Schrodinger’s End Times

Radio

^        When I was growing up the folks had this truly magical, as far as I was concerned, radio. It was kind of a creamy white with a gold colored dial. The top half of the dial was AM radio. The bottom half—the world! It could not have been an expensive radio if the folks had it.

^        The bottom half of the dial was a wonderland. We could get stuff from all over the world especially late at night or under certain atmospheric conditions that we knew nothing about. It required a delicate touch on the bottom half of that dial that foreign voices would speak out from along with conversations from Ham radio operators. The slightest twitch and the carefully tuned in station was lost.

Panic in the streets.

^        It was on one of those searches of the radio cosmos that I tuned in a preacher talking about the “END TIMES” that we were living in and that very soon life as we knew it would be over. Other than going to church with my grandma when I stayed with them in Missouri sans parents we were not religious folks then. I was scared enough to ask my dad about it the next day. Dad said, “They’ve been scaring people with that crap since I was a kid. Don’t worry about it!”

^        As far as I was concerned then Dad was the final authority. Case closed.

Kill the white man!

^        My last duty station is the Army was in Giessen, Germany. We were housed in old German barracks. The Germans were housed in the new barracks. That’s where I spent the last 5 months of my four year hitch. The Army would send people close to getting out overseas to a better duty assignment. Guys would like what they saw of Europe and reenlist. Then the Army would send them to Viet Nam. I passed on reenlisting. I’d had enough fun.

^        I was in our four man room late one night writing a letter home. All the other guys were either out on leave or at their duty station. It was quiet. One of their radios had been playing all day. I didn’t bother turning it off. One of the brothers had it set on a pirate radio station. This station was transmitting from somewhere off the coast if I remember correctly.

^        Anyway a program came on where some guy was saying over and over, “We must kill the white man. We must rise up and kill the white man. We must kill the white man. Kill the white man. Kill the white man.” Over and over and over. Non-stop. It was just playing in the background and I just ignored it and kept writing. I should mention here that there were some racial tensions in the Army during the time I served. As I was writing along I remember thinking yes we must rise up and kill the white man. I had to stop and look down to make sure that I hadn’t actually written that. I was and in fact am white. That’s when I realized that perhaps I should get up off my ass and turn the radio off.

^        A couple of my room mates were brothers and good friends. I would listen to the sermons that Will’s church sent him via audio recordings. They were great. I mean foot stompin’ “Yes, Jesus” great. Will was also a loan shark. I was also their barber. I couldn’t cut a white guy’s hair to save my life but I could cut a modified (short) afro easy peasy.

^        There weren’t any uprisings of mass killings while I was there. The point is in case you’re wondering if there is one is that having the same message delivered over and over can have an effect. It does. That’s what we’re living today.

Not an expert.

^        When I first started to read the bible in earnest it seemed obvious to me that the people of the time thought that Jesus was coming back sooner rather than later. Some thought that he would come back in their lifetime. I had explained to me later that this was not in fact the case. Obviously. Two thousand years have passed. Men that had a much deeper understanding of the bible than regular people have figured out a way to explain the discrepancy of a few thousand years.

^        So if somebody just finds a bible and tries to figure it out or apply what they have learned on their own they will more than likely get it wrong unless they have an expert or at least someone more knowledgeable on hand to explain things to them.

 Experts needed. Apply within.

^        In other words when I read that God had a plan for that one guy and thought that God just had a plan for that one guy I didn’t know that I was wrong about that. God in spite of our free will has a plan for all of us. So when I a guy steps out and gets hit by a bus God planned that. Miscarriages? God’s plan.

^        Where I might read a verse and think that it’s okay to kill a disrespectful kid an expert can explain that this is not the case and perhaps just a good talking to and grounding might be more appropriate. Or if you’re a Southern Baptist just give the unrepentant tot the thrashing of their life.

^        I’m just going to leave that whole the proper way of sacrificing of animals alone other than to say that they must have had very sharp knives back then. What a mess! Interestingly no one ever talks about who is going to clean that mess up afterwards. I’m going to guess a woman or women depending upon the size of the sacrifice.

^        Suffice it to say that the bible isn’t really a standalone book unless an expert happens to have left a really really good set of Cliff Notes with it.

^        We need guidance! Case in point right here.

 Back to the End.

^        I talked about the End back at the beginning of this. Technically people that didn’t know any better have thought that they were living in the End Times since the time of Jesus. So we are both living in the End Times and Not living in the End Times until we are actually in the End Times whether we know it or not. So the people that are always predicting the End Times are both right and not right unless there’s a cutoff point at some point in the past that I haven’t had explained to me yet by a person that knows.

^        There could be a cutoff date say a few hundred or thousand years back where those that predicted the End Times were actually deemed to be wrong. Expiration date exceeded. Out of warranty. Sorry buddy or budette take that class over.

^        This is how guys like Copeland end up making $300 million dollars off of rubes. He knows. Or at least he says he knows. Try and prove him wrong. Can’t be done. Can’t prove him right either. Well there is a way.

Jesus.

^        He either has to show his face or he doesn’t. Depends upon the time frame. We’re either deep into the End Times or just starting. Depends upon what expert you’re dealing with. If you like scary apocalyptic movies go with that expert. They know. Or they don’t. Could be that they’re just a fake prophet or smoking a little too much of the good stuff. Depends upon what their Godometer is forecasting at the time.

Who’s to know?

^        Here’s what I do know.

^        Don’t drink the Koolaid!

^        If your pastor is telling you that you need to all get close together in the middle of a pandemic they are bat shit crazy and endangering people including all the innocent bystanders that come into contact with the flock. LEAVE. Jesus doesn’t want you dead! Jesus doesn’t want other people to die because of you.

^        Team Trump jesus may not care if you’re dead but the real Jesus doesn’t want you dead. Jesus doesn’t need the Constitution to be believed in. Not a part of the Good News.

^        Holy Spirit is with you wherever you are. Jesus is not confined to four walls. Pray to God wherever you are. God is there.

Go with God.

 

I see dead people [Affordable Care Act]

        What gets lost too often in all the rhetoric about health care is that if tens of millions of people lose their health insurance tens of thousands of people will die from preventable deaths. I’m going to write that in a separate line.

        Tens of thousands of people will die from preventable deaths.

        Plain and simple: the Affordable Care Act (ACA) saved lives, tens of thousands of lives. People who could obtained health insurance and started getting basic needs taken care of along with treatment. Cancers and heart disease were caught in early more treatable stages along with a host of other treatable illnesses. People with preexisting conditions could and did get treatment. In my family the ACA saved a family member’s life TWICE.

        Think that’s too big or too small a number? Then how many people, men, women and children do you think will die with the repeal of the ACA?

        The questions we should be asking are:

• Why there are only 3 or 4 Republicans in the Senate who (partially) oppose taking away health insurance from those who can’t afford it otherwise? (Senator McCain is only objecting that proper procedures weren’t followed in condemning people to death.)
• Why are the majority of Republican leadership okay with condemning thousands of people to die?          
• Why are evangelical “Christians” okay with condemning tens of thousands of believers and non-believers to die? (Keep in mind that this is the same group that champions the right of the unborn to life. [Just not so much after they’re born.]) 
• Why so many people are already fixated on the number that I’m using as to how many people will die?
• Why was the House of Representatives able to pass legislation condemning people to certain death so easily?
• Why after all these years don’t Republicans have a viable plan to fix health care with a plan that doesn’t sentence so many people to death?
• Why does Republican leadership want to replace a bill that needs fixing with another bill that they acknowledge needs fixing rather than fixing the bill that already exists?
• Is it more abhorrent for a terrorist to kill or injure hundreds than for elected officials in suits to kill tens of thousands by making healthcare insurance unattainable?
• Is it easier to cause the deaths of tens of thousands of people when their names aren’t yet known?

        Wanting to live seems to be a fundamental desire for most people. For various reasons too many people who have health care insurance want to deny it to those who don’t have it. That would be the poor and people who just don’t have enough money to purchase health insurance. So the poor and less fortunate die. Some of the more fortunate are sad that that happens. I can’t really in good conscience say that “all” of the more fortunate are sad, because they aren’t. I’ve heard too many people say that’s good enough for them, that’s the way it is, tough.

        Too many of the Republican leadership and Party were unhappy with millions of people being able to obtain health insurance because of the actions of a Democratic Black President.

        They have fought against health care for the less fortunate every step of the way and along with the help of evangelicals, white supremacists, Russians and unfortunately a majority of voting white people who elected a clueless man that said he would fix it with something better. They (and he) didn’t have anything better. They only had proposals that made it look like they were doing something but in reality were taking it away. They are slowly strangling the ACA through non-support as well.

        This can be fixed. It may not sound as patriotic as taking a knee or saluting but health care can be provided to millions more Americans at a reasonable cost. Congress and the current administration will have to put petty divisions behind them and people first. Our elected officials can first stop trying to kill the ACA (For those that still might not know it, Obamacare is the Republican nickname for the Affordable Care Act) and then immediately start fixing it in ways that are positive for the American people and bring more people under the umbrella of being covered. They may have to make enemies of wealthy health care CEOs and pharmaceutical executives but they will survive – along with the tens of thousands of lives that will be saved.

         As a society we are justifiably outraged when hundreds die or are injured. We should be just as outraged when tens of thousands of innocent people are sentenced to die preventable deaths through inaction. We should be outraged at those responsible.