Shari made the kind of comment that makes this blog worth while. I do not subscribe entirely to what she says, but it is a unique contribution. Besides, the one thing I hope we all know about Bob’s Blog by now is that it is NOT dedicated just to Bob’s opinions. We are a SEMINAR, not a lecture. That is the exact disctinction between a lecture and a seminar.

Reacting to my quote from Mark Tawin, “Faith is believing in what you know ain’t so” Shari tied in our themes here in rejecting it:

Well Twain’s definition of faith is just the opposite. It’s the definition of no faith. Faith is not closing your eyes tight and repeating I believe, I believe. It’s opening your eyes and taking alook. Certainly we can see that western civilization has been based on very different things than the ant heap. The notion of social distinctions was not based on me am the sun god and the rest of you are cattle. It was based on the notion that a leader serves his people. A very Christian notion, even if men failed. As for territory, it wasn’t called “fortress Europe” for nothing, we believed in defence, but not cannibalism. After taking a look, faith has the imagination to take the next step. Hebrews 11:1 defines faith as the realization of what is hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. Twains definition is the one used by college professers, which is then followed by their antheap history with lies thrown in. This is the jewish problem, no faith.

Comment by Shari

Excellent work!

Joe says I am attacking him “in front of the class.” He doesn’t seem to be intimidated by this, since he has made several commemts in his usual bashful way since he said that.

Hey, gang, I get to have a little FUN here.

I hit at Joe because I enjoy it. The world is not exactly full of people I can drop the hammer on and not have to worry about it. What I say to Joe doesn’t bother me. What may concern me is htat readers, especially those new to the blog, may think that these two old dogs are actually BITING each other. Our snarling and mixing it uyp may make others uncomportable.

It shouldn’t. Joe and I enjoy each other because we have something irreplacable in common. And that was true long before we discovered we were both in “the program.”

One thing that suprises newcomers in alcohol and drug recovery is how us inmates talk about the most tragic things and LAUGH. Long before I entered the program at age 51, I had learned you hvae to either laugh or end up in a padded cell. If you see people tortured to death, if you see your world being destroyed, you HAVE to learn to laugh at the absuridty. Someone put it perfevtly, “We laugh and we joke but we don’t PLAY.”

Laughter in the program was just a late manifestation of this. Joe likes my brutal humor because we couldn’t have survived without it. This is important:

Man is the only animal who knows he will die. Man is the only animal who LAUGHS.

I have just as much if not more in common with the young idealists like Dave and the older idealists like Budarick. But each thing I have in common with you is irreplacable.

I don’t mind admitting that I’m not tough. I’ve been HURT with Elizabeth, I seek faith like Shari. I was a drunk like Joe. It hurts me to see a white person with a black adoptee the way it does Dave or Pain.

Joe talks about how he would have personally executed Ted Bundy. I have been in a lot of fighting, and I doubt there is a single commenter here who would NOT be willing to pull the switch on a cold-blooded killer.

That includes the women. In fact that may ESPECIALLY include the women. But Joe seems to think he is especially tough. He look down on mere words. The problem is that we do not have the CHANCE to pull the switch on people who deserve it. The battle is words. That’s the fight, and that’s the battle I fight. Pullling hte switch is a luxury I don’t have. But if I do what I am trying to do, my young idealists will get to pull it.

The humor Joe and I share is the pain Joe and I share.

No war hero ever made the slightest difference in real history. Only those who fought with words determined reality.

I am not the slightest bit concerned with whether I am bragging or not. or things like that. I have said that it would be mistake for me to be in any clique because I woud be destructive there. Nobody is less qualified for electoral politics than I am, because that requires an absolute obsession with leaving the right impression of ONESSELF and that most low and superficial of talents, remembering people’s NAMES.

Since Dale Carnegie people have freely admitted, even bragged, that they elect people to decide the future of their race and their children on the basis of whether a person remembers their NAMES, whether a person made sure they weren’t personally insulted. I would rather be accused of about anything than to admit that I let someone’s remembering my NAME determine the future!

No one else seems to consider that an insult. They say it is “human nature.” It’s sure as hell not the nature of THIS human. I think a human should have frontal lobe, not just a herd instinct. But REVEREND Dale Carnegie, the philosopher for psychopaths, said it was OK.

I have just recited a list of things above. Each would merit a book, but I have written all the books I plan to. Each of the observations I have made show how people have stopped being human, and not just in politics. I will use words to help make some of them human again.

I don’t need a faith or Judgement to make me act human. I judge myself every day. If I face a Judgement, I do not expect it will be an exam on the Old Testament or a test of how I followed any other theological BOOK. If God is THAT shallow, I don’t stand a chance anyway.