Is 98% of America Still Racist? (part one)

I made an active decision long ago that I wouldn't be racist. That may sound strange.

Probably 98% of you would say the same thing. In fact, 98% of you probably are racist, just to a much lesser degree than people labeled as racist.

Ask Newt Gingrich if he's racist, he'll tell you absolutely not. Ask virtually any intellectual black man if Newt Gingrich is racist, he'll tell you yes, absolutely.

There are degrees of racism, and the most enlightened among us are the people who acknowledge our own pre-judgments and make an active choice to dismiss them.

Let's take a look at the most extreme examples of racism.

On the one extreme we have members of hate groups. Organized groups (such as the original Ku Klux Klan) that not only dislike members of other races, but make a significant effort to see that people of other races are put down or hampered in their efforts to live a normal life.

The worst of these extremists are genocidal. The attempted extermination of the Jewish people during the Nazi reign or the attempted genocide that occurred in Bosnia and in several places in Africa.

Ironically, most of the worst racism in history had little to do with what people identify as the critical racial marker, skin color. In Rwanda the shape of the nose was considered the racial marker between warring groups, yet many people from Europe would be incapable of telling the two groups apart visually. To most Americans it's difficult to distinguish between Israelis and Palestinians based on skin tone or features.

Many may say these aren't racial wars, there are wars between religious beliefs. But in fact, there were probably hundreds of thousands of Jews that hadn't been to synagogue in decades that were still murdered. Even back as far as feudal England, your heritage was more likely to get you killed than your belief in any particular higher power. Often certain religious denominations became attached to a group of people, or vice versa, but it wasn't a particular belief that would lead to your demise.

In America most of the racism follows skin color boundaries. European whites are different than Africans, who are different from the native Central Americans and North Americans. Most of the suppression isn't directly because of religion or skin color, it's more based on socioeconomic culture.

At one point in our history the division between socioeconomic groups was clear. There were those who owned slaves and those who were slaves. This is probably the most polar any group can be to another, when one of them considers the other as their possession. Slavery wasn't invented in America, but it certainly was perfected.

Since then we've come a long way. Unfortunately, it's been a slow journey. Society has gradually reduced racism in the mainstream. But we aren't finished yet.

President Obama is our first dark skinned president. I'm happy he has broken through that barrier, but it certainly doesn't mean racism is dead. It means that enough people in the country are willing to vote for a black man, who acts very much like upper-middle-class white people, to elect him. The President along with hundreds of thousands of other black men and women have successfully made the leap from socioeconomic suppression into the mainstream. However, there are lots of people of color that are strong leaders and highly intelligent, but still speak and act in a manner that more closely resembles a lower socioeconomic status, regardless of their actual level of wealth. These leaders are unlikely to get mass acceptance.

We haven't eliminated racism by electing a black person, but it is a significant step forward. My children will be voting for the first time in 2020. Hopefully, skintone of our national leaders will more closely resemble the demographics of this country. When that happens, the checkboxes for race on census forms will be completely irrelevant. I don't expect that much progress in the next eight years, however, what I do know is that an intelligent man or woman who is passionate and dedicated will be elected president, and the color of their skin will be far less important.

So, with all this progress, why do I still believe that 98% of Americans are racist? And, why is it that I believe I'm among the 2%?

It's late... I'm tired... and you have a few things to ponder so we will continue this discussion again soon. Meanwhile, share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Great Valentine's Day Gift Ideas For Men and Women

Some women know what men really want for Valentine's Day. This woman gave him a beautiful bouquet of bacon roses, a DVD and an Xbox 360 game. Most women would give their boyfriends some hot sex. While this is nice, let's face it, it's only about 11 minutes of pleasure. The bacon alone will last at least 15 minutes.

Men are guilty of this too. They buy chocolate or lingerie. What they're saying is they want their girlfriend to look sexy, but have no interest whatsoever in helping them stay that way. I'm thinking of getting my right a gym membership and a pair of sweatpants. It tells her,"I care about your health and your body, but I love you no matter what you look or dress like."

Think about Valentines from your lover's perspective. Get them what they desire, even if it's totally screwed up in your head!

Happy Valentine's Day to all the lovers out there!

Shop Women's Clothing at Amazon

The Strange Case of Origami Yoda

My son, Jason Andrew, just finished reading The Strange Case of Origami Yoda and the follow-up book in the series, Darth Paper Strikes Back: An Origami Yoda Book.

He loved both of them. He actually read them twice. In the books there are instructions to make Origami Yoda and Darth Paper.

Today I ran across the above photo of Origami Yoda. It's much more elaborate than the one they teach you to create in the books, but it's extremely cool. Jas' made about two dozen paper Darth Vader andYoda figures while he was reading the books.

Anyhow, if you are a nine-year-old boy in fourth grade you love them. If you are a 41-year-old guy who sometimes acts like a fourth grader, you'll also love these books.

If you'd like to purchase them, consider doing it from Amazon using my links.  I think I earn about $.40 per book which go into the Jason's Million Project.

Description from Amazon

In this funny, uncannily wise portrait of the dynamics of a sixth-grade class and of the greatness that sometimes comes in unlikely packages, Dwight, a loser, talks to his classmates via an origami finger puppet of Yoda. If that weren’t strange enough, the puppet is uncannily wise and prescient. Origami Yoda predicts the date of a pop quiz, guesses who stole the classroom Shakespeare bust, and saves a classmate from popularity-crushing embarrassment with some well-timed advice. Dwight’s classmate Tommy wonders how Yoda can be so smart when Dwight himself is so clueless. With contributions from his puzzled classmates, he assembles the case file that forms this novel.

Friday Funnies: Losing Husbands and Wives

Lost Wives

Two guys, one middle age, one young are pushing their carts around Walt-Mart when they collide.

The middle age guy says to the young guy, 'Sorry about that. I'm looking for my wife, and I guess I wasn't paying attention to where I was going.

The young guy says, 'That's OK, it's a coincidence. I'm looking for my wife, too. I can't find her and I'm getting a little desperate.'

The middle age guy says, 'Well, maybe I can help you find her. What does she look like?'

The young guy says, 'Well, she is 27 yrs old, tall, with red hair, blue eyes, is buxom wearing no bra, long legs, and is wearing short shorts. What does your wife look like?'
To which the middle age guy says, 'Doesn't matter, --- let's look for yours.' 


Lost Husband

A married couple had been out shopping at the mall for most of the afternoon.

Suddenly, the wife realized that her husband had disappeared. The somewhat irate spouse called her mate's cell phone and demanded: "Where the heck are you?"

Husband: "Darling, you remember that Jewelry Shop where you saw the diamond necklace and totally fell in love with it and I didn't have money that time and said, 'Baby, it'll be yours one day'?"

Wife, with a smile, blushing: "Yes I remember that, my love."

Husband: "Well, I'm in the Pub next to that shop." 

The Honeymooners

Roger, 85, married Jenny, a lovely 25 year old.

Since her new husband is so old, Jenny decides that after their wedding she and Roger should have separate bedrooms, because she is concerned that her new but aged husband may over-exert himself if they spend the entire night together.

After the wedding festivities Jenny prepares herself for bed and the expected knock on the door.

Sure enough the knock comes, the door opens and there is Roger, her 85 year old groom, ready for action. They unite as one.

All goes well, Roger takes leave of his bride, and she prepares to go to sleep.

After a few minutes, Jenny hears another knock on her bedroom door, and it's Roger.

Again he is ready for more 'action'. Somewhat surprised, Jenny consents for more coupling.

When the newlyweds are done, Roger kisses his bride, bids her a fond good night and leaves.

She is set to go to sleep again, but, aha, you guessed it - Roger is back again, rapping on the door and is as fresh as a 25-year-old, ready for more 'action'.

And, once more they enjoy each other.

But as Roger gets set to leave again, his young bride says to him, 'I am thoroughly impressed that at your age you can perform so well and so often. I have been with guys less than a third of your age who were only good once. You are truly a great lover, Roger.'

Roger, somewhat embarrassed, turns to Jenny and says: 'You mean I was here already?'

The moral of the story: Don't be afraid of getting old, memory loss has its advantages.

Friday Funnies: a couple LOLcats and one shameless plug

Is this the new flavor at Kungaloosh Gourmet Tea Company?

Rapid Weight Loss is a Myth

Today on Facebook one of my friends was talking about how he lost 15 pounds in the past seven days, and was so proud he was going to reward himself with a good meal.

He had been on a liquid diet, drinking only juices.

For his privacy, I've removed his name, but I want to share with you what I wrote to him. One of my biggest pet peeves is that there is an entire industry that has been created around weight loss. Books, pills, diet aids, specialty foods, juice machines and gastric surgery all have one thing in common. They lie to you about weight loss, and they have no motivation to actually cure you.

My Facebook friend (whom I don't know in real life) is going to enjoy a good meal and hop on his scale tomorrow to discover a 3 or 4 pound weight gain. This misinformation is going to convince him that juicing is working and food is bad.

What's really happening is his body is reacting to the changing intake. He was getting unlimited water, and his body was letting it go immediately. Now that he's eating again, his body will start retaining some of that liquid just in case it's needed later. A quart of liquid weighs over 2 pounds.

Anyhow, here is the note that I sent to my friend.

-- --


I saw your post about losing weight. Congratulations.

I just want to caution you not to overdo it. My wife lost 85 pounds and it took her over 18 months.

To lose 15 pounds of fat, you'd have to burn 49,500 calories in a week. For a 200 pound man, this would be over 70 hours walking briskly on a treadmill nonstop.

To lose 15 in a week means that most of the loss was water and intestinal cleansing. This is okay, but not sustainable.

Realistically you should be able to lose between 1 and 2 pounds weekly. This is somewhere between 500 and 900 extra calories daily. This way you can eat 2000 and burn 2500 to 2900, and have consistent weight loss.

This is the only way to lose weight and maintain your health.

If you currently weigh more than 400 pounds, you can about double that rate safely.

A crash diet is okay, and good to cleanse your body, but don't deprive yourself of nutrition. And don't expect that this pace can last, even for a little while.

I know we don't know each other, and I don't want to overstep, but I'm continually frustrated by the diet industry continually lying to people.

There are no secrets to losing weight. It's pure physics...

It takes X quantity of energy to move X quantity of mass over X quantity of distance within a period of time. It's the same calculation for the human body, a gasoline engine, or a rocket ship.

It requires heat energy (calories), to move mass (your body), a given distance in a given period of time (exercise). Weighing more, moving faster, or reducing caloric intake affect weight loss but absolutely nothing else does over the long-term.

Ignore super foods, diet pills, metabolism myths, etc.

I see you've been juicing. That's fine short-term, but it's a trick to rinse your body of fluids and bile. You will lose weight, but after a few days you were also drain your potassium and sodium and have no energy. Your body reacts to your reduced potassium by decreasing muscle tone. You may have heard of people who have died from excessive water intake? This is potassium shock. Juice is less damaging than water but will eventually have the same effect.

Drink juice because you liked it and it's better than the empty calories of soda, etc. but it patches a symptom, it isn't the solution.

I wish you best on your journey toward better health. My wife is currently 37, and she is in better health than she was in eighth grade.

My best,

Jason

Bachelor Casserole

Tonight I made my kids "Bachelor Casserole" something I used to eat a long time ago. It's super easy, super cheap, it almost tastes like real food.

I stole this photo from the web, but it's kind of similar.

Here's the recipe: Bachelor Casserole

Ingredients:

• Two bags of Ramen noodles (I used creamy chicken)
• one can of condensed soup (cheesy broccoli was in the cupboard)
• one can of meat (chunk chicken in this case)
• fresh vegetable (clearly optional)
• breadcrumbs (to make it look like real food, again optional)

When I was a bachelor Ramen noodles were only $.10 apiece. A can of condensed soup was about a quarter, and a can of meat was less than $1.00. For about a buck and a half I could make four meals.

Step #1  -- Cook the Ramen noodles. The flavor doesn't really matter, because the flavor packets are optional. This way you can make this beef noodles with a can of tuna if you want.

Step #3 -- Drain off most of the water and add the condensed soup. Cream of Something works best. Again, it doesn't really matter. I used cheesy broccoli only because it was in my cupboard and it would go well with the fresh broccoli and had in the fridge.

Step #3.1 -- Add the meat. I usually used tuna, but cans of turkey or chicken work well too. I never tried canned ham or spam, but it's probably similar. Corned beef hash is awesome with eggs, but I don't think I'd try it here.

Step #3.2 -- Stir until it's mixed thoroughly and warm throughout.

Step #2 -- You probably should have been cooking your veggies, but let's face it, you probably wouldn't have read all of the instructions as a bachelor, so you're not really behind.

I added veggies because I have children. If you're under 30 veggies are truly an option because nothing can kill you. If you're over 30, you discovered that maybe a vegetable would have been a good idea in your 20s. If you're over 40 like me, you miss the days when you could put anything in your stomach without waking up at 2:30 in the morning needing to take a shit. (If you think I'm joking, check out the timestamp on this blog entry.)

You can boil, steam, or microwave your veggies to soften them a bit.

You probably don't have breadcrumbs if you're a bachelor, but if you do sprinkling them on top will make it look less like whatever was in your stomach after a drinking binge. Again, if you're below 30 you rarely look at your food, so breadcrumbs are optional.

You can add seasoning if you want. I threw a little garlic powder on top tonight, because, well it's garlic. Oregano, salt and pepper and bacon bits have also been used in the past. Warning: adding spices can make it seem like actual cooking.

Step #4 -- Dump the slop into a flat dish. A pie pan is good, casserole dish, whatever; we know you're limited.

Step #5 -- I sprinkled the breadcrumbs and broccoli on top, but you could stir the veggies in. Whatever.

Step #6 -- I baked it for about half an hour. Again, pretty much everything was cooked before you started, so you just need to bake it until it looks right. Don't worry about the temperature setting, because you probably don't know how to use the fancy dials anyhow. For women, bake at 350 for 30-40 minutes.

You don't have to bake it, but I think it tastes a little better.

Step #7 -- Let it sit for about half an hour if you want it to be able to slice it, otherwise grab a spoon and dig in. If you're actually a bachelor, grab a big spoon and sit down in front of the television. At this point you realize the bottom is hot so you should probably grab a hot pad, a dish towel, or put on some pants.

If you're cooking for your girlfriend, make sure you don't want to marry this one, because this dish isn't going to score you any points. But if she's just a girl, you probably want to break out the plates so you don't look like a douche.

If you have kids and your wife isn't home, one big bowl and three spoons makes you Awesome Dad.

Enjoy your new cuisine...