Dear American Politicians

Dear American Politicians,

It’s funny how the most Christian departments of government are the first on the, especially the conservative right’s, chopping block; education, food assistance programs, veterans’, women’s health, environmental agencies…

... in these times perhaps the most Christian of all are the environmental agencies as all God’s creatures are in peril. Whether or not you agree with the 99% consensus among the published & peer reviewed scientific community that humans are affecting planetary systems such as climate, you have to be reasonable and at least allow that such a thing as pollution exists. And that by it's very nature, pollution has a negative impact on the health of people and animals alike.  Thus it would be impossible to deny that many lives are threatened do to the overwhelming amount of pollution our one species has created. And as humans we have the power to stop it. 

So for all those of you out there who are so convicted that a single life is so sacred that is must be protected even at the risk and/ or detriment of other lives... Life begins at the creation of a single cell; there is really no question about it. Consciousness may arrive late, but new life (for the sake of this argument) is a scientific pinpoint. If life is so sacred, that one woman cannot have the right to extinguish one life, than abortion is the least of your moral concerns. Every time you help subsidize Big Oil, or Monsanto, the military complex, or any old vanguard of the age of combustion-based industry you endanger and kill millions of individual lives - from the lives of the exploited native people to the flora and fauna, to the consumer who is unaware of the true cost of whatever product, both locally and globally. It’s crisis time, so put your money and votes where your mouth and eternal soul lie.

God has all the time in the world to watch the rich squabble over money and power and influence via human politics, while the charge of stewardship of the planet goes unheeded...

We do not.

"Historically," God has little patience for politics.

Would you bring your gun for air travel?

It seems like an odd question but NBC found reason to ask...

but on july 4th's nightly news there was a bit one the rising number of people bringing weapons to airports so far this year. It seemed a common defense was "i didn't know it (the gun/knife) was there." or "i forgot it there."

Seriously?

Why would you bring a handgun or blade as part of you're carry-on?
Do you somehow not know that there are people who look for these things before they allow you to board the plane? Do you just have so many weapons that one just kinda slipped out from its storage space into your luggage? Maybe you grabbed it accidentally when packing your socks...
Or is it just that habitual for you to feel the need to toss a 9mm in whenever you pack more than a bag lunch that packing for the airport didn't seem like it should be an exception for any reason?

Lately it seems with all the gun violence issues as of late the most critical aspect of gun safety and gun ownership is the first to be overlooked and discarded; personal accountability. There are laws  against selling & the owning of firearms to certain age groups of teens and children solely because as children there is the assumption that they are not mature or responsible enough to own a gun themselves. That being said, if an adult is so irresponsible as to find themselves in a situation where they have wound up as what they knew would be a reasonably thorough security screening with the excuse of "I didn't know it was there..." That would appear to imply either you intended to see if you could just "slip it through" which is a crime, or that in packing less than 2 cubic feet of stuff you somehow didn't notice the several lbs. of cold steel you won't part with until it's ripped from your "cold dead hands" which you just happened to have misplaced at that particular time in surrounding the period of packing and driving to the airport, etc. etc.

I totally support the relatively unregulated sales of guns... background checks; sure, whatever, anyone with a decent criminal mind knows how to get around that... national gun registry; fine, it'll only ever be partial and if you really want to avoid it you can... there is not feasible way to administer any kind of competency test - look at cars, there is a test but they still remain a leading cause of death...

regulate things all you want... or as little as you want... people will become complacent with any system of control put upon them as long as they are convinced that the current system is better than the last regardless of the fact that it's ultimately no different... there is still suffering, still joy, still obsession and madness, and bounty and everything else and the chance of being born into it versus being able to find ways of acquire it are not only equal but pointless as all these things to want or to avoid are absolutely subjective to each person...

...that's why control is so important... in one way or another each of us is out of control in some sense in addition to the previous point in that we only know what we think we know so the reality of the situation changes from one person to another so there need to be boundaries. Rules. Laws. A Ruling Class. Control.

but where there is opportunity, the laws of nature dictate that there be greed... do not all living things feast when invited to? so the ruling class who's existence is to maintain they're control over the masses so that we don't just run around killing each other like a Mad Max kinda life, are by their own nature corrupt in that the maintaining of status and the search for more power are the two creeds by which each one of those lives by. Maintaining of one's status is tired to doing one's "job" by maintaining whatever the status quo of product is for that position... economic growth, muffins, graduates, babies...

... and you take another step back...

... and you realize that we are all just little eyeless corks bobbing in a night sea waiting for complicated chance to bring us to the nearest crest or trough, whatever our preference may be.