse to be defeated and my only salvation comes in thoughts about how people have overcome adversity before-- but then I think it was only because they were committed and really wanted it to happen. My hope-- my prayer--is that we will want it bad enough too. I firmly believe that adversity shows us what we are really made of and that the tools for change are inherent in each of us. Like building a house however, those tools are useless-- unless we pick them up and use them.

Over the past years I have written several columns dealing with the shortcomings and inequities that plague this nation and several times I have been criticized for being overly pessimistic. It was never my intent to bring doom and gloom to the forefront but rather just a challenge, to say this is the way it is and why don’t we do something about it. To those who “poo paw” this rhetoric and prefer to go on with their heads in the sand. To those who are so blinded by their political parties teachings, that the truth gets buried in the sand-- right along side of their head-- your not doing anyone any favors. Please, let’s have an open mind.

The real answers will not come from Washington and we shouldn’t wait for that. Washington is owned and manipulated by outside interests that have only their own self-interests in mind. Until the day comes that we see people there defy the outside interests and become there own people, interested in serving those they represent back home, they cannot and should not be trusted. But rather change needs to come from each of us and if the tail needs to wag the dog then so be it. They will get the point soon enough. “No pain, no gain,” however should be our mantra because we cannot undo, what has been done to our country without, a lot of pain. Like pulling a rotten tooth it leaves a hole and discomfort but gradually it will heal and we can go forward again.

The start of a New Year may only be symbolic in nature but it is a start. We can’t undo the past but we can cover it up with enough good things, that hopefully it will only be remembered for what it was-- mostly a bad idea. We have over the years had many significant days to remember. Dec. 7^th 1941, July 20^th 1969, Sept 11^th 2001 to name a few. Some of them good, some of them bad, but all of them a day to remember. Lets make Jan 1^st 2015 a significant day too.

We have some very stormy weather on the horizon but we have proved we can weather storms before. Haruki Murakami said about adversity and I Quote. “And once the storm is over you won’t remember how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm is all about.”