Benjamin Franklin Set Up A Democratic Socialist Society

Benjamin Franklin invented the United States. He was a polymath. Most genius converges to a narrow focus like math or physics or medicine. Franklin's genius like Da Vinci's diverged, he was a genius in everything he touched, such people come along once every three or four hundred years. All the other founders were young men when Franklin was in his seventies and at the top of his game. They must have all took turns on their knees waiting to kiss his ass in the hope of gaining his favor and being allowed to stand in his light. 

He and John Adams another luminary ordered Jefferson to redact the Declaration and change, Life, Liberty and property to Life, Liberty, and The pursuit of happiness. Why? Because Franklin said that there was no right to hold property in excess of bare necessities because without society everyone would have to be a generalist like the Indians who lived in small families or tribes and had to be able to do it all themselves from hunting to building their homes to making their clothing and planting crops. 

And even if they could specialize and say make many pairs of moccasins, without a large society they would have no market for their goods, so he reasoned that since the existence of society and its laws were the only reason that anyone could accumulate property beyond his or her bare necessities, then all property accumulated by anyone beyond bare necessities was held only by the lack of objection of societal government and was subject to be taken at any time to provide for the general welfare of that society of which the individual was a member. 

So the Republican bullshit of, "I made it myself, so I get to keep it myself," is just that, bullshit, right along with the myth of the self-made man and American exceptionalism. Franklin set up a democratic socialist society. Society is an insurance policy for us all where we are all mutually dependent on each other. The entire Republican philosophy of greed and selfishness and society as just a group of individuals striving for their own success is a goddamned lie.

"All the Property that is necessary to a Man, for the Conservation of the Individual and the Propagation of the Species, is his natural Right, which none can justly deprive him of: But all Property superfluous to such purposes is the Property of the Publick, who, by their Laws, have created it, and who may therefore by other Laws dispose of it, whenever the Welfare of the Publick shall demand such Disposition. He that does not like civil Society on these Terms, let him retire and live among Savages. He can have no right to the benefits of Society, who will not pay his Club towards the Support of it." *

* Benjamin Franklin letter to Robert Morris, December 25, 1783

http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/.../documents/v1ch16s12.html

Stress Kills — It's It Time To Do Something About It?

 
Are you feeling stressed? I would be very surprised if you weren’t. Between the growing demands of our jobs, raising a family while working full-time, and the increasing need to stay connected all day every day, most of us feel stressed out more often than we like to admit. Add to it a chronic lack of sleep and exercise and you have a recipe for disaster. Stress kills and that’s no joke. Let’s look at some of the worst negative side effects of stress and what you can do to stress less and relax more.

Stress will cause your blood pressure to rise. You’ve experienced this when you found yourself hot and with a raging headache when you were in a particularly stressful situation. Feeling that way from time to time is no big deal. The real danger is in the lower-level stress we all feel on a daily basis. It can lead to hypertension and a higher risk of suffering from a heart attack or stroke.

Next, let’s look at sleep. When you’re stressed, you don’t sleep well. You may even find it hard to sleep at all. Insomnia is a common side effect of living a stressful life. It doesn’t take long before you start to feel the negative side effects of not getting quality sleep. 

You feel drained, unfocused, and things spiral downward from there quickly. Your body can’t function well and recover without at least a few good hours of sleep per night. For optimal health, destress and shoot for at least six to eight hours.

Since stress is so hard on the body and mind, what can you do to reduce it? Quite a bit actually. The most obvious solution is to go to the source of the stress and cut it out of your life. Obviously, that isn’t very practical, or desirable when you’re having a few rough weeks at the job you rely on or your kids are driving you nuts. 

Instead, try things to actively relax and destress when and where you can to counterbalance the unavoidable. Go for a walk outside. Hit the gym for some exercise. Meditate. Learn some breathing exercises to help calm yourself down whenever you feel particularly stressed. Get plenty of quality sleep. Eat a healthy diet and cut down on sugar and caffeine.

We’ll talk more about how you can stress less and love life in future blog posts. Being aware of the stress and how it is affecting you is a great first step. Now take a deep breath and go for a stroll around the block. Notice how much better you’re feeling already?

If you are ready to live a stress-free life why not join us in our 7 part series as we explore how to overcome stressfulness? You may follow our series on this blog or request the 7 part series by email by sending your email address to stress@soci-media.com.

Who Are The Homeless Among Us?

As the Founder and former Executive Director of Victory House Ministries in Pensacola Florida, a 30 unit residential transitional housing facility, I have had a lot of experience with the homeless. I found that most people are homeless because they have been experienced problems and losses and have no home to go to.

There is a small minority that chooses to live on the streets and that have, even if inadvertently, adopted the philosophy of Timothy Leary: "My advice to people today is as follows: if you take the game of life seriously if you take your nervous system seriously if you take your sense organs seriously if you take the energy process seriously, you must turn on, tune in, and drop out". They are simply tired of fighting a system that has all the cards stacked against them. It's hard to get back up when you are broke, homeless, and without resources.

The vast majority of the homeless suffer from physical and mental disorders. Most people think the main reason for homelessness is alcohol and drugs. But this dismisses the root problem. As a psychologist and a certified addiction counselor who has worked extensively with patients suffering from addiction, I understand that addiction is a result of physical, and or, mental anguish and the resultant attempt to self-medicate.

For years Victory House Ministries was the only facility that accepted prisoners that were released in the state of Florida and Alabama. I found that many of these men were essentially victims of a corrupt justice system.

I hope that we as a people can come to understand the truth about mental health and addiction because EVERYONE will be personally confronted and affected by those that experience these problems at some point in their lives. 

It Is Time To Overthrow Our Corrupt Government!

American independence from a tyrannical government will never be achieved by peaceful revolution. The only option we have for change is a violent revolution in the style of Pancho Villa against the political and corporate masters that have us enslaved. I realize the risk I am taking in making this pronouncement but cowardly acceptance of "business as usual" will never gain the freedom we as human beings deserve.

I understand the risk of being arrested in an attempt to silence me. That is what fascist governments do. However, I am sick of the greedy oligarchs that are bleeding us dry. They must be eliminated!

Please consider the following essay:

Within the United States of America lies a large industrial city that is the sight of one of the world's largest slave labor camps.

Located in and around the center of this city are community settlements where the slaves live.

Each morning the slaves move herd-like from their quarters into the slave labor camps.

Each one is at his or her station by 7:30 AM. Here they report to their master for the day's duties. And here they remain chained until 5:00 PM when they're released to go home.

The slaves have no choice as to how many hours they labor. Sometimes they are required to work overtime until their master tells them they may leave and go home.

Each year the slaves are told when to take their vacations, for how long, and when they must return.

They have little choice as to how much money they earn as they are paid not what they are worth, but what the job is worth.

They are allowed very little time for lunch and coffee breaks during the labor hours.

The slaves will remain in their chains in great fear because the master can punish them with the "firing" or "layoff" whip.

Even some of the older slaves who have been good and faithful have felt the sting of the whip.

Day by day, year-by-year, the slaves toil and grow older until the master decides it is time to release them to the retirement camps where they're forced to sit idle and wait for death.

It's a well-known fact that the old slaves who try to keep working are sometimes whipped with a "stop their-pension" whip.

I've seen many slaves sadly pack their belongings to leave their city in search of a new master, but it is always the same.

There is, however, a ray of hope for the slave.

He or she can buy their own freedom.

The cost is not high, yet it seems high to those who do not have the courage to pay the price.

What is the price?

ONE MUST BE WILLING TO BE THEIR OWN MASTER!

The slave owners will NEVER give up without a fight!

We Rented Mt. Vernon to George Washington

"For George Washington, his relationships with members of the Lee Family of Virginia begin right here, at Mount Vernon. Mount Vernon was established in the 1730s by George's father, Augustine Washington, on a family patent that George's great-grandfather John Washington had acquired about 1674 or 1675. When Augustine Washington died in 1743, George Washington's half-brother Lawrence inherited the property. Lawrence made a number of improvements before his death in July 1752, including building the original part of the mansion house.

When Lawrence died the estate passed to his infant heir, Sarah, the one surviving child of four that had been born to Lawrence and his wife, Ann Fairfax. Under Lawrence's will, Ann received a life interest in Mount Vernon and the use of one-half of the property's slaves; the rest of his estate was left to Sarah. The will stipulated further that if Sarah died before her mother Mount Vernon would pass to George Washington. If Sarah died childless, part of the estate would descend to her mother and part would be divided between Augustine and George Washington.

As it turned out, Sarah died in 1754 at age 4, childless, of course, and thereafter, considerable confusion arose regarding the distribution of the slaves. Ann remarried to George Lee (1714-61) of Mount Pleasant in the Nomini Creek neighborhood of Westmoreland County, the deputy clerk, justice, and burgess of Westmoreland, and a first cousin of Arthur and Richard Henry Lee. George Lee and Ann rented the Mount Vernon tract and 18 slaves to George Washington for her lifetime, at the rate of 15,000 pounds of tobacco, or £93 15s Virginia currency a year. The agreement was made in December 1754.

Let's shift gears a little here and turn to George Washington's relationships with the Lee Family as a whole. First, his associations with family members were more extensive than with any other group of persons, except for the Washingtons themselves. More than 5 dozen members of the Lee Family of Virginia appear in Washington's Papers. (See Appendix.) That is about half the number of Washingtons who appear, but by far greater than any other group of people with whom Washington ever associated. The list of Lees that came into Washington's sphere include, of course, the more famous Revolutionary War Lees—Henry “Light-Horse Harry” Lee, Jr., brothers Francis Lightfoot Lee, Arthur, William and Richard Henry Lee—as well as their siblings, children, parents, uncles, aunts, and cousins."

Lee Family Archive

http://gwpapers.virginia.edu/documents/lease-of-mount-vernon

How Rare Do You Want To Go?

My dad told us that when he was a young man [whose father was a Tennessee farmer] he ordered a medium well T-bone steak at a restaurant in Boston. He cut into it and beckoned the server with a request to send it back to the kitchen. His reason "My father had a cow that got burned worse than this and she lived!"

The Truth About The Second Amendment

The Second Amendment written by the Founding Fathers was not intended to protect us against our own government. The spirit of the law was for the purpose of organizing a "well-regulated militia" to defend this nation from foreign invasion. Revolt against the American government was considered treason.

The fledgling American nation did not have an organized military at this vulnerable time. Remember this was right after we had fought a war to win our independence from England and the fear of another assault by England or possibly by Spain, France or even Portugal was the reason for the amendment.

Please read the Constitution so you understand this and not be fooled by the right-wing history rewriting deceivers!

https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/constitution-transcript