Category: Rich Hoffman

What Is Meant by Having “Thin Skin”: Stealing value from those who have it

It has always come up, and for whatever reason lately, has come up more often than usual, the notion of having a “thin skin.”  The insinuation is that one should develop a “thick skin” and yield to insults of whatever kind for the purpose of collective opinion.  Most of the world functions on this premise; however I disagree with it vehemently.  I take name calling as a challenge to combat, otherwise it wouldn’t be attempted—for that is the real meaning behind the action.  Yet our modern American interpretation of name calling and subtle slander is to assimilate the individual into group oriented behavior—to do as the drill sergeant does and drive out individual ego from a task and replace it with group assimilation.  When the term “thin skin” is used, most of the time it is because the accuser wishes to impose upon another the destruction of individual ego so that they yield to collective enterprise.

When the issue of bullying is addressed in public schools, this is almost always the root cause.  Schools do not know what to do about bullying because they are institutions of compliance, and require the destruction of individual ego.  They generate bullying behavior by their very nature of existence.  So they hope to curb the most violent forms of bullying with rules which never work, because the desire of institutionalism craves more the compliance of ego destruction than the compliance of rules to serve the whims of individuals.  So as along as public schools exist in their current form, bullying will always occur.  There is nothing a teacher, an administrator, or a parent can do about the issue.

In the military, bullying is used heavily during basic training.   Personal insults are flung at individuals to strip them of their ego.  The military mind molder then replaces the stripped away ego with compliance to greater causes associated with sacrifice to the group.  Colleges do the same in their hazing rituals for the similar reasons.  This is why such large portions of functioning adults have duality issues in their lives—why so many of them feel individually unsatisfied, ethically, sexually, intellectually when they are alone and are driven like moths to fire at social circles of group assimilation in order to find personal comfort, which never fully comes.  They drink, get drunk, pop anti-depression medicine, or indulge themselves in some type of television prime time fiction, or fantasy sports selection to compensate their personal loss.  The human craving of such activity comes from the destruction of their individual egos—and usually at the young age of grade school.

The entire human race past the age of 15 years of age expects group yielding to some degree or another.  It has been pounded into our minds from a young age and the results are terribly obvious.  Personal depression is driven by the need to align the values of individual ego with the social imposition of group assimilation.  The desire to fulfill the empty goals of any group whether it be in a business enterprise where the underlings structure their lives around sucking up to their boss for the needs of the company rather than the drives of their individuality.  The boss should not be surprised when they discover that a parade of incompetents work for their company.  The boss hired individuals to fulfill certain tasks, yet those employees have built their lives around group pecking order, becoming obsessed with who is where on an organizational chart, believing falsely that the title one holds provides the merit of value for a job done—and those titles are given out by the boss—so sucking up might provide such merit.  Both parties miss what they are looking for in the relationship, the boss loses because they end up hiring incompetent staff members who bring nothing to an enterprise but bobble heads who nod in agreement not because they agree with the boss, but because they want the titles the boss is entitled to provide to those deemed worthy.  Because the boss often thinks the same way, they often give such titles to those who are most prone to assimilation to their organization—and failure ensues.

When I was young as is still the case, I did not accept this assimilation.  In sports I sabotaged my own career because I would not allow myself to be assimilated into the group.  I refused the snippy comments and personal insults from my coaches thinking they were making me better with violence earning me the nickname of “animal.”  The older I got, the worse it got until coaches stopped trying to involve me.  They wanted my athletic ability but I was just too much of a pain for the “team” they were trying to build.  In class, I didn’t accept it from teachers.  One example was an English teacher who was late every morning for home room class.  This went on for months. The entire class had to stand outside waiting for the teacher to arrive.  I felt as an individual that this was wrong, because it disrespected the individual rights of the other kids, and it made me very angry.  So one morning when this teacher arrived to class—late, they discovered that the lock to their classroom door was packed shut with chewing gum, so that a key would not unlock the door.  My message to the teacher was that if they wanted to ensure they could unlock their door in the morning, they better arrive early to protect it from sabotage.  It took half a day to get a locksmith to open the door, which I had packed with gum in full view of everyone.  Of course some of the students told the authorities on me as they were seeking favoritism from the teacher in a similar way that businessman kisses ass to work their way up the institutional ladder.  They want the authority figure to grant the titles not based on individual effort, but by degree of personal sacrifice to the organization as a whole.  I got into a lot of trouble, but it didn’t stop the behavior.  I went on with a group of friends to set off fireworks in the halls under student’s feet within the very next week, and had frequent fights with other students.  I sought to sabotage authority any way possible.  It wasn’t that I went out looking for trouble, but was simply protecting my individuality against group assimilation.

As an adult I am very happy, and healthy.  I’m in my middle years now, I take no medicine for depression, heart disease, or any other physical aliment.  And while many my age seem to rely on Viagra to maintain their bedroom stamina, I couldn’t imagine having such a stupid problem—and don’t need it.  I don’t drink, I don’t over eat, I don’t lose sleep at night over social issues, I could care less what my neighbors are doing so long as they don’t bother me.  And I could sit for entire weekends totally alone and not get enough “me” time.   I love myself, and I am happy I do.  The result is that I have much love to give my family because the value of “love” is generated by my ego—which is uniquely preserved.  Part of the preservation is in not tolerating attempts to assimilate my behavior to the whims of group compliance.

When it is said that such people have “thin skin” this is what the accusers hate, they wish to see a person who will yield their individuality to group goals instead of an individual pulling the group toward their goals.  When it is wondered by the masses what the invisible qualities of leadership are, the root is in the ability of individuals to get groups to follow them.  But leaders are not provided in this fashion by titles given by a boss.  Leaders have intact egos that can bend the will of broken intellects to their desires by sheer force—the force is in unifying conquered souls toward a goal the individual leader desires.   Really good leaders can do the same with individuals as well, and I am of this latter category.   Because of my background that is often dripped with blood I learned how to achieve leadership without destroying the individuality of the participants.  The spilt blood was worth the value, because the skill is unique in modern America, and it serves me well.  That value wasn’t given to me by anybody; it is something I gave myself by not allowing my ego to be stripped away by group assimilators at any point in my life.

The same rules hold today.  I don’t worry what people say behind my back, but if they engage me directly, they will get a fight—100% of the time.  It is a personal policy that I have for my life to protect it against the forces of group assimilation which I have determined is one of the most corrosive forces in the known universe.  At times when I have found myself at Walgreens to get a passport picture, or just to pick up some small grocery item I continue to be amazed at the long lines of people seeking doctor prescriptions for ailments that are mostly psychological.  Most of the morbidly obese, the headache prone, the depression driven, the faulty heart conditions of those seeking Walgreen prescriptions, and even the blue pill popping men who desire to keep a four-hour erection for 5 minutes of bedroom engagement with their wives are driven to their multiple forms of insanity because of their stripped away egos which they yielded to group compliance imposed upon them by name calling.  Of course my attitude has put me before many court judges who threatened years in jail if I did not become more compliant, but I always presented to them the perilous dilemma, which I covered in my novel Tail of the Dragon.   I was always basically a good person, with moral authority on my side.  The cost of putting my non compliant behavior into a locked up area is greater for them than against me, so they have elected not to do it.  In times when blood has been spilt and bodies were broken, it was cheaper for the statist system to yield to the individual, because the refusal to yield in a locked up environment means death and liability for the captors—and knowing that they were looking at a pure example of goodness, they elected not to impose that cost on themselves. Thus, the benefit of being an individual in a socially broken world full of followers who are lost if they don’t have a leader in their lives to issue out merit for unearned action.  Name calling is the first step into removing ego from individuals for the benefit of group assimilation.  The loss of ego destroys individuals and robs the gifts that personalities have to give to their families, their friends, their companies, but worst of all, themselves.  Such victims die a slow death beginning in their grade school years once they start yielding to authority instead of fighting to preserve themselves.

So I have a strict policy against assault, I don’t allow it, verbally, or physically.  It is not my duty to learn to take it for some mythical “greater good,” yielding to the needs of institutionalism.  The by-product is that I have unique gifts to offer, and those who know me best, understand how much it enriches their lives—and institutions.  But the benefits cannot be understood without the context of leadership and what makes someone a “natural leader” and what makes others just kiss-ass administrators as worthless as toilet paper—the tragedy of our current society is in their lack of ability to know the difference because they are functioning from the wrong motivations in their lives given to them by faulty educations at an early age.  It is for these reasons that I have a zero tolerance policy for personal insult, and why many refer to my behavior has being “thin skinned” as if it were my social duty to allow impositions from inferiors to loot my value to bolster their own deflated egos with the value of my personal worth.  The term, “thin skin” is just another name calling attempt to do for the egos what Viagra does for their genitals, and that is something I won’t allow—and never will.

Rich Hoffman

 www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

Give yourself the gift of ADVENTURE.  CLICK HERE!  

Obama Looks to Kickstarter to Fund World War III: The reason both political parties love war

Isn’t it cute that some groups are trying to raise money for President Obama’s World War III campaign?  Even though the below video is satirical, the humor is based on reality.  Obama is looking to start World War III and has proven to what extent statism has taken root in American government.  When the political left has turned against Obama and referred to him as a war monger, the extent of the statism in American, and all world governments should be terribly obvious.

For those who have the memory of a second hand on a clock that is perpetually fast, President Obama won his election based on his anti-war stance.  Many of the liberals standing with Obama now in his campaign against Syria were the same people who called former President Bush the same—a war monger—yet it is ironic how quit those same protesting voices have become now that it is a man of color in The White House who leads the progressive agenda in America from the political left.  The hypocrisy is grotesquely obvious.   That hypocrisy is captured wonderfully in the satirical video about the Kick Start campaign for President Obama’s World War III campaign.

Most of those who voted for President Obama, school levies, and virtually all tax increases, are just as stupid as the actors pretending to support Obama’s World War III campaign appear to be.  The typical Obama supporter does think it’s cool that Obama hangs out with a race baiting rapper and is social media savy.  Those are the criteria for voting for a politician so it is no wonder that the American republic is in danger.   They don’t care that Syria is a political smoke screen that serves the interest of the same powers which drove Bush to drive for perpetual war.  They only care that Obama knows Jay-Z.

The modern war of the statist government is not one of valor, or individual nobility where one man wonders whether or not they have the courage to take the life of another.  Few progressives wish to acknowledge that Teddy Roosevelt craved to attack San Juan Hill in Cuba not because he wanted to drive out the Spanish from the island closest to the continental United States, but to kill a man.  “The charge itself was great fun” Roosevelt declared, and “Oh, but we had a bully fight.” His actions during the battle earned a recommendation for the Congressional Medal of Honor but politics intervened and the request was denied. The rejection crushed Roosevelt. As though in consolation, the notoriety from the charge up San Juan Hill was instrumental in propelling him to the governorship of New York in 1899. The following year Roosevelt was selected to fill the Vice Presidential spot in President McKinley’s successful run for a second term. With McKinley’s assassination in September 1901, Roosevelt became President.  Roosevelt would spend his presidency stomping all over the American Constitution and would later lead America’s first Progressive Party, paving the way for Woodrow Wilson to become president as Progressives assimilated into the Democratic Party for the most part.  Roosevelt however had been a Republican, and many followed his lead.  Few who study history know the real reason Roosevelt wanted war; it wasn’t for national security, but to prove that he could kill a man, as he had hunted all the big game the world had seen—except a human being.  It was nothing more complicated than that—or moral.

http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/roughriders.htm

No question Obama does feel sorry for the poor people who suffer under a tyrannical regime in Syria, as all right thinking people do.  But tyranny is not limited to Syria, and there are many terrible deeds occurring all over the world yet Obama does not rush to help those.   Perhaps he chose not to look into the slums of Brazil when traveling to Rio to see the horribly poor who live under South American socialism, or the sad underpinnings of the radical Islamic faith, which Obama has been shy to scorn for reasons that are not mysterious considering Obama’s childhood in Jakarta.  Obama says nothing of the multiple human rights violations taking place in China, or even gives casual care for the millions of aborted babies who have had life snuffed away from them before they were even born.  At least the people in Syria killed by either Rebels trying to pin the act on Syria’s ruthless dictator, or the Syrian government—had a chance to live.   Obama doesn’t care about such things for reasons that might otherwise be mysterious, if it wasn’t known that the president was just the latest spokesman for government statism that doesn’t care if the occupant of The White House is a Democrat or a Republican.  If they sit in the Oval Office, presidents are expected by statism to adhere to certain rules, and one of those rules is perpetual war to always cover up the deeds of the wicked, and strategies of sinister intentions.

Obama wants war because he is a bad manager and he needs a distraction.  He was put in office because of his lack of skill so that the architects of destruction could maneuver him witlessly into their schemes.    Obama in just five years went from an anti-war protestor to a war monger and it has not gone unnoticed.  But it’s not just because Obama changed his position—it is because he doesn’t really have roots that sink deeply into any belief which allows him to be steered by real war mongers who wish to remain anonymous—concealing their actions behind a progressive president who won the Nobel Peace Prize, and is beyond refute to the international media.  That is the harsh reality, that not even the sinister communist Obama is really in charge but is just a slut spokesman for progressivism the likes of Lady Gaga or Mily Cyrus.  Their role is to carry the flag of progressivism, and to shove through more statist policies upon the American Constitution, they need war to keep the wheels of power from losing their concealment as they pull all the political levers of known politics.

The satire of Obama’s World War III scenario is not far off the mark.  It is funny because it’s real.  It does not take much imagination to consider whether or not Obama and his supporters would stoop as low as the actors of the video have, because they have before.  Obama was elected by people just as stupid and ridiculous as the fictional actors pretending to raise money for Obama’s World War III effort.   Only the Obama Presidency wasn’t a joke—it was real, and the menace to America has become obvious.   So maybe the video isn’t so satirical after all.  Maybe it is rather a work of seriousness brought to fruition in an insane world.   In that case, World War III has already started, and the money is already spent.  Obama doesn’t need Kickstarter—because he has the American taxpayer.  Americans tend to vote for higher taxes in cases of patriotic war, but not when it comes to large statist social programs.   It is there that anyone interested in discovering why Obama craves war suddenly need look.   War increases tax revenue—and for a money grabbing statist like Obama, it’s all about raising taxes.

Rich Hoffman

 www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

Give yourself the gift of ADVENTURE.  CLICK HERE!  

What Fast Food Workers and Teachers Have in Common: Rich Hoffman and Matt Clark talk about it on WAAM Radio

Matt Clark had me on his WAAM radio show in Ann Arbor, Michigan to discuss the inflated wages fast-food workers have been demanding as unions are attempting to infect the food service industry with communist oriented mediocrity.  During our conversation we covered some of my personal stories and feelings about how value has been robbed from all fields of endeavor due to the subtle influence of communism through labor unions, and how that has lowered the performance level of productivity in America.  CLICK HERE TO REVIEW MY THOUGHTS ON THIS MATTER IN GREATER DETAIL.  As our discussion evolved we discussed public school teachers and how they are like the ridiculous fast-food worker in thinking they are worth a lot more money than they really are just because of their collective-bargaining agreements.  Watch and listen to the interview for yourself:

What has been robbed from the fast food industry, the teaching profession, and every endeavor where unions’ public and private have taken root is the value of value.  Value has been stolen from the American worker through these collective bargaining agreements, the belief that just because the ignorant masses believe something, that they can assert a value to it.  Obviously, they can not.  When people like Matt and I show outrage at the behavior, it is because we see that it is value for an endeavor that has been lost in the process of teaching, building cars, or simply making hamburgers as mediocre workers inspired to achieve a “living wage” through collective enterprise no longer reach for the stars, dream of becoming more than they are, or constantly invent new and better ways of doing things because they are complacent.

American industry was the best in the world because it offered the prospect of profit, even at the lowest level job—as effort and value drove the market.  Through the typical progressive, through the unions, the government workers, and all forms of collectivism from the private union steward to the college fraternity, it is the concept of “fitting in” to a group that is destroying American ingenuity, and thus, destroying the American worker.  All participants in such processes understand the concept of collectivism and they sense there is something wrong with it, yet they continue to keep their mouths shut because they know they must do so to reap the benefits of group affiliation.  Groups do not like individuals who speak out, because there is comfort in silence, and under the communist like methods of the labor unions, there is pay through collective bargaining.

That mentality is attempting to migrate into the fast-food industry out of sheer desperation.  Like a cancerous leech, labor unions have destroyed American manufacturing, all government unions, and a good portion of the food distribution network.  They need fresh blood to keep their influence migrating off the used carcasses of their members, so they are targeting restaurants.  The cost is a loss of value from the industry that is there to some degree in individual pockets where exceptional workers can still make a difference in some fast food stores, and rise to the top to eventually run some of those establishments.  But the threat of a labor union moving in to build a nation of more complacent workers happy to make $15 an hour for doing a job that is only valued under $10 is a threat not only to cheap and easy food, but the value of capitalism that is implanted in every free-standing restaurant in America.

Once workers become unionized they are forever tainted by the effects of collectivism, and are more or less ruined for life.  The union employee is a typical individual that has been cannibalized for the greater good, and yielded all their hopes and dreams to the value of the worst of their group affiliation.   Unions are anti-America, anti-capitalism, and anti-productive.  They are no good for anybody.  But worse than anything they are looters of value as they not only rob individuals of their merit, but steal value from every task they are affiliated with.  And for that reason, they are agents of destruction upon a wasteland that was once known as the most productive country on the planet—now consumed with the parasite named “collective-bargaining.”

Rich Hoffman

 www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

Give yourself the gift of ADVENTURE.  CLICK HERE!  

The Overworked Lakota Teacher: New levy talking points from the regime of public union monopolies

If it was ever wondered what the cost of public education monopolies are, read the following comment from an apparent Lakota teacher who came unglued the other day on the Channel 9 website for a story they did about the upcoming levy attempt.  CLICK HERE TO REVIEW.  The teacher’s comments are shown below.  Before I dismantle this teacher’s claims to pain and suffering, read it for yourself.  The short of the issue is that this teacher can make the claims of hardship because they are working for a monopoly—they have no competition to judge against.  So they can claim any little thing as an unwarranted pain, because the unionized workforce of the teaching profession backed by the federal government is operating as an anti-trust.  Their demands, and pay rates are dictated by price-fixing, and their expectations are ridiculously high because of it.   Now read what a teacher from Lakota thinks is a hard day as they answer to a commenter named “Joe Jobs.”

Let me be succinct in case you can only hold one or two thoughts in your head at any one time. First, those “unions” are made up of teachers; teachers who spend their every day in the classroom with their students and then do the grueling “union” job after hours in many cases. Teachers choose their profession because they are dedicated to helping children be successful people and citizens of their communities. See, it benefits us all when our children succeed in life. Joe, take a “sick day” this week and visit any Lakota school. Sign in and tell the secretary you want to volunteer in a classroom for the day. Don’t forget to pack a small lunch; you won’t be going out and you won’t have much time to eat that lunch anyway. Better be sure to go to the bathroom before the students arrive, because once they do, your only “break” of the day will be after the students go home. Please dive right in; help that teacher manage classes filled with students who arrive with a myriad of abilities and challenges. Some don’t speak English yet. Others are living through family wars, losses of parents or jobs, some are latchkey and arrive at school before the sun is up and most people are not even dressed for work. Be sure you help the students understand how to edit their writing to make it clear. Then help the students understand the challenging new math curriculum that the state and the new “common core” dictates they must understand and succeed with. You’ll have to write for the student whose muscular disease no longer allows her to hold a pencil. You’ll need to always be aware of the time so that students get to the nurse for their insulin checks and their medications. The counselor will need to see some who desperately need his/her help. Several in your class will need to leave at their appointed time to go to the resource room where they’ll continue to work with their specialist who tailors their work to meet the individual needs of each of those students who struggle. Don’t forget to challenge those kids who fly through their work and crave more! Follow the students as they travel their day to each of their classes without their favorite subjects: art, music, and PE. They’ll get a lunch and small recess; you won’t. During your half hour lunch, I hope you can eat with one hand while you answer parent emails with the other, tutor that child that comes in needing help with their math facts, and of course, you’ll have a meeting 4 out of 5 days. When everyone is exhausted, and you finally send your students home, get your butt outside because you have carpool duty. See, Lakota lost most of their busing, so you’ll stand outside every afternoon while hundreds of cars line up to retrieve their children. Pay attention; make sure the right kid gets into their car quickly. The kids will be too busy talking with their friends to be paying attention, so you’ll have to. Finally, at 4:30, go to the bathroom, finally, and drag your butt into your car. Did you remember all those papers that must be assessed before the kids arrive tomorrow? Take them home. Forget watching TV or going out for a run or walk, you have work to do. This is your 60+ hour a week job, that you love, by the way, for 40+ weeks of the year. With an advanced degree and 20 years of experience, what is your salary? Seriously? Think again, JoeJobs. Support our children and their education. Teachers have been doing just that every day.less

I see no problem with arriving at work at 7:30 in the morning and not taking a break until 5 PM.  The teacher however does get a bit of a breather between class periods all through the day, so no matter how grueling this teacher attempts to portray their day; it is an obvious neurotic exaggeration.  A ten-hour work day is a piece of cake, and I have offered Lakota schools to take this teacher’s challenge and teach not just one of their classes, but four of them at the same time.  I made such a challenge to Lakota East’s Spark Magazine where Dean Hume is the head of that endeavor.  Of course they didn’t take me up on the offer, and our relationship is so deteriorated now that it is off the table.  But the gist is they know at Lakota that their claims of hardship are overblown in a big way, and their collective bargaining agreement expecting over $60K a year on average is too high.  Way too high—by about 10K per year.

Much of what the teacher complained about is driven by failures in progressive education, where teachers have attempted to take the place of traditional parents, infusing themselves to the lives of all children in intrusive ways.  They have desired to push traditional parents out-of-the-way and raise children into a statist education making students always dependent on others.  This has made the teacher’s job harder as parents have yielded to this intrusion seeking a taxpayer-funded babysitter while they build their careers for their own pursuits.  The teacher at Lakota made themselves advocates of a progressive education, and they are dealing with the results of a classroom full of dependents.  The failure is in the style of education.  If the teacher’s job is harder, it is because the progressive education children are receiving has made it so.  The task of putting a band-aid on the failure by throwing money at education through permanent tax increases is a stupid idea.

If there were competitive options, that teacher would be happy to have the problems they are complaining about now.  The only reason they feel obliged to complain in this case is because there is no competition to their profession other than a few remote private schools, or the occasional home-schooled family.  Therefore, the severity of the workday expressed by this teacher is measured against the unrealistic expectations of employment created by a government monopoly at Lakota.  Only in such monopolies could employees behave as badly as some of those teachers at Lakota who have been involved in sex scandals, and gotten away with the crime, and still make the claims of hardship similar to what was made in the above statements.  The reason is that they are anti-trust employees justifying their impositions on the communities that employ them with parades of complaints that are driven by their own incompetency.

For further proof of this mentality, here is a letter to me from a pro tax supporter I received just the other day.

Rich,

I disagree with your goal of $45K average salaries for teachers.  But the public will ultimately decide that.  If that goal is reached, it will be up to the teachers to work at a $45K pace and not the pace they are currently working..  Your comment that “teachers at Lakota are making too much money for doing too little” is the point of the levy results.  Why would anyone devote so much time toward a job which the community deems as being not worth it?  Why isn’t 8 hours of hard work each day enough time toward their jobs?

Mr. George says that the public wants to work with the teachers, but the union won’t let them.  Who does he think the union is?  It is that 2nd grade teacher that comes in to school 3 weeks early to set up her classroom and prepare for the year.  The union is the 5th grade teacher who postpones her bathroom break so her students are under constant supervision..  The union is the AP teacher who teachers college level material using a high school schedule with high school materials and support.  When parents go to open house and conferences, that is when they should voice their displeasure with the union because that is who they are directly talking to.

Once again I call on the labor force of the schools to determine the next round of cuts if the levy fails and those cuts should be in the time devoted to the job at hand.  Make gone the 50-60 hours work weeks.  The public, by voting no, is saying they can’t afford to type of service.

William Schmidt

Isn’t it amazing how similar those comments are to each other?  It is the new union talking points for the elections of 2013.

Rich Hoffman

 www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

Give yourself the gift of ADVENTURE.  CLICK HERE!  

The HWK-290: Preparing for war, gaming way into the night, and the start of revolutions

I have a running fantasy that someday the government will show up on my doorstep with tyrannical intentions and shred off the pretext of decency for open warfare.  At that time I will be free to do what I do best and have loved since my feet could carry me upward, and that is to fight—fight for independence, fight for respect, fight for the human race—fight for anything—but fight.  Now when I say fight, I don’t mean “serving” for some greater cause made up by a statist government.  I mean fighting where my strategy and effort destroy an opponent no matter how great the numbers or odds of victory, the worse, the more attractive.  So the fantasy of a large statist government having the audacity to believe that they will win my submission with force is an attractive one to me.

I do not make a good soldier material, or a sports player who simply does what somebody else dictates.  That is not the kind of fighting that I’m good at.  In sports I never wanted to be a player, only the coach or the owner of a franchise, never some meat head player who was simply a field soldier.  In the military, I never wanted to be a soldier, only a commander.  But the way the human race is set up, they expect people to run through some kind of social initiation period where they start on the bottom and work their way up.  However, by the time that such people find themselves in charge, they have been beaten down into submission and lose the ability to “think” uniquely.  So I avoid all structured war games like the plague, and always have.  When I play at war whether it is politics, business, or physical submission of one group over another, I require being in charge otherwise I’m just not interested.  If people shut up and listen, they find that they benefit greatly by doing what I tell them.  I don’t get out of such arrangements anything from the participates—any level of camaraderie, any back slapping from social respect—any feeling of “fitting in” to the structure of human existence.  I simply enjoy winning in games of conflict.

One of the greatest aspects of being human is that we are thinking creatures and find many ways to entertain ourselves.  Of the many things invented to entertain the human race, war games for me have always been the thing that I most enjoy.  When I was a kid I ran into tabletop war gaming from a military history class I took where famous Revolutionary War battles could be re-enacted.  As an adult my wife introduced me to similar games such as the Star Wars: Assault on Hoth which we played nearly every night during the first couple years of our marriage.  When I started having kids I played a lot of video games with them—all of which were about war, fighting, and combat.  I never approached the games as an escape from reality, but as the only way I could do the types of things I enjoyed doing without destroying the fabric of the world around me.  Then of course there was the Wiz Kids Pirate Constructible Strategy Game that I have discussed in great detail here before, which my family spent a good five solid years playing together.

As fate would have it, one of my son-in-laws is a serious table top gamer.  He plays games I never had the patience for like Magic the Gathering relentlessly and will play any board game that has ever been invented.  He simply loves games.  He along with my nephews over the past summer introduced me to the Dungeons and Dragons like game, Hero Quest which I enjoyed greatly.   But I have since discovered something much, much cooler—Star Wars X-Wing Miniatures by Fantasy Flight Games.   This game has all the things I enjoy and have only found possible since LucasArts produced the old video game X-Wing, which was a combat flight simulator that I often spent entire nights playing.  As video games became better and moved online, Star Wars: Galaxies had Jump to Hyperspace, which was the latest evolution of the old X-Wing game, but it has since left the scene since Star Wars: The Old Republic arrived.  There was a void in my heart that was there in the years between the exit of Jump to Hyperspace and the creation of Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures that wasn’t filled by anything else.  Now that I have discovered X-Wing Miniatures, it has been like revisiting my favorite games of the past with new updated spins which should be expected with evolution, and I have been soaking up.  I have enjoyed myself more since the discovery of X-Wing Miniatures than I can remember consistently in decades.  I have been buying up ships for the game like crazy and getting very serious about it.

Both of my son-in-laws have also been getting into the game, so over the weekend we went to Yattaquest in Mt. Healthy to purchase a mat for our X-Wing Miniatures game as the playing surface is supposed to be a 3’X3’ area and we wanted something nice.  So we went to Yattaquest and saw that the place was absolutely rocking with activity as they had a game night where the back room was filled with players.  I was stunned how many other people were playing these games for the same reasons that I do, and I was shocked by how many different games were on the shelf at Yattaquest.  There was an entire section for Warhammer—it was simply amazing.

  I picked up my game mat and the last two ships they had for X-Wing Miniatures, a couple of A-Wings.

http://www.yottaquest.com/

Then all my kids along with my wife went to Sci-Fi Cincinnati over in Northgate Mall and found two Y-Wing Fighters and a Tie Fighter Advanced, which are both extremely rare.  I bought them up knowing that they were selling for over $50 dollars a piece on the internet because of their rarity.  I felt I had just uncovered a gold nugget—a rare treasure and it made my entire weekend.

http://www.sci-fi-city.com/cincinnati.htm

We arrived home late after the mall had closed and began playing X-Wing as a family with the game ending at around 3 AM.  We then played most of the next day and I can report that it is some of the most fun I have had in years.  It has many of the elements that I personally enjoy more than anything, it’s about miniature detail models, strategy, technology, large concepts, and it has a creativity level that is limited only by the player—which is very attractive to me. After our very successful weekend of playing X-Wing Miniatures, I treated myself to a rare privilege; I pre-ordered a ship that I am hungry to get as a compliment to my Millennium Falcon builds, the new HWK-290.   In a 100-point game, the HWK-290 will provide for me the perfect support for my aggressive style of game play and I am very happy to see it come available as it does not technically ship to the general public until September 11th.  Fantasy Flight Games pre-released HWK-290s during Gen Con in Indianapolis, but until then and since nobody has put their hands on them.

The ship is a sentimental favorite for me; it’s from the video game called Dark Forces which my daughters used to play with me.  So it meant more than just a game piece for X-Wing Miniatures to make the purchase, I am just ecstatic that it will be coming to me.  It is a unique item that I can’t wait to put my hands on, and it feels good to have something which drums up so much happiness.  Yes, there are a lot of very bad things going on in the world, and I have written about many of them here at Overmanwarrior’s Wisdom.  But the new game X-Wing Miniatures has given me new juice where few things prior provided.  I simply love the game for what it does.  But more than anything it is allowing me to build a squad that has the Millennium Falcon as a tactical option with the HWK-290.

I don’t socialize much, but it was nice to see so many people with similar interests at Yattaquest.  The place was huge and very busy as business was good.  I’m obviously not alone in my love of combat because most of those games were themed around conflict resolution.  As I stood in the center of Yattaquest I had the sense that if the first American Revolution started in pubs around New England, then the second and third will be in places like Yattaquest.  The game players were simply enjoying some escapist fun while not compromising their minds in the process.  Those people are not compliant statists of the type who built the trouble of LBJ’s Great Society.  They are rebels, commanders, and tacticians that nobody else takes serious as they have fallen through the cracks of the establishment only to become the next sleeping giants awakened during the next great crises.  But never before that I can recall did so many people flock to games like Warhammer, Magic the Gathering, and X-Wing Miniatures as they do now.  I attempted with all my resources to find Y-Wing fighters but could not, because they were sold out everywhere I looked, even on Ebay and other online outlets.  I found them by chance at Sci-Fi Cincinnati and quickly bought them up.  They weren’t sold out because the company didn’t make enough of them—quite the contrary—they were sold out because the demand is that high.  I find that extremely encouraging.

I might have to wait for my fantasy of a statist government gone mad showing up on my door step to declare war against me and my family.  Obama can’t even make a decision against Syria, so I’m not worried about progressives making a visible move against the American people who would cost them terribly—because such things at least require courage, which they lack.  But until then, I love that there are games like X-Wing Miniatures that I can play with my family late into the night and all the next day.  War gaming is a good substitute for the real thing and I love being a member of the human race because it invents such things.  But one thing that is a running theme among these gamers is that submission is not an option.  They enjoy war gaming because players contemplate resistance and wish to play out scenarios that bring about such results.  The exchange is peaceful so long as participants have an outlet.  But heaven forbid that places like Yattaquest didn’t exist.  These are not the games of our grandparents, these are the direct response to large-scale statism, and the minds drawn to them are not compliant.

I’ve bought cars, homes, taken exotic vacations and raised families.  I’ve been successful, won many real battles and have enjoyed my life immensely in many capacities.  But let me just state that when I purchased the HWK-290 for $14.95 a chill of delight went up my spine that I can’t get from anything else in this world…………….and the reason is beyond the comprehension of the average statist politician.  Only people who play such games understand.

Rich Hoffman

 www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

Give yourself the gift of ADVENTURE.  CLICK HERE!  

“We Are Lakota” Campaign Exploits Children: Parents demand tax increases to shrug their responsiblity

Taylor Mirfendereski from Channel 9 in Cincinnati did a nice article about the upcoming Lakota Levy of 2013 as the new campaign launched.  She interviewed members of both sides of the tax increase argument which is highlighted below.  Lakota’s new campaign this time is the marketing slogan “We are Lakota” and the angle they are playing is obvious, the inclusion of “community” spirit to encourage voters to feel they are part of the team by voting for the levy.  Again the common mistake the pro levy crowd makes is they only react to the causes of tax increases.  They never ask why conditions are the way they are, they simply respond with a desire to raise taxes.  One of the carrots Lakota has dangled out in front of parents is the promise of more busing to earn votes back from people like the women mention below.

Kim Reber is a mother of three daughters and is a levy supporter. Reber lives within two miles of the school district and has to transport her children to school each day.

She said the success of the levy is critical for convenience reasons and for the success of her children’s education.

“A lot of things that kids need to develop and to grow are being taken away gradually and kind of falling apart. Lakota is known for being excellent and without funding, they cannot maintain that excellence,” Reber said.

She said the stakes are so high for her family, she’s even considered moving if the levy doesn’t pass.

“When I came here, I came here because of the schools. I’m not seeing that the schools can maintain their excellence given the lack of support from the residents,” said Reber.

Some residents say they will never support a Lakota school tax hike because they don’t think enough money is going directly to the students.

Graeme George, an 80-year-old Liberty Township resident, is a staunch opponent of school tax levies.

“We can’t influence the cost and benefits and make improvements because the unions are too much in control. We can’t work with the teachers and the school board and the public because the unions come in,” he said.

George is a member of the anti-levy group, No Lakota, which says it has plans to actively campaign for the levy’s failure once more.

Bob Hutsenpillar, a Lakota district resident and No Lakota member, said he will also vote against the levy because of  “wasteful spending” towards teacher salaries.

“What they are asking for to give to students is a very small percentage of the levy,” Hutsenpillar said.

But Willms said taxpayer contributions to teaching salaries are essential for the successful operation of any school.

“We have 900-plus teachers. You have to understand what schools do. They have teachers who teach kids. It’s a service industry, so of course a bulk of your budget would have to go towards your employee,” she said.

The actual article from Taylor Mirfendereski can be seen at the link below complete with pictures:

http://www.wcpo.com/news/education/lakota-school-district-pushes-for-levy-after-three-time-failure

What Willms misses in her statement from above is the salary level amount, not just the wages.  Most teachers are not worth $60,000 a year.  They may be worth $45K per year, or even $50K, but they are not worth an average salary north of $63K per year, which is what the teachers at Lakota average through their collective bargaining agreement.  When 900-plus teachers make over 60K per year it wrecks the budget at Lakota, from a tax rate that is already 33 mills.

People like Kim Reber moved to a nice community like Lakota for the schools, but that is not all the community has to offer.  Reber doesn’t ask the question “why are the teachers making over $60K per year, she simply wants a free education for her children and assumes that the cost of her home was all the payment she had to contribute to the task.  Parents like her assume that “WE” means everyone, that I, Graeme George, Bob Hutsenpillar and other NO voters are responsible for raising Kim’s children.  This is the same mindset of Hillary Clinton’s ridiculous notion of “it takes a village” mentality.  No, it doesn’t.  It takes a mom and a dad caring for their own family, and not asking a community to cover higher taxes just to throw money at a teacher’s union that is already over paid. 

The Lakota Levy is supported by the kind of people who do not want to take responsibility for their own children—but rather want Hillary Clinton’s “We Are Lakota” type of message insinuating that we are all in this together—the raising of children.  The presumption that children are the only aspect of a community is dangerous, and will lead to short lived prosperity when those children grow up and move away never to return because taxes prevent them from moving back to Lakota to raise their own families.  The levy supporters at Lakota are again short-sighted, selfish, and lack fiscal understanding.  They are happy to parade around with signs on a Saturday afternoon pulling on people’s heart strings hoping to win votes by exploiting their own children so to take the responsibility away from their own parenting, instead of asking the hard question of……………why.

The teachers at Lakota make too much money for doing too little, and that is the reason for a levy request, and the reason behind the extorted children. Parents looking for freebies, and radicalism exhibited by a school that wishes to make itself the center of a community that has a lot more going for it than just football games on Friday night are the type of people supporting higher taxes through a levy vote.  The Lakota Levy of 2013 is all about selfishness on the part of the school and its employees, and the amount of deceit and scandal they are willing to exploit in order to get their way. 

The lowest part of the whole ordeal is seeing parents stick their children out in public carrying signs such as can be seen in Mirfendereski’s article.  The parents should be ashamed of themselves.  I can’t imagine telling a child they are required to stand with a pro tax sign to cover for the lack of effort by the parents who are hoping to save the cost of transporting their children to school, or even the extra cost of private instruction, with a collective tax increase.  If parents really want their children to have a good education, why aren’t they willing to pay for it?  Why do they expect the other property owners of Lakota to care for their children?  We are not Lakota.  They are, and they simply want a hand out for something that is their unmanaged problem to cover an effort they are too lazy, or cheap to handle themselves.

Rich Hoffman

 www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

Give yourself the gift of ADVENTURE.  CLICK HERE!  

Egalitarianism: Parasites seeking asylum from their own ineptness

Chances are dear reader you fall on the latter half of this upcoming statement as opposed to the former, that often there are those who are on the cutting edge, who fearlessly face down the impossible with a mentality that is obscure to all others, and there are those who wish to sit down with such people and share in the wealth of fiscal opportunity they have created with sheer uniqueness.  People who believe in consensus building and shared ideas are those trained in the false ways of egalitarianism.  Most every education system in the world teaches this forged method of human achievement because it masks a grim reality—that it is the very few who have the courage to face down the unknown, the perilous opportunities of uncharted waters, but the many wish to take credit for the voyage once safety is realized and strategy is achieved.

I have sat through many dozens of human endeavor where I solitarily cut through the dangers of a task only to have a parade of parasites join me at the finish line wanting to pop corks and celebrate in a victory with the chant of “teamwork.”  I laugh inwardly at such people knowing that at any moment I could repeat the task over and over again forever—but they could not, and they know it.  They hope that I don’t know it, or that nobody else discovers it, but they do—and it terrifies them.  So they promote the social activity that was taught to them during their educations—egalitarianism.

Egalitarianism (from French égal, meaning “equal”)—or, rarely, equalitarianism[1][2]—is a trend of thought that favors equality for particular categories of, or for all, living entities. Egalitarian doctrines maintain that all humans are equal in fundamental worth or social status, according to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.[3] The Cultural theory of risk holds egalitarianism as defined by (1) a negative attitude towards rules and principles, and (2) a positive attitude towards group decision-making, with fatalism termed as its opposite.[4] According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, the term has two distinct definitions in modern English.[5] It is defined either as a political doctrine that all people should be treated as equals and have the same political, economic, social, and civil rights[6] or as a social philosophy advocating the removal of economic inequalities among people or the decentralisation of power. Some sources define egalitarianism as the point of view that equality reflects the natural state of humanity.[7][8][9]

 

At a cultural level, egalitarian theories have developed in sophistication and acceptance during the past two hundred years. Among the notable broadly egalitarian philosophies aresocialism, communism, anarchism, libertarianism, left-libertarianism, social liberalism and progressivism,[dubious – discuss] all of which propound economic, political, and legal egalitarianism. Several egalitarian ideas enjoy wide support among intellectuals and in the general populations of many countries. Whether any of these ideas have been significantly implemented in practice, however, remains a controversial question.

One argument is that liberalism provides democracy with the experience of civic reformism. Without it, democracy loses any tie—─argumentative or practical—─to a coherent design of public policy endeavoring to provide the resources for the realization of democratic citizenship. For instance, some argue that modern representative democracy is a realization of political egalitarianism, while in reality, most political power still resides in the hands of a ruling class, rather than in the hands of the people.[13]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egalitarianism

Egalitarianism allows a room full of businessmen to believe that they deserve a seat at the table when it is only one or two at the table who gave them all something to talk about.  Without the initiative of the self-motivated, nothing happens.  In politics, board meetings and town hall gatherings allow democracy to claim the rewards of the very few who created the options discussed such as whether or not a new store could be built into a community, or how to spend the tax money taken from property owners.  The money and business opportunities were created by the very few, but is spent and consumed by the many who wish to see themselves as equal contributors to the process through egalitarianism.  But they are not equal, they are simply parasites—they depend on the actions of others to sustain themselves.

In the case of today’s egalitarian trend, for over two hundred years Europe’s altruist, collectivist intellectuals claimed to be the voice of the people—the champions of the downtrodden, the disinherited masses.  They advocated unlimited majority rule—rule by consensus.  But their error was that they failed to pay heed to those who created their opportunities. Without those types—the creators–the “champions of the people” would have nothing to discuss or distribute to the masses.  Capitalism and its moral—metaphysical bases had to be destroyed by the egalitarians so that the evidence of this parasitic enterprise indulged in by the could be realized.  The concept of justice had to be destroyed so that value judgments could not be distributed to those who were ripped off—the creators of virtually everything—the forward thinking individualist whose mind and effort molded the world from their sheer imaginations.

In the end, it was Payton Manning who won the game for Denver and the loss of Ray Lewis sealed it for Baltimore.  Everyone else playing the game were egalitarians.  The Broncos “team” simply rode the coattails of Payton Manning.  Without him, they would only be “average.”    

Every time I encounter these egalitarians it sickens me to my very core.  I offset my disgust by withdrawing from them for long periods of time, and I always return to the act of creation not for them, but for me.  I create because I enjoy it.  But the process of the egalitarians never ceases to disgust me in the way that maggots on a rotting corpse might sicken the stomach.  Egalitarians are simply vile to the creative process, and they bring nothing to the table.  Consensus building exercises do not work, it has never worked, and it will never work under any conditions.  There are always only two types, there are people with ideas, then there are people who seek to loot portions of other people’s ideas to fill voids in their own lives.  Value is not created through equalitarianism.  It is simply another form of wealth redistribution, the value of those who create given to those who do not by democracy.

Rich Hoffman

 www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

Give yourself the gift of ADVENTURE.  CLICK HERE!  

Why Some Republicans and Democrats Want War in Syria: Protecting the United Nations with American money

Many pundits and social commentators seem baffled as to why some Republicans share with Democrats a desire for war in Syria while others share in common a desire to stay out of such an action.  It is mysterious to them that a supposed anti-war, pro peace politician like Barack Obama would support a war effort of any kind, while political “extremists” such as Sarah Palin does not.  The reason is not because one political party represents elephants while the other represents donkeys, but because they are both social progressives as the others are not, or are trying to distance themselves from such political parasites.

Progressives believe in global unity, and individual sacrifice for the greater good as defined by them.  They wish to think of the world as a giant global village and they are the chieftains.  If some terrible thing happens in Syria, then it is the job of the “international community” to do something about it once the United Nations is made aware of an evil.  In the case of Syria the crimes against the Syrian people has been known for a long time, but it was only once the United Nations inspectors supposedly saw footage, and were granted into the country to inspect conditions for themselves that progressive politicians decided that the time for action was now, rather than at any other point in time, past or future.

Progressives are not attempting to do justice to the poor people killed under a tyrannical regime.  They are simply attempting to preserve the authority of The United Nations as a world police force.  The war drums in Syria by otherwise antiwar politicians are the obvious result of these progressive types. If it was ever wondered what politicians are progressive and which actually hold the type of beliefs established under their respective political parties it has never been more obvious, or hypocritical as to whom are progressives than those who support the Syrian War.

Progressives are vile, despicable people who are destructive intellectual collectivists.  What they are fighting for is not justice in Syria for the benefit of free people.   They simply fight to preserve the reputation of the United Nations.  In the context of the global community, it is the United States that is known as the official police force in that global community—and other countries who have elected to stay out of Syrian engagement wish to see the police do their job on behalf of the United Nations, while maintaining their own disengagement from conflict due simply to the financial cost.

It is not such a mystery once this basic fact is known, who is what and why they believe the things they do.  Progressives want war because it further advances their desire for global rule under a gigantic social village where the values of The United States are erased so that the values of lower quality countries can be elevated.  Eventually all progressives hope the values of all people will be equal under the leadership of the village chieftains, the progressives. Under those terms, things are not so mysterious.  Progressives are not for American preservation, they are about advancement of United Nations influence, and the war in Syria allowing them to achieve two of their goals, to destroy the reputation of America as an independent sovereign nation, and strengthen the influence of The United Nations as a global police force.  But the war is not about preserving American independence, or fighting for freedom across the world.  That is the distinct and sorrowful difference.  The supporters of the Syrian War are united in their goal of progressive politics and that makes them dangerous to every American who supports the Constitution of The United States of America.  Progressives desire to use the resources of America to destroy it while moving all the countries of the world toward a global village ruled by a Constitution not yet written, by a society of people the progressives hope to mold from their own cloth.  It is not the Founding Fathers of America that these people hope to emulate.  They hope to become their own type of “Founding Father” in a society not yet known built on political views of the dangerous progressive, and their wholesale desire to destroy individuality at all cost.

Rich Hoffman

 www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

Give yourself the gift of ADVENTURE.  CLICK HERE!  

Vote Justin Binik-Thomas for Deer Park School Board: The right person for the right reasons

For those who need to be reminded, Justin Binik-Thomas is an author, one of the founders of the Cincinnati Tea Party, and was at the heart of the IRS scandal personally targeted because of his conservative beliefs.  He is also a fan of my novel Tail of the Dragon and is a recent conqueror of that treacherous road in the mountains of the North Carolina/Tennessee, which is evident by the picture on his web site: http://www.binikthomas.com.  He is a frequent guest on Greta Van Susteren’s Fox News broadcast and does several radio spots a year with my friends Matt Clark and Doc Thompson.  He is also a personal friend of mine.  So it gives me great pleasure to announce that Justin is running for the Deer Park School Board.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Committee to Elect Binik-Thomas Contact

Justin Binik-Thomas
Candidate for Deer Park School Board

candidate@binikthomas.com

(513) 402-2727

Binik-Thomas Responds to Deer Park School Levy Request

Deer Park, OH, September 4, 2013– The budget shortfall remains one of the largest district concerns.  I have had the opportunity to review the coffee session materials and the five-year budget with senior district leadership.  I have come to the conclusion that the levy is premature.

As a taxpayer, I expect budget lines that do not impact services or people should be reduced or removed prior to a request for new funds.  The five-year budget includes quite a few areas where this has not yet occurred.  Among these are a postal meter, awards, and a line labeled “other.”

The coffee session materials provided attendees with a false choice of ‘tax me a bit more now’ or ‘tax me a lot more later.’  Predictably, the attendees selected the lower tax number.  District mailers tout this “choice.”

The proposed levy will tax us forever in order to plug a potential four-year gap.

Next Steps

Regardless of the outcome of this levy, we need to engage in long-term revenue planning to ensure we can cover unfunded mandates, educational needs, and emergencies without continually asking for taxpayer bailouts or levies.

We have two success stories in town to use as a model:  my alma maters, Walnut Hills High School and the University of Cincinnati.  Each has provided ways to grow funding, using many under-$20 donors, to achieve their goals.

We can further mitigate this risk by limiting our dependence on taxpayer (federal) funds.

About Justin Binik-Thomas

http://www.binikthomas.com

Justin is married to Casey and the proud father of two preschool children (aged 1 and 3).  He is a nine-year resident of Deer Park and graduate of Indiana Wesleyan University (MS) and the University of Cincinnati (AA, BS).  In addition to working as a contract manager in the medical research industry, he specializes in media relations as owner/consultant of Conservative Media Group.

In his free time, he volunteers as a chaplain at his synagogue and leads the Sunshine Committee.  Justin has taught at religious school (grades 2, 3, and 7), currently teaches a social media course annually at a local university, and is responsible for training new employees at both businesses.

Even though I personally think public education is a complete waste of time, and am not the politician type as I don’t play well with others, I admire when local people who are very passionate about reform get involved in politics.  I would say to Justin that he is wasting his time with the Deer Park School Board; however, he wouldn’t be if all the school board members were like him.  It is entirely possible that public education would not be such a wreck as it is today if people like Justin were school board members in every district in America.

Unfortunately most school board members are big spenders who are in love with the government statist version of public education—filled with progressive politics and antagonistic toward American tradition.  That’s why they often run and win while conservatives build businesses, make money and throw money at progressives like a fisherman trying to escape blood thirsty piranhas by pouring blood in the water to take them off the scent.  Justin Binik-Thomas is not one of those types.  He is a star in his own right, an accomplished person who could care less whether or not he has a powerful nameplate on his desk in charge of millions of dollars.  If voters of Deer Park had to pick anyone in a ballot box during their entire lifetimes, it is unlikely they would run across a candidate as pure as Justin Binik-Thomas who simply wants to do the right thing for the right reasons at the absolute right time.

Vote for Justin Binik-Thomas for Deer Park School Board!overmanwarrior-team

 

CLICK HERE FOR MORE ON JUSTIN.

Rich Hoffman

 www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

Give yourself the gift of ADVENTURE.  CLICK HERE!  

Lakota Levy Cheerleaders Strike Again: Ignoring the facts to preserve a monopoly

After several years of levy fights in the Lakota school district I have heard the pro tax crowd call me personally every name known to the human mind in anger that I don’t yield to their social impositions.  In response to their diatribes I have come up with a lot of names of my own to call them, such as “levy addicts,” “Lakota Zombies,” “Latté sipping prostitutes,” and “Levy Cheerleaders.”  This last one reflects well most of the inner sanctum of school levy supports who treat the school superintendent as though she were a rock star for a musical group.  Many of these levy “cheerleaders” seem to have replaced their youthful days when they attended rock concerts and tossed their undergarments at a stage advertising themselves for backstage adventures, to becoming enema plugs for Superintendent Mantia at Lakota.  Their rambunctious social display of levy support is rather sickening and deserves that type of criticism.  It is what came to my mind upon their booth set up at Lakota football games advertising their levy scheme like nighttime employees of K-Street working a hustle.  

The local media this time around is being very careful, as they are afraid that someone is going to get physically hurt and they might be blamed for provoking the violence.  From their point of view I can see their concern.  Over the last three levy attempts at Lakota things have gotten incrementally worse each time, and after the third levy I had promised a “head for an eye” revenge for the Kroger survey taken against my name during the month of February 2011.  CLICK HERE FOR REVIEW.  However, I usually only respond to attacks, I don’t issue them, so as long as the pro levy crowd engages in civil debate they have little to worry about.  Where they need to worry is when they attempt extortion against known NO voters, vandalism, theft, and public reputation lynchings of characters that stand in their way.  But until then, debate is acceptable, and one of the levy supporters who has been there from day one is Pam Perrino.  Pam in the beginning started down the road of threats and intimidation against anyone who did not support a tax increase for her children attending Lakota schools.  When I went on 700 WLW to expose the real reason for the levy needs at Lakota, she threatened the radio station with boycotts.  LISTEN TO THAT BROADCAST HERE FOR REVIEW.  So she has been at this pro levy business for a number of years, and she is back at it with a Letter to the Editor in the newspaper, Today’s Pulse stating:

IT IS TIME TO SUPPORT LAKOTA LEVY

I am so grateful that the Lakota School District has finalized their plans for the levy funds.  It has been eight years since the last levy passed.  Lakota has experienced extremely harsh cuts over the past two years.  In fact, it is now operating on $20 million less than it just three years ago.

They just shared that our per pupil spending is less than it was in 2005, when the last levy passed.  While I want them to be fiscally responsible, I also don’t want it to go so far that it is compromising the great education we have been providing during the 20 years I have lived here.

Because of a change in how schools are measured, we will not be given an assessment by the state o Ohio this year.  We will not know exactly how these cuts have impacted Lakota’s performance.  We do know that some testing scores have gone down the reduction of class offerings at the high school and participation in sports throughout the district is significantly down.

So – we are starting to feel the negative impact from cuts we have experienced over the last two years.  I know that Lakota has spent the last two years reaching out to the community to find out what it wants in a school district.  After the board of education presentations, I feel they responded to this input and are meeting the needs of our students and also provide services that the community has identified as the most essential for student success.  It is time to support this levy to secure solid futures for our Lakota students.

Pam Perrino

Liberty Twp,

That to me was a reasonable levy cheerleading argument that deserves an answer, which I provided to the paper.  Even though Perrino in the past has been quite divisive in her participation of tax increase campaigns at the school, she brings up a lot of issues that need clarification.  So here is my response to Perrino’s letter which appeared in the paper.

Say No to the Lakota Levy

The assumption that there is a time to support a Lakota levy based on the years since one last passed is a poor measure of fiscal management.  Levy supporters at Lakota are starting their levy promotion efforts for the November election with the very weak argument that the best reason for a tax increase is that there hasn’t been one since 2005.  The postulation is that time is the measure of levy necessity, not market conditions.  Only a functioning monopoly could make such a claim.

Lakota does not need a levy; it is going through an approximate ten-year period of declining enrollment which will necessitate workforce reductions at Lakota do to the much smaller classroom sizes that will be needed.  The $20 million the school has had to cut over the last couple of years is due to this declining enrollment and is part of the painful process of fiscal management which should be expected.

The best way to keep costs down at Lakota is to keep money out of their hands with “NO” votes, and force the school to reduce their work force in conjunction with the declining enrollment which is a natural part of a mature community.  Under the pro levy argument they are saying that every couple of years forever Lakota will expect a tax increase no matter what the market conditions dictate.  The proposed tax increase in spite of claims for improved security and technology upgrades are simply going to cover payroll increases for raises issued under an upcoming 2014 labor contract.  Only an organization that is functioning as an antitrust would have the audacity to make such a claim which is all the reason that school levies should be defeated at Lakota for at least the next decade.

Rich Hoffman

Liberty Twp,

The trouble with these levy discussions is that all the information is subjective to the real problem that public schools are functioning monopolies.  Lakota is an antitrust by its nature, as all public schools are organized allowing them to make any claims of fiscal hardship they can imagine without having opposing facts generated through competition.  This allows schools like Lakota to claim hardship when forced to make budget reductions by the tax payers to reduce their per pupil expenses at the ballot box.  Voters in Lakota have had to take control of the administration’s spending by keeping money out of their hands which has forced them to make cuts they wouldn’t otherwise make—which has been on par with budget conditions.  CLICK HERE TO SEE THE FACTS ON THIS MATTER.  The claim of hardship by the school is due to the fact that they are the only game in town, and do not have another school to compete with who operates with lower per pupil costs, allowing them to claim imposition to gain public support for tax increases.

But to the levy cheerleaders, none of those facts matter.  They propose an infinite amount of tax impositions upon the community with the short-sighted intention of perpetual approval.  What they don’t understand is that when costs go up, businesses, and residents sell off their properties, and they move.  Lakota as a district in Butler County has benefited from having relatively low taxes, particularly with sales taxes, and this is the real reason for the spawn of real-estate growth.  It has little to do with Lakota schools.  Many parents would love to send their children to Lakota schools, but few can afford to live in the district which is the byproduct of being a successful community.  The natural impact on the school from that success is that there will be declining enrollment.  And that fact alone is enough to put out the fire that the levy cheerleaders are trying to advance by blowing on the flames of consumption for higher taxes.

Rich Hoffman

 www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

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