Tag: Free Will

The Collegiate Deception: A grim reality regarding the lies of higher education

The great fear that those who support the collegiate system of education most have is the revelation to their minds that all the money they spent and mental energy expended—that it was for nothing. Their fear—which is quite extensive and the root of much anxiety is the discovery by the world what they know themselves—that they were unable to purchase skill and prestige in society with a college degree—and that their path to success was paved with deception. There are many people who pursue degrees at colleges largely due to the marketing efforts of the last forty or so years by collegiate institutions and governments that education could be purchased by attendance—and on the back side of such endeavors good jobs and social respect awaited them. But that has not been the case. People who succeed in college do so because they tend to succeed in everything they do, and would in most cases succeed whether or not they ever attended a collegiate school at all. As for the rest—the masses—those most ardent supporters of higher education—and education in general—college has proven to be a scam that has not been able to buy respect from society in general just with the presence of a framed piece of paper.

College cannot make a poor mind into a good one. It cannot make a lazy person into a successful bastion of productivity. College cannot make the stupid into the smart—and this is in violation of the promise that has been made to those who have attended. The great crises of our day is when a highly educated bastion of collegiate endeavor sits down across the table with a person who is a truly hard worker, and has gained all their knowledge in life by doing, and applying skills directly to a task—that the collegiate supporter is out-witted in nearly every instance. The reason is that skill, and aptitude cannot be cheated with the purchase of an institutional endorsement. Experience cannot be bought with a yearly tuition and a life of ease not obtained by simply graduating college. This is what has been sold to America—and it was a lie.

It was a grand plan concocted by the same types of people who thought that communism was a good ideal in the 1930s, and to this day believe that global warming is caused by man, that equality in every human being is the highest form of endeavor, and that stylish diversity in hiring practices constitute quality. While those are noble features of an advanced civilization, the lack of understanding of what makes some people better than others and what truly drives innovation, productivity and ultimately national GDP the failures are self-evident. Rooted in the college system is the old socialism of lower case “communism” where all people are equal if given equal access to education. Like the atrocious experiment with public education called “Common Core” colleges have found that they must penalize the good so to prop up their bad and sell the whole package to the public through their sports programs to divert inquiring eyes away from the failures and ultimate castigation that will ensue once fault has nowhere else to go but to the perpetrator. That castigation is upon us due to the continued failure of the college system in America to do as it promised—but has instead delivered massive debt to families who spent money on the system and students heavily liberalized into a progressive mentally who are more dependent on government instead of less. The success that college graduates are finding is not the promise of a life of ease in the private sector unless they can secure a government job—because in private enterprise where nearly all innovation and productivity occurs—it is experience that counts most.

There is behind the collegiate system an old superstition that comes from the dawn of civilization—that kings were descendents of gods and that bloodlines deserved to be persevered.   Those who believe in modern college are most apt to be concerned over a company’s organizational chart so that they can see on a map of progression who is above them and who is below them. Particularly in males is the concern over what males are superior to them and which are inferior. Males are and have always been most concerned about their place in the peeking order of other males—and for the collegiate supporter is the fantasy that they can gain superiority over others by obtaining a magic fleece called a college degree, which gives them some advantage. So long as the world functions from that old falsehood of bloodlines, and that social ordainment can be obtained through organizational charts—then the illusion of merit can be sustained. The crisis comes when they come face to face with a man or woman forged from the pressures of endeavor and has succeeded legitimately. When paired off with such a person—the collegiate supporter is unarmed and easily destroyed in every category—and this is the real terror of their present condition.

Social position does not equate to a quality position and this is the tremendous difference between the capitalist system of The United States and every other country in the world—particularly Europe—which still endorses the ridiculous notion that blood and social position dictate who the movers and shakers are in the world. In America—traditionally the decision makers are those who prove most able through entrepreneurial endeavor—Walt Disney and Bill Gates come to mind. A quick glance through the most successful people in human history, CLICK HERE TO SEE WHO THEY ARE, will prove that success and college are not tied together. All that can be obtained through college which can sustain profitable lifestyles is the adhesion to the old mantra of the “power of pull” the ability to network and relate to others not based on merit—but on social order reflective of bloodlines and organizational charts.

Not all things learned in college are a waste of time. Often students enter the work force knowing how to give PowerPoint presentations and to conduct conference calls. They learn how to interact professionally with the outside world—but they do not learn to think with a mind toward quality. They think with a mind toward deception—which they learned through their institutional instruction. They don’t learn to solve problems, but how to mask them with dialogue that would make Saul Alinsky proud. The are so good at it they deceive themselves and continue to until they come face to face with someone who does not play by their rules and can easily sidestep their authority.

The best path to success is not to think that it can be purchased, but to live every day honestly and with a curiosity toward solving problems. Experience has been and will always be the sure ticket to a good life—and the more experience one obtains, the greater their success in life. If a person wants success, they should not let organization charts stop them from learning, or doing the correct things in life. Success will not be obtained allowing some scholastic peasant stuck in the old European ways to bottleneck innovation so to protect their status in the peeking order of corporate politics. The most terrifying thing in the world for such people is for a person they believe is beneath them to shut their office door and instruct them on how little they really know about the world around them and to destroy their perception of peaking order reality. Large displays of embarrassment are not needed—only the knowledge that there are people functioning that are beyond the reach of a chart of hierarchy which was supposed to protect them from the knowledge that they aren’t all that smart and that their purchased status did not magically make them into quality people—but buffoons on parade using excuses as masks for their incompetency.

College is not a ticket to success—but only a stepping stone. For those able, it is best to leap over the stepping-stones all together and proceed through life with bold action that leads to the most experience. But for those not so strong, and not so able, college can help obtain experience—but success cannot be purchased. Anyone who has said such things is lying and is either a proponent of communist beliefs, or a victim of them. The frame-work for our modern tendency toward collegiate autocracy is rooted in a time in American society where communism was entering a capitalist culture with a promise that anybody who paid the money could enter the gates of the able and productive. But that is not, and never has been the case. Still, the only way to real success is through experience and hard work. To truly obtain such things, they cannot be cheated. They simply must be acquired with adventure and curiosity followed by a strong desire to persevere.

Rich Hoffman

www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

 

Welcome To The Wasteland: I told you people……………..

I’m not surprised and neither should you dear reader. For around a decade now I’ve been warning about the world we’re living in. People have avoided direct knowledge of this crisis by removing the evidence—which has resulted in many firings from jobs, editorial censorship, and social castigation. They have also sought to inebriate themselves with intoxicants, or hide behind those mind altering substances with social orthodox. But they cannot hide from the terrible reality that under their watch—they have destroyed the world and the United States for the next generation out of their sheer stupidity, arrogance, and pretension. The impact of this debacle was covered on a recent O’Reilly Factor Talking Points Memo which released the most recent poll numbers from Americans who normally lean left. The situation is not good at all, and the people who have avoided knowing about the severity of this problem are to blame. You get the world you deserve—due to the contents of what you put into your minds. This is what you get.

In a lot of ways I’ve already moved on beyond this crisis. I know longer feel a need to report daily on the kind of issues warning like Paul Revere what threats are on the horizon. The threats are now here and people either used the knowledge or they are suffering as a result. But there is no debate as to the validity of my warnings—or those others out there who have spent considerable time trying to save fools from the plight of their own stupidity.

Sadly most of my articles most read on a daily basis are those I wrote years ago—as people are just now arriving at the conclusion that they need to learn more about those particular issues. While it is nice to see that they are interested, they are about 3 to 4 years too late now to avert the impact. It’s too late. It is as if a light suddenly came on and the masses turned off E Television, or the afternoon tabloids and realized that they screwed everything up and want to suddenly fix it—but can’t. It takes a long time to arrive at this point, and it requires so much apathy—and it’s simply too late. It will take generations to repair the damage now—the inevitable debacle of mismanagement is unavoidable.

My daily emphasis naturally will change from warnings to repair. There is no longer time to save who we can—it is now time to write off those who have failed, or will fail and concentrate on those who can fix things. So my tone and content will naturally change. I have to help those who can be helped. Just like I spent the last dozen years writing about how to avoid this current America, I will now put the needs of the world a dozen years out from now so that those people will have the tools to solve the riddles presented then. But there is no time for regret at the sense of loss in seeing the first generation of America leave the world less than it found it drifting out to sea lost to time and sympathy. They did it to themselves with sheer apathy and neglect.

On Adult Swim recently I watched the premier of Black Jesus—a comedy show about a modern Black Jesus who smokes pot and tries to save members of the “hood” with compassion. It was a ridiculously stupid show and was terrifying ignorant. But—it represents modern culture and there is no way the people those actors are portraying which have real life counterparts in urban areas—are equipped intellectually to deal with modern problems. After Black Jesus sat with a group of guys smoking dope I turned the show off and found on VH1 a show where a couple were swimming together naked, then showered next to the pool. It was a dating show, and the ritual of romance had been cheapened to such an extent that their public nudity wasn’t a big deal in the least. There was nothing taboo in the presentation—and that’s the problem. There is no way the couple presented will ever be equipped to solve any problems in their lives let alone their country. They represent a generation lost to sheer animal action between promiscuity and bodily pleasure. There is nothing intellectual about their life—so they have no capacity to solve intellectual problems—only physical ones. Out of 60+ channels on television at 11:00 PM there was really nothing on and society is feeding off that content. The by-product is the collapse of politics, philosophy, art, entertainment, economic power, and every endeavor of productive enterprise. Welcome to the wasteland of T.S. Eliot—a creation directly brought to America by Europe.

I warned you people………………….

People thought they could neglect the topics of the day and not pay attention to what was being written in the newspapers. They thought they could have government employees teach their children without impact, and adhere to ideals that are corrupt to logic. But they couldn’t. And now there is Hell to pay, and we have only seen the first payment. It will get much, much worse from here. The old school ways still function in the world to a small extent. In a few years, there will be no common sense left. Our society the world over will be filled with the kind of people who think that Black Jesus is a funny show, and have filled their minds with tripe from VH1 reality television shows—and lived nearly exclusively existences in social media.

My focus will change to the next decade, to the people who are not yet lost—to their hopes and ambition. Everyone else had their time and chance, and they blew it.

Rich Hoffman www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

 

Bullwhips For Self-Defense: The techniques of Anthony De Longis

One thing that is different from my view of bullwhip work and many of my friends who spend a lot of time working on technique with an emphasis on dance like choreography is that I find the whip most useful as a melee weapon in martial arts. In my novel The Symposium of Justice, the main character Cliffhanger uses bullwhips exclusively as his primary weapon to fight the forces of evil. Even when firearms and modern technology present options that might otherwise be considered more attractive—Cliffhanger uses two bullwhips to slice up and dominate his rivals with blistering effectiveness. My friend Gery Deer runs the only bullwhip instructional studio in the world, and his emphasis has always been non-combative instruction. So when the two of us get together we politely avoid the subject. Most bullwhip artists feel the same way that Gery does—and for good reason. There is a stigma that bullwhips are naturally violent weapons, so to promote the sport, they put emphasis on the non combative aspects of it. But, bullwhips by their nature are very violent, and are among the most flexible and versatile weapons ever created by a human being. And a guy who has made quite an extensive living teaching bullwhip combat techniques is Anthony De Longis.

Anthony has a long history with bullwhips and has done a good job of promoting them within Hollywood. Once while I was doing a short picture in Glendale, California which is Anthony’s hometown his name came up often by the stunt people and stunt coordinators. He is well-known within the Hollywood community as the go-to guy for bullwhips in film and he has worked with great passion to create interest in his spare time.

As a published writer, De Longis has contributed articles on the sword and the bullwhip to both martial arts and stage combat publications. These include articles on the Spanish Mysterious Circle, published in Fight Master, Inside Karate and Martial Arts Insider, and on sabre in Black Belt. Articles on the bullwhip have appeared in Inside Karate, Black Belt and Inside Stunts.

Off-camera, De Longis was Fight Director for the Los Angeles Music Center Opera from 1985 to 2003. He was Swordmaster / Stunt Coordinator for episodes 1-6 of The Queen Of Swords, and Swordmaster for Secondhand Lions.

He is also a professional stage movement and combat instructor, teaching in academic (UCLA Theatre Arts Dept. 1974-1993), small group and private settings seminars. He was inducted into the Black Belt Hall of Fame as 2008 Weapons Instructor of the Year and into the International Knife Throwers Hall of Fame in 2009,

http://www.delongis.com/Biography.html

He shares with many of the people I most associate with a love of these kinds of skills—these western arts–and his impact to the industry deserves respect. He and I share specifically a love for Terry Jacka made bullwhips from Australia as most of the rest of the industry leans toward Joe Strain. There are others, but those two names are among the highest in the business. Samples of both their work can be found at Western Stage Props. However, both whip makers can be found at their individual sites.

http://www.westernstageprops.com/

But when it comes to combat and the bullwhip, I can think of no better weapon in the world to deal with an armed thug in melee combat. There isn’t a martial artist that I’ve met, or a weapon used in those arts which surpasses the ability of a bullwhip. They can be coiled up for easy transportation and stuffed into a bag for concealment, but can become a projector of danger as lethal as knives from a safe distance of 8’ to 10’. They can disarm a foe, or tie up their feet if they are trying to run away from a treacherous act, or bullwhips can choke an assailant to within inches of their life with the leverage needed to cut off the oxygen and blood to their brain with much more effectiveness than bare hands even among the strongest man.

Years ago I sold cars and spent a lot of time on the car lot waiting for customers to visit so I could sell them something. To kill time, I often practiced with my bullwhip in the back lot, which attracted the attention of the various lot techs and mechanics. On one particular occasion a couple of strong guys who thought they were particularly tough wanted to spar with me, their knives and baseball bats from the trunk of their car against my whip. Three of them against me and my bullwhip. It wasn’t even close. I was able to get the 12’ whip around me so quick that they couldn’t attack without getting hit. When they tried to come all at the same time I was easily able to go after the head of one of them to break their line and step out behind it keeping them from trapping me. If they elected to take the hit, it would have hurt them catastrophically—which was the intention because we were playing that kind of game. One of them finally got smart and stepped on the end my whip as it was so long, it took a lot longer to move around than some of the smaller 6’ whips. Once he had the end of the whip trapped, he thought he and his friends had me defenseless. But what they didn’t know was that I could then close ranks and wrap the whip around their necks and use the handle as a club—very similar to a blackjack.

My grandfather used to carry a police style blackjack in his pocket and considered this adequate to knock away most foes he met around town in times of crises. I used it a few times, but retired it quickly realizing that it was best to get distance away from your opponents as opposed to being close enough to use a small club. I replaced the blackjack with a bullwhip and have never since stopped. If an opponent has control of the end of the whip it essentially takes their hands out of the fight. This gives the bullwhip wielder the advantage in a conflict because they can then use the handle as a club against an unarmed victim.

My use of bullwhips has always been combat related as opposed to showmanship. Recently a reader of my daughter’s website wondered why I had a bullwhip with me on our trip to the Ghost Ship of Cincinnati. Well, there were reports that some of the locals might be hostile and often take shots at people who visit the Ghost Ship. That turned out not to be the case—the people I met were quite nice—but you never know when you might run across some drug dealer’s marijuana patch, or someone burying a body deep in the woods—and in times like that you don’t want to be unarmed. So I bring my bullwhip as I always have. When people think of such things, they think of Indiana Jones—but the truth of the matter is, Indiana Jones is a practical adventurer—he knew how to dress for occasions and what to bring. Ironically, my daughter and I used my bullwhip to climb up the side of the ship. Of course I didn’t use one of my Jacka whips for that task—I used one of my long rawhide whips which are very tough. With those whips you can swing across things and climb trees—or disassemble someone who means to do you harm.

I could tell many stories about bullwhips, and when it comes to combat work with bullwhips, Anthony De Longis is the current spokesman at the entertainment level. What he has been preaching is real, and really just begins to touch on the possibilities. But those possibilities are infinitely exciting when it comes to weapons and their effectiveness.  In my opinion learning any other skill for any other weapon is pointless and a waste of time. There is nothing that I’d choose to use for self-defense than a bullwhip and that includes a firearm. Most firearms are shot at a close range and often miss their mark the first time—just because of the implication of what it means to shoot another person—death—long jail times, that kind of thing. The bullwhip will put an end to such threats within 1.5 seconds which is often the time it takes to decide to pull a trigger. The legal impact to such a self-defense measure is far less, and much more beneficial to staying out of court in the aftermath. Anybody who has been thinking of learning such a skill might want to visit Anthony out at his ranch to learn a thing or two about combat bullwhip techniques. That skill will likely save the life of you and those who mean you harm with the most effective way to remove threats under circumstances of coercion.   His site can be reached by the link above.

Rich Hoffman

www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

 

The Great Loop Rawlins: Doing for a living what’s driven by passion

I remember well when a bunch of us as young men—Gery Deer, Chris Camp, and of course myself were watching the work of Mark Allen and Alex Green out in Las Vegas and trying to improve on the western arts that they were putting on for America.  And we became faster, more accurate and more exciting as a result.  Gery Deer and Chris Camp have in fact really elevated the western arts act to new levels throughout the last two decades and I have done some work in Hollywood and literature that we all hoped would ignite the next generation.  And while we are far from done, the seeds of all that hard work are finally paying off.  Last year I spoke about the “Rise of Adam Winrich” who came out of the Ohio WWAC class of 2005, CLICK HERE TO REVIEW, and even as the national WWAC (Wild West Arts Club) ran by Mark Allen which I was a member of for many years finally died out in the late 2000s, it looks like the legacy is living on in the young man named Loop Rawlins.  Loop is just a few years older than my oldest son-in-law and is of around the same age as Adam—and like those vigorous, hungry youth who want to surpass the efforts of their elders—in this case—us, Loop has taken the various western arts, gun spinning, whip work, and particularly the lasso and really moved them to a new level as a recent member of America’s Got Talent during the month of July 2014.

Loop did a fabulous job on America’s Got Talent and even though he is very good with bullwhips, he chose to do an act with the lasso.  His musical selection was wonderful and his on stage presence was energetic proving that there is quite a dramatic hunger for this art form that is uniquely American.  Gery has appeared on that show and so has Chris, but Loop has taken the energy to a new level.  Loop had in fact met at an early age many of the same people I call friends, he was at the 2002 Wild West Arts Convention conducted by Mark Allen and it is there that he won five international awards as a young burgeoning talent.  He has since worked for Cirque Du Soleil and shot some commercials for McDonald’s, MTV and an award-winning Western film.

For people who still look at western arts performers and wonder why they do it, there is a purity to them that simply isn’t found anywhere else in any other professional venue.  Loop represents the best of what America has to offer the world and it is for people like him that programs like America’s Got Talent are designed.  It should be noticed that many of the young men performing regularly in Wild West Arts today have beautiful young women on their arms—particularly Adam and Loop.  They are today’s “rock stars.”  When I was their age, heavy metal band members attracted the type of women that are now flocking to see Adam and Loop perform.  But what’s different about these young Wild West Performers is that they are straight-laced and dedicated.  With the same energy they put into the thousands of hours of practice it takes to become good at these art forms, they are able to maintain long-standing relationships with attractive women.

For women with limited options these days, where 9 ½ out of 10 men in the world from the ages 16 to 60 are just absolute douches—low ambition slugs who struggle to wake up every morning with a positive thought—they know that people like Loop Rawlins is a wonderful catch.  Even with all his success so far, it is hard to make a living with the Western Arts—it is hard to do what you love to do, because there aren’t many people willing to pay for it.  The reason is that there just aren’t very many people in show business who know how to write about the Western Arts in an exciting way that modern audiences find attractive.  In many ways, I have dedicated my efforts at resolving that end of the business—by writing content that producers might want to hire people like Loop and Adam for.  My friend Gery Deer was brought in as a whip consultant for the movie The Rundown.  His whip holstering system worked great, and we still use them to this day primarily because of his experience working on films like that.  But the amount of motion pictures produced that calls for those skills is just dismal.  Television is even worse—ironically.  As I’ve reported, this is largely due to the perseverance of progressive politics which has entered show business.  One of the founders of the Wild West Arts Club, Alex Green appeared in thousands of television shows and movies because in his day, Hollywood produced them and needed a Western Arts performer.  These days, Anthony DeLongis is the only whip coach in Hollywood—primarily—because there just isn’t enough production going on to justify more.  But in spite of the cool reception among popular culture, the new rebellion for attractive young women hoping to land a real man who thinks, loves, and lives life with traditional passion—Western Arts performers are their ticket to a good husband—feminism has left most women with few options that their biological clocks can be set by—and for them, they know Loop is the catch of a century.

When my own son-in-law was young and was attending the Ohio WWAC conventions, he had the ambition to do all the things that Loop is doing now.  He wanted to learn roping, knife throwing, gun spinning, but he managed to get pretty good with a bullwhip.  He even managed to win for several years the bullwhip fast draw.  But he had to make a living and it is hard to get really good at what you love and still make a living that doesn’t involve that passion. I’ve managed in unique ways.  I wear my whip holster with me everywhere I go, the one that Gery made for me after his experiences at The Rundown set—to remind me of what’s important.  Everyone who deals with me knows about my real passion and it’s not unusual for me to pull my whips out in a parking lot of an expensive restaurant dressed in a suit and tie and crack targets out of the mouth of the curious.  Like Loop, I have a family and the choices I made during my child raising years was to not take the hard life of a performer and enter business so I could make the kind of money needed to care for them.  Recently I was with Chris Camp as he was unloading his “show” from the back of his van. Chris Camp is one of the best Western Acts around—he is the current high mark—but even after all his years and passion, he works hard to make ends meet.  It’s not easy to say the least and he has traveled all over the world to do shows—much the way Loop is currently.  Chris’s van likely has over 200,000 miles on it and it’s hardly new.  But he approaches every show with enthusiasm and love no matter if the audience is several thousand to just twenty-five.  When Loop said at the beginning of his America’s Got Talent presentation that he wanted to make a living for his family doing what he loved, it hit even Howard Stern hard—because like anybody who has been around knows—that is the real trick.  The real dream we all have in life is to do what we love—not just work to make money.  It is best to have those values aligned.

So it was nice to see Loop pushing the limits of those set before him and taking Western Arts to new levels.  I wish America was filled with millions of young men just like Loop, and if I have it my way, they will be.  The best thing that could happen in America is that the ratio of good men might evolve from 9 ½ out of 10 bad ones to something like 6 out of 10.  Women who want good husbands deserve that opportunity if they want it, and right now—even those that want it can’t have one–because they don’t exist.    But Loop is one of the good ones and it is good to see that he is pushing to break through barriers which are quite thick, and that he is determined, hopeful, and resolute to keep trying, to keep practicing, and to find that secret treasure in life defined by aligning what we do as a living with our passions.  Loop’s energy at America’s Got Talent is derived from that hope and the promise that people might see the need for his art in the quest we all share toward creating a productive society built by values rooted in American culture.

Rich Hoffman

www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

 

A “Kick-Ass” Satire of Rich Hoffman: Living authentically–against the current.

I have a lot of readers and obviously the kids who made the video below were satirically bringing their perspective to my content and life as viewed from their California neighborhood culture.  Their comedy skit against bullwhip superheroes also looks to be shaped by the movie Kick-Ass 2 which wasn’t nearly as good as the first one—but did make some good points.  My novel The Symposium of Justice was a work of philosophy written at a fairly young age molded after my personal experiences with politics and bullwhips during the 1990s.  In those years I was in my twenties and knew what I thought about things, but couldn’t yet understand why just because there wasn’t enough contextual information.  About a year ago I wrote an article titled Taking the Mask off Once Again, (CLICK HERE TO REVIEW,) which put a kind of end cap on that period from my twenties to current—which essentially came to a similar conclusion as the ending of Kick-Ass 2—superhereos aren’t needed on movie screens and behind crazy costumes and masks as much as they are in real life.  Fictional characters are fun for telling stories but the world is in desperate need of real life people who are willing to do heroic things without a mask of any kind—whether the mask is literature, an entertainment personality, or a literal costumed avenger.

From the culture of young people taught to not have any values or a code of ethics I’m sure a lot of the things I do seem to them the way they were presented in that video—they cited a Midwestern lifestyle, a grandfather’s bullwhip, and the desire to save America by using it in their plot.  They are products of public school peer pressure shaped by the politics of our day—which is crumbling in virtually every social category.  Of course they hold the belief that America doesn’t need a bullwhip wielding superhero from the Midwest—because they don’t yet see the crises before them.

After I wrote The Symposium of Justice I didn’t feel comfortable performing the normal role of author.  Scholarly pursuits centered on philosophy were a pretty new concept for me and wasn’t exactly the direction I thought my life should go.  I was used to performing actual physical feats, and doing things that were actually very dangerous.  So it felt strange to write about things as opposed to doing things.  In my neighborhood—bad things were happening—and the lag period between books was just too great to solve problems in real-time.  When presented with those kinds of problems a person should use every skill they have to solve problems.  The results often mean the revelation at the ending of Kick-Ass 2—that the world needs real people to do extraordinary things and to do it without the concealment of a mask.

As an author of a couple of books now and using this blog site to tackle problems in real-time instead of the long publication periods it takes to move a novel through the normal process of going to print most of what I have written can be confirmed by some real life experience.  I have never been satisfied telling stories or providing content without experience lending perspective to my work.  And to get experience you have to do things—as a person.  Watching that satirical video I can’t help but feel sorry for those kids—like most young people they are finishing a long career of public school education shaped by a statist government and they believe they have the tools of assessment needed to enter the world.  But they don’t—instead they will travel through the normal cycle that most people go through, they will start their lives voting for people like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton (if they vote at all).  They will then support all the liberal causes, “Global Warming,” economic socialism, gay rights over traditional marriage, and collective value over individual merit.  By the time they hit their late 20s and early 30s they’ll discover that to have children of their own—they’ll become more conservative.  At that time they will often support a presidential candidate like Mitt Romney (soft Republican), they’ll start becoming frustrated with larger government once they see their taxes increase once they purchase a home, and they’ll start thinking like a Republican after cutting grass in their own yards each week.  They’ll spend their lives trying to make their bosses happy, will stare at their high school senior yearbooks wondering where all their friends went and will discover that they now have resentful teenagers who do not show respect for them during their 40s and 50s.  The kids of course will be angry at their parents for not providing a good role model as their parents will spend most of their lives as social boot-lickers instead of admirable parents, and homeowners.  During their late fifties their children will reconcile with them as those young people then realize that their liberal educations and salty outlook on life has not prepared them for the needs of their individual lives—and the parent and child will likely sit in a restaurant embracing each other on how mysterious life is and how screwed up their preparation for it was.  In their 60s the parent will likely then become a real conservative who will want to see the world they are leaving behind restored in some fashion to what it was when they were children because they see how detrimental everything has become during their lifespan—and they will at that point regret it—hoping to improve that life while they still live.  During their 70s and 80s those parents will find themselves abandoned by their children, overlooked by their grandchildren, and completely despondent to their great-grandchildren.  They’ll watch in frustration as the world of politics spirals out of control in spite of all their efforts and the last days of their lives will shrivel away into oblivion.  Not long after, nobody will visit their grave sites and history will forget them.

That cycle is a standard one for anybody who follows the shaped life of a statist government where the service and attention of that entity takes precedence over individuality.  There is no other ending for most of the people in our society—who follow that path.  My hope has been to maybe change the lives of a few so that such a miserable existence could be avoided and I use the skills I have in all their capacity to perform that task.  The kids who made that video have no other path in their life but the one described above they will live it nearly word for word and there is nothing I or anybody else can do to help them.  They are simply too far gone.  Even in comedy, much about reality is revealed.  Nothing is just a joke—everything has a cost associated with it—and you can’t cheat life without cheating yourself in some fashion.

Recently I told a bit of the story of the movie Bronco Billy by Clint Eastwood and for me, it taught me early on that people only get one chance to live their unique life the way they see fit.  That choice may run counter to the culture of society—but the goal is to be authentic to your individuality—and to not yield to the social pressure of conformity.  I made my choice long ago to live an authentically personal life in spite of the social pressures to serve a bind system led by sightless bureaucrats.  I have lent my support to many causes of the day in real life, a spokesman against taxes, Tea Party groups, talk radio, business,   and countless other endeavors—but I have never stopped being who I uniquely am even as those movements have ebbed and flowed.  And it always comes back around to the term “Justice Comes from the Crack of a Whip” from The Symposium of Justice.  In that novel the justice that most of us seek does not come from the laws of politicians, it comes from our own personal authenticity and those destinations can only be found by living life honestly even when the currents of civilization seem opposed to the task.  To be the last living things left on a receding beach, you have to stand against the current because then and only then—will you discover what was always hidden from view.  I communicated what I saw in my novel but felt I needed to dig deeper and to do that—it required real physical action instead of just observation to discover the concealment that holds many of life’s real answers.   And a tool for getting at those answers can be obtained with a bullwhip if you know how to use them.  A mask isn’t required.

Even though those kids thought they were making a satire of Kick-Ass at my expense, they obviously missed the point of the movie.  But that doesn’t surprise me.  It won’t hit them for another 25 years but eventually they will look at how they saw the world now and regret it.  They’ll also learn that they were woefully wrong—America does need such a hero and that even though they changed the title to avoid direct slander “The Crack of Justice” the proper way to always frame the situation is that “JUSTICE COMES WITH THE CRACK OF A WHIP”—because it does.

Rich Hoffman www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

 

Bernie Sanders the Socialist: A strategic plan involving immigration, economics, and the Vikings

Because of his work over the Veterans Affairs scandal and trying to rectify the errors of management directly on the doorstep of Washington politics, Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont has been receiving a lot of press—even being featured on the O’Reilly Factor.  Noticeably he is listed as one of the rare “Independents” in the Senate as he doesn’t recognize himself as neither a Republican nor a Democrat.  Many who do not know the real story might think that Sanders is an Independent in the way that a Tea Party candidate might be—but they would be woefully mistaken.  Instead, Sanders is the exact opposite, he is so radically to the left that he doesn’t even call himself a Democrat, or a Progressive to hide his real intentions.  Instead, he is a devoted Socialist, but lists his party affiliation as an “I” instead of an “S.”  His interest in the VA issue is one to defend the role that government can play in managing social needs—to protect the brand of socialism he supports most, Scandinavian socialism—which unknown to most of America—is all the rage in the Beltway of Washington.

Scandinavian socialism is a mix of high taxes to support cradle to grave welfare mixed with lower regulations against business to churn growth.  These types of socialists have learned that to generate tax money for government to loot off of, they must have businesses that can generate things to tax.  So they lowered barriers for businesses to start so that they could tax them to support their welfare state.  Their primary focus is to eliminate the gap between the “rich and the poor” so to provide an equalitarian society under the managed care of government.  But what Sanders and his fellow socialists in the Democratic Party and Progressive caucuses refuse to learn is that the success of such societies are far from being equalitarian, but have more to do with their Viking past and low immigrant population—which will be explored at the end of this article.  But first let us learn more about Bernie Sanders and the tremendous push from the progressive invasion that is intent on insurgency in the United States starting in such bastions of liberalism like Vermont, Massachusetts, and New York. The following information is from none other than the New York Times in 2007.  After the election of Sanders they were very happy and produced a very long and glowing story on Sanders as they felt their kind of candidate had just been elected into the Senate—an open and honest Socialist who refused to run from the designation—unlike Chuck Schumer and at the time Barney Frank.

Sanders has always been an easier fit in Vermont than in Washington. Being a Socialist in the seat of two-party orthodoxy will do that. While he has generally championed liberal Democratic positions over the years — and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee endorsed his Senate campaign — Sanders has strenuously resisted calling himself a Democrat. And he has clung to a mantle — socialism — that brings considerable stigma, in large part for its association with authoritarian communist regimes (which Sanders is quick to disavow).

But he does little to airbrush the red “S” from his political profile. On the wall of his Congressional office hangs a portrait of Eugene V. Debs, the Socialist Party presidential candidate of the early 20th century. A poster in a conference room marks Burlington’s sister-city relationship with Puerto Cabeza, Nicaragua — one of a few such alliances he forged with cities in Marxist states during his 10-year stint as mayor of Vermont’s biggest city in the 1980s.

Socialism brings Sanders instant novelty in Washington and, in many circles, instant dismissal as a freak. But Sanders’s outcast status in Washington probably owes as much to his jackhammer style as to any stubborn ideology. It is a town filled with student body president types — and Sanders, for his part, finished a distant third when he ran to be president of his class at James Madison High School in Brooklyn.

“I’m not afraid of being called a troublemaker,” Sanders says, something he’s been called many times, in many different ways, many of them unprintable. “But you have to be smart. And being smart means not creating needless enemies for yourself.”

In this regard, Sanders has not always been smart, especially when he was first elected to the House in 1990. He called Congress “impotent” and dismissed the two major parties as indistinguishable tools of the wealthy. He said it wouldn’t bother him if 80 percent of his colleagues lost re-election — not the best way to win friends in a new workplace.

“Bernie alienates his natural allies,” Representative Barney Frank, the Massachusetts Democrat, said at the time. “His holier-than-thou attitude — saying in a very loud voice he is smarter than everyone else and purer than everyone else — really undercuts his effectiveness.” The late Joe Moakley, another Massachusetts Democrat, waxed almost poetic in his derision for Sanders. “He is out there wailing on his own,” Moakley said. “He screams and hollers, but he is all alone.”

Frank says he came to like and work well with Sanders, with whom he served on the House Financial Services Committee. His early objections were over Sanders’s railing against both parties as if they were the same. “I think when he first got here, Bernie underestimated the degree that Republicans had moved to the right,” Frank told me. “I get sick of people saying ‘a curse on both your houses.’ When you point out to them that you agree with them on most things, they’ll say, ‘Yeah, well, I hold my friends up to a higher standard.’ Well, O.K., but remember that we’re your friends.”

Among his House colleagues, “Bernie’s not a bad guy,” is something I heard a lot of. “You appreciate Bernie the more you see him in action,” says Senator Chuck Schumer, the head of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, who served with him for several years in the House. A fellow Brooklynite who is nine years younger, Schumer attended the same elementary school as Sanders (P.S. 197) and the same high school (James Madison, which also graduated a third United States senator, Norm Coleman, Republican of Minnesota). “Bernie does tend to grow on people, whether it’s in the House or in Vermont,” Schumer says.

But again: Could Sanders be elected to the Senate anywhere else?

No, not as a Socialist, Schumer says. “Even in New York State it would be hard.”

Massachusetts? “Maybe this year he could,” Frank says, meaning 2006. “But if he were running in any other state, he probably would have to comb his hair.”

Leahy says that just any Socialist probably couldn’t get elected in Vermont, either. But Sanders has made himself known in a state small enough — physically and in terms of population — for someone, particularly a tireless someone, to insinuate himself into neighborly dialogues and build a following that skirts ideological pigeonholes. Indeed, there are no shortages of war veterans or struggling farmers in Vermont who would seemingly have no use for a humorless aging hippie peacenik Socialist from Brooklyn, except that Sanders has dealt with many of them personally, and it’s a good bet his office has helped them procure some government benefit.

“People have gotten to know him as Bernie,” Leahy says. “Not as the Socialist.”

Sanders calls himself as a “democratic Socialist.” When I asked him what this meant, as a practical matter, in capitalist America circa 2007, he did what he often does: he donned his rhetorical Viking’s helmet and waxed lovingly about the Socialist governments of Scandinavia. He mentioned that Scandinavian countries have nearly wiped out poverty in children — as opposed to the United States, where 18 to 20 percent of kids live in poverty. The Finnish government provides free day care to all children; Norwegian workers get 42 weeks of maternity leave at full pay.

But would Americans ever accept the kinds of taxes that finance the Scandinavian welfare state? And would Sanders himself trade in the United States government for the Finnish one? He is curiously, frustratingly non-responsive to questions like this. “I think there is a great deal we can learn from Scandinavia,” he said after a long pause. And then he returns to railing about economic justice and the rising gap between rich and poor, things he speaks of with a sense of outrage that always seems freshly summoned.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/21/magazine/21Sanders.t.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Economic inequality is caused because some people don’t wish to do things productively that others do.  The ratio of those who have versus those who have not is not manageable by comparing their social or economic output which is typical of socialism.  The value of initiative is always ignored—but it is because of initiative that some have wealth and others don’t in a capitalist society.  Some show up to invent, create, and do productive work while others wait for the products of that enterprise to enhance their lives.  But in their quest for equality—they hope to be labeled with sameness with the productive through socialism.

In Scandinavian socialism the big secret of their success is that they are a series of small countries that have not had massive quantities of immigration—due to their regional location largely.  They also benefit from their heritage of a hardy people who descended from the enterprising—and war like Vikings.  Scandinavians are not lazy, but are used to tribal rule, which is why their collective socialism works somewhat for them.  They aren’t producing massive new inventions carrying mankind into space, or developing new medical breakthroughs, but they are producing enough economic activity to support their welfare culture—to some extent that can be viewed as not catastrophic.  They get this from their heritage as Vikings who served kings and other nobles in spite of their independence—and they did it willingly.  Their culture has not changed demographically a great deal because of their lack of an immigrant population.  To a large degree, the people of Scandinavia are the same hard-working Vikings they were in the past.  For more proof of this the following captions from Frontpage Magazine will further illustrate the point:

Because the US, Canada, UK, France and Germany are large countries, the absolute numbers of their immigrants are also very high, not just in percentages.

So is poverty low in Scandinavian countries because their “socialism” works, or because they have relatively few poor immigrants entering?  And if poverty is low because Scandinavian “socialism” works, should it not be working for migrants in those countries as well?

Separate poverty data for the migrant populations in Scandinavian countries are available and there are numerous indications that these are quite high. According to one study, “While first and second generation immigrants constituted 44% of the poor children in 1997, they were 65% of all poor children in Sweden in 2008.  Only 5% of native Swedish children live in poverty. For immigrant children with both parents born outside of the Sweden, the child poverty rate is 39%.”  Poverty rates have also been shown to be high for immigrants in Denmark.  According to a recent study of poverty rates among immigrants in all Scandinavian countries, “While native children face yearly poverty risks of less than 10 percent in all three countries and for all years investigated the increasing proportion of immigrant children with an origin in middle and low-income countries have poverty risks that varies from 38 and up to as much as 58 percent.”

So Scandinavian “socialism” is doing a remarkably poor job in eliminating poverty among non-Scandinavians living in those Scandinavian utopias.

The conclusion can only be one thing.  The low poverty rate among Scandinavians in Scandinavian countries is thanks to the fact that Scandinavians work.  It is NOT because socialism works!

http://www.frontpagemag.com/2011/steven-plaut/does-scandinavian-socialism-work/

For a guy who has a portrait of the extreme socialist Eugene V. Debs and maintained a relationship with Puerto Cabeza, Nicaragua during his stint as a mayor, the intentions of Bernie Sanders political affiliation is evident.  The difference between him and Chuck Schumer or those like him in the Democratic Party is that Sanders is honest about his intentions while the others feel they must deceive and change the names of things to avoid the backlash of an American society built by capitalism.  Sanders and the Democrats who work with him through progressive caucuses desire socialism—specifically Scandinavian socialism—and they know what they are doing.

In America, the people are not like Scandinavia—the people who have settled North America are uniquely from every corner of the world.  Their heritage is not built by a Viking past but by pasts that caused them to flee wherever they came from in favor of the opportunity to work and produce without government intrusion.  The secret behind the open boarder policy that many Democrats support is they hope to create a more equalitarian world by bringing immigrants in from Marxist countries, like Nicaragua and Honduras—and integrating them into American society to water down the immigrants who have come to North America with a hard-driving work ethic.  Democrats achieve two things with this method, they destroy the work ethic that is making most immigrants desirable hires for a society built by capitalism, but they also bring with them the conditioned socialism which has impoverished their native lands.  Slowly over time, these new immigrants from socialist sources will change America from a capitalist country into a socialist one paving the way for people like Bernie Sanders to initiate his version of Scandinavian socialism.

Not even Fox News will put the “S” next to Bernie’s name and call him what he really is, or talk about what he truly stands for.  They allow the charade of politics to continue because as part of the New York culture, they see this push for Scandinavian socialism coming from virtually every politician, from Mitt Romney to Chuck Schumer—so they ignore the stereotypes against socialism that persists all across the flyover states.  Bernie hopes to repair the relationship that the government has with the VA so that other government programs will not receive scandalous appraisal in the future as the Democratic immigration assault performs their strategic effect.  But now, for those who didn’t know it, you know dear reader what Bernie Sanders really is.  He’s not an “Independent.”  He’s a socialist, and the media does not put an “S” next to his name because they hope to deceive viewers from the real intentions of the Democratic Party.  Since Bernie is so unapologetically “socialist” the media helps him by changing the “S” to an “I” so not to scare voters.  And the deception is so great that it was even perpetrated on the O’Reilly Factor—which shows just how deep socialism has already penetrated American culture for a destination of full-fledged Marxism which is supported so fervently by the New York Times and every other political figure in entertainment or public office that calls themselves “progressives.”  The crime in this case is that a willing deception has taken place and virtually everyone is playing along—even Bill O’Reilly.

Rich Hoffman

www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

 

Why People Like Lois Lerner Fear Conservatives: The McDonald’s matrix

People’s political opinions largely are formed by the kind of work they do, so it is not unusual within the Beltway of Washington to find people who think the way Lois Lerner does about “radical right-wingers.” For them, anybody who is not willing to throw endless amounts of money at government jobs and altruistic causes progressives support—is a “dangerous right-winger.” The same mentality caught by the Lois Lerner emails can be found in virtually any public school, or where government workers have unrealistic expectations about wage rates and quality of living under the umbrella of government. The desire for government to always expand is to bring in more employees who will thus protect it from insurgency. It is that concern of rejection that people like Lois Lerner fear—a rejection of their lifestyle and beliefs which is frightening to them.

One of the reasons I have spent the last week talking about the Annie Oakley Festival that I recently attended was because the entire region around Darke County, Ohio where it’s held is so wonderfully free of the type of people who work for government. There are of course police who sit like parasites on the side of the road looking to give out tickets to meet their revenue quotas—there are school teachers, and Post Office workers around town, but a vast majority of the people were farmers or people who have fled the urban life for the rural countryside to get away from government in some form or another. Nobody I met during my visit were radicals, but there were a lot of people who were to the political right of my position who have Don’t Tread on Me flags hanging from their porches, and gun racks in the windows of their trucks and they didn’t vote for Obama—that is for sure. They are the mainstream of rural America which makes up most of the country—and in those lands, they are filed with the kind of people who Lois Lerner fears most—those scary people who call in to talk radio shows and express anti-government opinions.

Lois Lerner and Barack Obama gladly put on blinders to the outside world of the Beltway. Their entire life and culture of their occupations centers around government employment which is not performance based, but measured by kiss-ass ability. Schmoozing, brown-nosing, and boot licking to gain promotions are particularly prevalent in government occupations if they want to accelerate faster than their annual merit increases. The fear that those government employees have of the “radical right” are essentially of those who have value, who likely attend church on Sundays, who are engaged in long marriages to the same spouse, who prefer straight sex over anal sex—in essence people who care about things over those who don’t.

I tend to judge cultures based on the McDonald’s matrix. Since McDonald’s restaurants essentially are the same everywhere—the food is the same, costs are the same and is of the same quality, the only differences from one to another is in the people who generally attend. For instance, if a McDonald’s is attended in Finneytown, Ohio it is common to see women wearing hoochy mama heels looking like they are Vegas prostitutes because the welfare culture in and around the area produces those types of people. I actually had this experience last week during a lunch rush. The people were discombobulated and behaved as if they were perpetually intoxicated. The people in front and behind the counter were fragmented—the static patterns of their lives had major holes that were filled by chaos. The best way to attribute their behavior was that they were the result of government employment—in one way or another they were victims of government employment. They either worked for the government in some way, or they were welfare families mooching off the tax payer for their sustenance. Just days later my wife and I stopped at a very nice McDonald’s in downtown Eaton, Ohio—in the middle of a very rural community. Sitting in the seats were old men reading newspapers and talking to their neighbors, groups of women planning yard sales, and families bringing their kids to play on the vast indoor playground they have there. Behind the counter the young women were very nice, and seemed engaged with life. It looked like the town McDonald’s was a major employer in that remote country town, so people treated the job with care—like it was something to cherish. A truck drove by me outside with a Confederate Flag in the back window and had a sticker of the church they attended on the bumper. This was the land that people like Lois Lerner fears most from the vantage point of the Beltway.

Using the McDonald’s matrix it is easy to determine the quality of people from region to region. Most of the time the root cause of degradation of a population can be determined by properly measuring the amount of government influence there is on a community. In places where welfare checks are more frequent than privately employed citizens, the quality of people goes down dramatically by way of personal values and taste. In places where getting a job at McDonald’s is a coveted occupation the value for the type of clothing one wears, the way they speak, the kind of things they put in their heads goes up dramatically. My trip to the Eaton McDonald’s was in itself a vacation because it was nice to be around people who had value. Beltway types and big government employees would say that such places are racist or “extreme” in their political views simply because they themselves fear such places the way that a demon might fear Holy Water. They ridicule the people in such towns because they don’t have control of them. They don’t fear the people who live in Finnytown.

Lois Lerner is reflective of a Beltway culture from both Republicans and Democrats who live in a bubble of their own making constructed by their social mooching and rampant looting of those who do have value. Since they are fleeing from judgment for their social crimes they have no other recourse but to hate and slander. The very existence of some people is too much for typical government workers to handle. During my entire trip to the Annie Oakley Festival from the time I left my driveway to the show itself, the interaction with the people was wonderfully American in that they were self-motivated and lacking that haze over their eyes that you often get when dealing with government employees—where the light is on, but nobody is home upstairs.

It is this culture of having somebody home who can think with their minds that Lois Lerner and her type of government worker fears so emphatically. They slander it, they tax it, they try with everything they have to destroy it—but when they can’t they hide from it in their Beltway offices and their expensive homes hoping to change the world into their image by other means. And when they can’t, they complain about it. I’ve been to D.C. and have traveled all around the area. I covered enough ground on my trip to the Annie Oakley Festival to eat the land mass of Washington D.C., New York City, and Los Angeles put together. The people who live in that vast summation of land won’t be opening their doors to the type of government interference that has corrupted Finneytown, and the other suburbs of Cincinnati where former glorious homes now rot under the care of the lazy, the addicted, and the minds with nobody home.

To illustrate the point let’s look at some census data between the two regions, Finnytown then Eaton.

In Finnytown the population was 12,741 at the U.S. 2010 census, in 5,294 housing units.[2] However, as of the 2000 census,[3] formerly there had been 13,492 people, 5,194 households, and 3,807 families residing in the CDP. The population density had been 3,382.8 people per square mile (1,305.6/km²). There had been 5,336 housing units in 2000. The racial makeup of the CDP in 2010 was 61.7% White, 33.7% Black, 1.9% Hispanic, with others 1% or less. However, the racial makeup in 2000 had been 72.95% White, 23.83% African American, 0.16% Native American, 1.10% Asian, 0.01% Pacific Islander, 0.45% from other races, and 1.48% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race had been 0.80% of the population in 2000.

There had been 5,194 households, out of which 34.6% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 55.7% were married couples living together, 14.6% had a female householder with no husband present, and 26.7% were non-families. 23.9% of all households were made up of individuals and 10.7% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.57 and the average family size was 3.04.

In the CDP in 2000, the population was spread out, with 27.6% under the age of 18, 6.1% from 18 to 24, 26.3% from 25 to 44, 22.9% from 45 to 64, and 17.1% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38 years. For every 100 females there were 87.9 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 80.3 males.

The median income for a household in the CDP in 2000 had been $52,219, and the median income for a family had been $58,393. Males had a median income of $41,932 versus $31,250 for females. The per capita income for the CDP was $25,355. About 4.3% of families and 5.9% of the population were below the poverty line, including 7.5% of those under age 18 and 4.1% of those age 65 or over.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finneytown%2C_Ohio

In Eaton as of the census[2] of 2010, there were 8,407 people, 3,486 households, and 2,181 families residing in the city. The population density was 1,358.2 inhabitants per square mile (524.4 /km2). There were 3,903 housing units at an average density of 630.5 per square mile (243.4 /km2). The racial makeup of the city was 96.3% White, 0.6% African-American, 0.2% Native American, 1.0% Asian, 0.5% from other races, and 1.5% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 0.8% of the population.

There were 3,486 households of which 30.3% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 44.2% were married couples living together, 13.7% had a female householder with no husband present, 4.6% had a male householder with no wife present, and 37.4% were non-families. 32.7% of all households were made up of individuals and 15.5% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.33 and the average family size was 2.90.

The median age in the city was 40.4 years. 23.3% of residents were under the age of 18; 8% were between the ages of 18 and 24; 23.7% were from 25 to 44; 25.7% were from 45 to 64; and 19.1% were 65 years of age or older. The gender makeup of the city was 47.2% male and 52.8% female.

There were 3,274 households out of which 30.3% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 51.3% were married couples living together, 11.2% had a female householder with no husband present, and 33.3% were non-families. 29.1% of all households were made up of individuals and 14.0% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.37 and the average family size was 2.89.

In the city the population was spread out with 24.0% under the age of 18, 8.7% from 18 to 24, 27.5% from 25 to 44, 21.6% from 45 to 64, and 18.1% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38 years. For every 100 females there were 89.6 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 85.6 males.

The median income for a household in the city was $37,231, and the median income for a family was $42,241. Males had a median income of $32,404 versus $24,006 for females. The per capita income for the city was $16,771. About 5.8% of families and 8.7% of the population were below the poverty line, including 10.0% of those under age 18 and 9.5% of those age 65 or over.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eaton,_Ohio

Statically, they look very similar they have similar numbers of family size, similar numbers of female lead homes with no husband present and median incomes that are close. The big difference is that Eaton has nearly 9 more males per 100 females than Finnytown. The other statistic that doesn’t show up in this a case like this is the number of those married homes that are from first marriages. Obviously Eaton has a much higher success rate of first marriages than Finnytown leading to fewer fragmented homes and less dependency on government subsidy. One town has a greater welfare culture than the other and produces a mentality in one group that is vastly different from the other.

It is this nasty little secret that Lois Lerner’s type hope to hide from public knowledge and the reason she campaigned against those same groups using the power of the IRS to alter elections and suppress the opinions of those people outside of the Beltway which she felt so comfortable protecting. Just because they are scared doesn’t make government worker reality valid, it just means they have a frame of mind that is weaker due to their dependency on government than the hardier types who live outside the reach of Lois Lerner and her government employees contributing to the daily erosion that takes place with a government issued check in whatever form.

Rich Hoffman www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

 

‘Tail of the Dragon’s’ Parent: Mad Max’s ‘Fury Road ‘unleashes itself at LAST!

One of the great treats for me that came out of this year’s Comic Con in San Diego was the interview with the great George Miller and the preview of the new Mad Max movie, Fury Road. I can admit without shame of any kind that George Miller’s Mad Max films were deep on my mind while I was writing Tail of the Dragon. I have watched the development of the new Mad Max film for over a decade now and remember well when it was first proposed back in 2002. Back then Mel Gibson with all his box office horsepower was behind the project with Miller, but the project still didn’t get off the ground. Then Gibson fell from grace and nobody in Hollywood wanted to touch the project and there were film delays and all types of issues. But Miller—finally—has managed to make the film with Tom Hardy now playing Max and I am ecstatically excited for the project.

http://insidemovies.ew.com/2014/07/27/george-miller-mad-max-interview-comic-con/

I was a bit shocked that the review of the San Diego Comic Con thought that preview of Fury Road was the most interesting thing they had witnessed. I couldn’t help but think of my own car chase story Tail of the Dragon which surpasses car crash wise anything seen in that preview or any of the Fast and Furious movies. The biggest difference was that I set my car chase story in the present as opposed to the future. My character is trying to save society from the kind of collapse that Max is reacting to. But I agree with Miller, car chases stories are essentially westerns on wheels. Hearing his articulation and the general audience reaction to his new Mad Max film gave me encouragement that Tail of the Dragon might someday find the right elements to end up on film. But it would take a really good director to pull off—and people like Miller are not exactly falling from the trees like apples.

I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about somebody besides Mel Gibson playing Mad Max. I grew up with Max and brought those experiences to my Tail of the Dragon novel mixed with plenty of Smokey and the Bandit. Star Wars is often compared to a western in space, and car chase films are like Miller described, westerns on wheels. Whenever a film has something to say about morality they are usually termed as “westerns.” Growing up with Mad Max I learned a lot about the depravity of the human spirit which was remarkably insightful. The opening of the first Mad Max film with the Nightrider on a rage across the desert with his crazed girlfriend was classic cinema that climbed into the mind of insanity at its finest and took viewers into the essence of a mind gone mad. I watched that movie almost every day from age 12 to 16. Not because of the movie influence but because of what it revealed about human nature, I became Mad Max at age 16 and I have the car chases, races and crashes to provide the testimony. Those experiences then became my own story, Tail of the Dragon—the horse of the western had been replaced by a car and I used mine as a kind of weapon against depravity. And when I couldn’t defeat depravity I out ran it with sheer speed.

I will forever be grateful to George Miller—his films are art with a value into the human mind that goes well beyond what people are comfortable revealing about themselves. The stunts in the Road Warrior, the second Mad Max film were unbelievably intense and I never forgot them. Even after all these years they still hold up as some of the best stunt work done in any picture. The cinematography has never been surpassed even after thirty years by anybody in the business. The dust, the smoke, the blood and violence of the car crashes are both beautiful yet horrific to look at and nobody does it like George Miller.

Miller’s vision of the future is not far off—if the engines of the world are turned off—the minds that drive society forward–people certainly do revert back into a tribal abyss. It is not hard to conceive that they would devolve into the kind of villains seen in Miller’s Mad Max films. Max was a good man during the days of civilization; he had a child, a nice wife and wanted to give up life as a cop to get away from the madness of the people he was holding back from taking over. Miller understood the strange mix of great charisma and madness that Mel Gibson was able to bring to the screen when he was in a 100 MPH stand-off with the Toe Cutter at the beginning of the first Mad Max. Mel Gibson would show throughout his career that his real life was more like Max than anybody would have guessed, and that brought some humor to the 2014 Comic Con that Miller addressed correctly. I share with Gibson some of those traits and as a young man I would discover the real genius of Miller’s Max character when I too had to face off against an opponent traveling at me at over 100 MPH in a game of chicken. Like Max, I didn’t budge even though I had far more to lose than the other guy.

I know what it feels like to be that close to the edge and to push beyond it to a place of fearlessness. Whether or not there had ever been a Mad Max film, my fate would have put me in the same circumstance. But as those circumstances occurred, I always thought of how much insight into the human condition George Miller had in his Mad Max films—a brutal reality not beheld by any other artist in any other art form—and I could confirm its authenticity.

Max couldn’t escape madness and it finally caught up to him and killed his family leaving Max a very sane man bent with rage in an insane world that only devolved from there. Fury Road takes place between the first Mad Max film and the Road Warrior, so there is some rich material there to delve into for Miller as society devolves from a rich industrious culture into tribal nomads desperate for value of any kind fleeing constantly from chaos. In the Road Warrior there was always sadness to Max—an awareness of how far down the drain the world had devolved, but a resolute charisma that refused to join it. It was as if he alone stood against the insanity of the world and was aware that the only way to meet it was by going “mad” himself when pressed by danger. As a result, those still sane in the world gravitated to Max to be saved, which he did in the Road Warrior, then on a more epic scale in Beyond Thunder Dome.

Beyond Thunder Dome was a bit too light for a Mad Max film but was still enjoyable. Mel Gibson was moving into a mainstream actor and George Miller was being lured in to doing more commercial work. It was the weakest film of the series but was still a work of art visually and in concept. I went to see it in 1985 all by myself at a summer matinée. I had some time to kill before work so I went to see it alone, just me and Max and I loved it. It was a wonderful way to watch George Miller’s version of a “western”—like Max himself.   All alone.

As much as I am rooting for Fury Road—and I will see it on opening day—it won’t surpass the violence and sheer magnitude of car crash carnage I wrote about in Tail of the Dragon. I am a product in some ways of Miller and I took that into real life then wrote about it with a new perspective. But it is encouraging to see such positive audience reaction from Comic Con as they had toward Fury Road. There may be hope for my own project yet due to the forecasted success of Miller’s resurrection of the Mad Max franchise. Apparently Miller has a sequel to Fury Road already written and is ready to head into production. For that film, yet unnamed, I will be the first to that one as well, and for every film that comes after—because George Miller is a master of the car chase western, and I am grateful to him in ways that are beyond description.

As for Tail of the Dragon, it is a shame it takes a positive reaction from audiences at Comic Con to tell studios that movie goers want car chase movies. I didn’t see anything in the Fury Road preview that eclipses what was done in Tail of the Dragon. So I was a bit impressed that audiences thought Fury Road was the most intense preview coming out of the event which showcased the latest and greatest that Hollywood was churning up. That certainly puts Tail of the Dragon in a class of its own but like Miller’s journey to bring Fury Road to the screen; the trip for Tail of the Dragon will likely be longer and will take just the right personalities—which has not yet been assembled.

Rich Hoffman

www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

 

A Needed Circus Tent: ‘Bronco Billy ‘dreams that could resurrect a nation

At an annual dinner conducted by the participants of the Annie Oakley Western Arts Showcase there was much discussion about the new location in 2014 at York Woods in Ansonia, Ohio—just north of Greenville.  The reviews of this new site were very favorable, but I wasn’t so sure when we were driving there for the first time.  York Woods was founded in the mid 1800s and today is the site of the Greenville Steam Thrashers—a group dedicated to maintaining antique farm equipment.  Once we arrived I said to my wife that this country was so much God’s that you felt like you could reach up and scratch his beard.  It was amazingly remote and full of character.  It was the first location of our annual Western Arts Showcase which has now been going on for well more than a decade that could justify a circus tent for our shows.  Here is a video of the event:

We had the idea by seeing what kind of tent the drama group had up and for the first time considered that we should hold our future shows in just such a tent.  In previous years our shows were in the Coliseum at the Darke County Fairgrounds about 10 miles to the south.  Several times during the day weather threatened to alter our outdoor show, so it put in our minds the need for adjustments in the future if the York Woods site continued to be the destination.

We hoped that it would because there are things we could likely do at York Woods that we would never be allowed to do at the Fairgrounds, such as using firewhips and live ammunition for portions of our shows.  I typically don’t perform for the exhibitions due to the many restrictions and my lack of interest in living within too many boundaries.   I admire those who do, but I’ve always thought that our shows should incorporate more live fire—as was seen in one of my favorite movies, Bronco Billy.  At York Woods the Annie Oakley Committee actually had shooting contests on site which greatly enhanced the event for the crowd.  The Fairgrounds was in a fairly dense population area, but out in York Woods, there wasn’t much by way of residential living for at least a mile—maybe two.  The farmland was vast and very open giving a truly ideal location for improvements to the Western Showcase.

We could continue to do the shows outside as we have for years, and just work around the weather, but it may well be time to have our own circus tent.  Where space was always in short supply at the Fairgrounds, there was no shortage of space at York Woods giving our group for the first time some creative ability not seen before—so a small circus tent is something that we should pursue in the upcoming year.

 To do this we are looking for corporate sponsorship that could pay for some of the costs and would be proud to feature all benefactors prominently.  There are opportunities here that are unexplored for both parties, the Western Showcase participants and advertisers—so discussion would have to take place to make sure everyone gets what they want.

Interested parties should contact my friend Gery at:

http://geryldeer.com/

As for my the movie Bronco Billy, it has always been a dream of mine to do for kids what the Clint Eastwood character in that film wanted to achieve.  In that film Bronco Billy was operating his life upstream of the current in society and was functioning by a traditional set of rules that were grossly outdated even by the 1970s standards.  It has always been a dream of mine to step into a circus tent like the one shown at the end of that movie made of American flags.

Americans for too many years have felt guilty for their history, their art, and their success.  The tent at the end of Bronco Billy was a kind of statement of honor in preserving all those things.  But it wasn’t real.  Bronco Billy was just a movie character and the story was fictional.  When the shooting was done, the tent was scrapped, and packed away forever forgotten, except on film. Well, 35 years after that film became a favorite of mine, I’m in the strange position of knowing really the only people left in America who have the ability to put on a show like what Bronco Billy did in that film.  Gery Deer is the closest thing alive to Clint Eastwood’s fictional character in that movie and is the reason he and I have had a friendship that has went on for over a decade now.

The people in Gery’s shows are some of the most genuinely good people I have ever met and the gifts they have to offer the world extend well beyond the yearly shows at Annie Oakley’s festival each year in Greenville.  But you have to start somewhere and it would appear that the York Woods location is the perfect spot for such an audaciously American fantasy.  There were enough crowds at York Woods to fill the stands of a small circus tent and resurrect not in Las Vegas, Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, or Orlando, Florida the lost arts of the cowboy, but Ansonia, Ohio the literal birthplace of Annie Oakley herself–one of the best trick shooters anywhere and a person all women should think of as a role model.  Annie Oakley used to say, “Aim at a high mark and you’ll hit it.  No, not the first time, or the second and maybe not the third.  But keep on aiming and keep on shooting for only practice will make you perfect.  Finally, you’ll hit the bull’s eye of success.”

I read those words on the back of the brochure the Annie Oakley Committee passed out to visitors of their festival as I watched our group perform their knife throwing exhibitions, and whip tricks and thought of the possibilities if firearms and other—more audacious elements could be added to the show in York Woods in the future.  And I couldn’t help but think of that Bronco Billy circus tent which has been bouncing around in my head for more than three decades now.  There is no reason to aim high in this case because we have the firepower at many levels of hitting this target—a new target that was presented through a change that could very well be for the better.

These days it doesn’t matter if a show is ten miles outside of a town that is already many, many miles away from the rest of civilization.  This is actually a plus, especially when the performers also have the ability of bringing the show to the rest of the world through “media.”  Gery is a television producer—and he is also the producer of the only real Wild West Show left in the world.  There are a few theme park types of acts out there, but nobody has the ability to pull the most talented people in the industry in for a real honest to goodness Wild West Show like Gery.  All he needs to pull off the chance of a lifetime is a circus tent and a few sponsors.

Rich Hoffman www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

 

The 2014 Annie Oakley Western Showcase: Bringing Lash LaRue off the silver screen into reality

As usual it was a marvelous weekend at our annual Annie Oakley event.  What started as a large group that originally met at Las Vegas each year is now just a handful of whip crackers, knife throwers, trick ropers and magicians intent to put a smile on the faces of young people and wow the adults who graced the grounds of the 2014 Annie Oakley Festival in Darke County.  The venue this year was moved from the usual fairgrounds in town to a more remote location just to the north.  It felt a long way out and even deeper into “God’s Country” but a very large crowd turned out and what they found there were shooting contests, fast draw contests from the Single Action Shooting Society, theater drama, and the 12th Annual Annie Oakley Western Arts Showcase accompanied by the many venders selling goods.  Most of the venders very unique with little booths set-up mingling among the trees of York Woods.  For over ten years now some of the best whip crackers in the country have gathered to meet with their own kind at the event and as usual it was a marvelous enterprise.

I said many times during the day which was absolutely perfect for July weather with mild temperatures and occasional rain bursts erupting just to the north and south painting a menacing sky at times across the vast plains of farmland extending out into Indiana—that my love of this event was yearly maintenance; it restored my faith in humanity.  The people who attend are some of the few people left in the entire world who do these kinds of things which used to be common place during Annie Oakley’s time.  A few are in long-term marriages which are inspiring, and most have spouses that they bring with them where they enjoy each other in a healthy way and it is just good to associate with people of that character.  I’ve said it before, but it is applicable, the people in our group are nearly identical to the characters shown in the Clint Eastwood film Bronco Billy—which is a favorite of mine.  They are a small group of people who are all that is keeping a way of life in America alive for the next generation.

There are many in the world who might say good riddance to classic American arts—particularly those residing around large metropolitan areas—which is why attending each year restores my faith in humanity.  It is so refreshing to spend time around genuine people who truly love something rooted in classic Americana.  But to lose these values, the whip cracking, the gun spinning, roping, and knife throwing—with vaudeville type shows conducted from corn fields in the middle of nowhere—U.S.A would be treacherous.  The heart of what it means to be an American is in those shows, I have now known the ring master of the Annie Oakley event—Gery Deer for over ten years and each year he finds new ways to change-up the show to always keep it interesting.  At first there were concerns over moving the Annie Oakley Festival to the outskirts of Greenville—but quickly those worries proved pointless.  Large crowds attended and the celebration was nothing short of inspiring.

It took me a while to get warmed up but by the time we got to the Speed Switch contest which allows bullwhip artists to strike at ten targets as fast as they could–first with one hand then with the other on the way back up the target row, I had hit my stride.  This year it was obvious that everyone was a bit smoother and had been practicing.  The times were faster generally for everyone which made for an exciting show for the people watching from the bleachers.  I had my fastest time ever on the Speed Switch—just a bit over 11 seconds which is fast for even the Speed and Accuracy contest so well-known to seasoned veterans.  I enjoyed the location, the vast open spaces all around the touring bus of the Brother’s and Company set up as a backdrop for the stage as a generator provided all the power needed for the show.  The crowd sat in the beginnings of the York Woods where shade gave them shelter from the sun which peaked out often around menacing storm clouds.  If anything pushed my speed a bit it was a combination of those elements.

Many of the same people who came last year came this time around again traveling from far away destinations to arrive.  Some couldn’t make it, but the beauty of the event is that each year there are opportunities to do it again and recharge their batteries from a punishing year.  It is punishing to stand behind these classic American art forms when the current trend is to run away.  Often the skeptics will stand on the outskirts of the roped off area and watch with curiosity as most of their thoughts were created by pop culture—but after a few moments, they can’t help but smile at the cheesy jokes and purity of the type of Western Showcase that Gery routinely puts on.  There is a playful innocence in it that is unmistakable and it doesn’t take long to reach into the inner child of the typical viewer to touch that part of themselves which has long ago been ignored—and suppressed.

I saw some of that at the end of the day when my wife and I went to the restaurant we normally gather at in Greenville to make reservations for the back half of the dining room.  The rest of our group was on the tour bus coming down from the York Woods location so we wanted to have everything set up for when they arrived.   As the manager arranged tables I saw some of that modern cynicism in the bar where my wife and I waited.  A corner contained a group of young twenty-somethings watching a baseball game and as I stood silhouetted in the doorway between the bar and dining room a young kid with his date looked my way and started texting his friends sitting next to him murmuring—it’s “Crocodile Dundee.”  I stared at the kid just to make him feel uncomfortable and to let him know that I could hear him, which he hadn’t expected.  He wanted anonymity from the security of his reality among his friends so I made a point to not give it to him.  This isn’t the first time this has happened and it won’t be the last.  On more than one occasion in that same bar we’ve encountered worse but quickly converted them over into fans.  One year Chris Camp took a skeptical woman outside and made her into a whip target stand in the parking lot in front of her husband cracking straws from her outstretched hands.  Moments before she had been similar to the kids in the corner, but after about five minutes was gushing all over herself at the coolness of having a weapon break the sound barrier right next to her face.  The only references modern people have toward such things outside of the type of events that Gery puts on, is music, movies, and television which has turned dramatically against the American Western, or any form of rugged individualism.

The clash of cultures is one where the values of two groups of people crash in places like that bar.  At the Annie Oakley Festival the context is already presented.  It is not unusual for members of the Western Arts Showcase to roam around the event in costume.  I typically wear my whips with me, and nobody bats an eye—they expect it because of the context of the show.  When our members used to attend the Fairlawn restaurant in years prior the strip of road separating it from the Darke County Fairgrounds was filled with people attending the festival.   This year there was no late night activity in town, because the Annie Oakley event had moved far to the north—so the Fairlawn was filled with regular people living their regular lives watching baseball games and trying to show how well they fit into the modern world of the big nearby cities like Dayton, Columbus and Cincinnati to the south.  So for the kids in the bar they had no idea there was an Annie Oakley event in town as it had moved.  The boy who made the Crocodile Dundee comment likely hoped that his girl friend would be impressed by his remark and the laughs and giggles among his friends would earn him an honor of some kind, to prove that he was just as much of a douche bag as the next guy.  What kids like that don’t know, because it’s not part of their experience, is that the heroes of old, which the Ohio Western Arts group is dedicated to preserving are people like Lash LaRue, Douglas Fairbanks, and of course Annie Oakley—people they have no experience with.  If they did, they’d have a much more fulfilled life—their marriages would last longer, their lives would be richer, and they’d be generally happy people.  Some of the members of our group travel in trucks and vans that are twenty years old filled with stage props.  Often they sleep in a cramped back seat traveling from gig to gig in a hope that their sheer charisma might improve the lives of just one person with the kind of hopes and dreams born from the mind of America.  Most of the time they get paid decently, but are drained from the experience only to dust off the feeling and do it again weekend after weekend year after year.

I have never seen a young girl who didn’t melt away into butter when a confident whip handler removed a target from her lips.  If the kid wanted to impress his date—and I wanted to tell him this—the best thing he could do for himself is to learn the skills our group brought to the Annie Oakley Festival.  As our group arrived and filled the back of the room, the kid stood in the doorway wondering who all those people were sitting with that same guy in the Australian style outback hat.  His perplexed look was one of realizing that there was a group of people in the world functioning around him who were different from the patterns he had learned—that certain music was popular, certain modes of dress acceptable, and that there were people out there who considered non-conformity to be far superior to social conformity.  It is that trait that the Annual Annie Oakley Festival in Darke County, Ohio appeals to best, and the primary reason that so many make the yearly pilgrimage.

I certainly have a lot of experience with such things measuring public temperament.  Unlike the other attendees I have chosen a more controversial roll using my desire to preserve the Western Arts in a way that I think the real Lash LaRue would have done in his day—I have made it part of my political discourse.    I have fought higher taxes and known political corruption using the skills nurtured along over the years with the bullwhip to have the same effect the young guy in the bar experienced.  When it comes to traditional American art, I feel that the best ground to defend it is outside of the shows where viewers can watch comfortably from behind a roped off area.  I take great pleasure in bringing the show to the safety of the herd because it is there that they need to see it most.

At the end of the night there were jokes about how out-of-fashion we were as a group and pride was taken in being so out of style.  I remarked that all we needed to do was wait another 50 years and there will be hordes of people desiring deeply the traditional American arts displayed yearly at the Annie Oakley Festival—it will at that time become fashionable again.  But right now, especially with the failure of the Lone Ranger at the box office last year, nobody in movies or television is going to produce a film like Zorro or Lash LaRue in the jaded culture we have now.  But for those who still desire such things, the way we do who perform them, the yearly event of Annie Oakley is a real treat.  It recharges my batteries with meaning after a year of typical cynicism in a way nothing else does.  I typically wear my hat year round everywhere from Michigan to Florida and in every possible venue from wealthy to poor—so it is routine to get the kind of reaction I received from the kid in the bar.  But what is unique is that a horde of people dressed similarly who share my values don’t often come walking in behind me.  And while I might want to take Lash LaRue off the silver screen and plop him down into America in 2014 with my real life antics, it is the one and only time a year that I get more from everyone else than I typically give leaving me feeling uncharacteristically fulfilled.  In that regard, I hope that Gery gets the circus tent next year that he’s talking about—because that would be absolutely grand and a good next step to the new venue at York Woods marking of the start of a second decade in a long march toward eternity.

Rich Hoffman   www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com

 

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