Living in my idyllic cocoon.

If it's necessary for America to go to war -- well, then let's institute the draft. Yes, conscription. Call it whatever you like. Make everybody eligible to go to war. Men and women. Old and young. Rich and poor. Even 76-year-old men like me. Thing is, if we had a draft, there would be less war. Maybe no war. Because relatively few people wanna go to war. Only a few volunteers. And some of the volunteers are crazy. Super patriots. Or just plain stupid. They don't have anything better to do. Some of 'em are sent into four, five and six combat tours. Occasionally, they go crazy. They go out and kill indicriminately. Execution-style. Just for the hell of it. Could be they don't even know what they're doing. Which is a definition of crazy. Unfortunately, there are so few volunteers that it's apparently necessary to send even the crazies into combat. Trained killers. Soldiers turned into killer robots. Sort of like drones. Push a button. And they go ahead and do the job. Machine-like. Without human conscience. Yes, folks, we've come to that. We have computerized war. Made it a video game. We can kill the enemy in Afghanistan merely by pushing a button on a computer in Nevada. We even kill our own American citizens with drones. Merely because we suspect that they may be collaborating with the enemy. No court or legal proceedings. The decision is made by some political hack. We allow our nation to get away with murder. Maybe because we are exempted from doing the killing ourselves. No draft. No conscription. We close our minds to what's going on. Or we're like me. I know what's going on. But I keep telling myself, not much I can do about it. I'm only a powerless individual. I have no control over the big picture. I merely rant and rave. In my blog. And get on with my life. Living with my Italian true love. In my idyllic cocoon. While the rest of the world goes into rot and decay. --Jim Broede

Maybe on a wind-blown home run.

I've been listening to the wind today. Out on the Sonoran Desert. It was a completely quiet day. Until I heard the wind. Talking to me. In pleasant, meaningful ways. The wind asked me to turn and tilt my head. And to listen. Intently. The wind spoke loudly. And whistled. Directly into my ear. Then the wind mussed up my hair. In a playful way. And whispered. Sweet nothings. Gave me a caress, too. Felt like a feminine touch. With a cooling comfort. Right there on the usually hot desert. It was a cool front. Riding the wind. All the way from Northern California. Tomorrow will be 20 degrees cooler than yesterday. But not the bone-chilling cold I'm used to in Minnesota. Enough for me to don a jacket or sweater. It helps, too, that the wind brought in overcast skies. But no rain. Maybe rain tomorrow. But I hope not. I'm to be at the ballpark. Presumably to see the Cubs beat the White Sox. Maybe on a wind-blown home run. --Jim Broede

Yes, we deserve each other.

I've learned to treat myself nicely. But it's amazing how many people I know that don't treat themselves nicely. It's almost as if they dislike themselves. So they inflict punishment. On themselves. Strange, isn't it? Throughout my whole life I've known such people. My mother. My father. My sister. My brother. And so many others. I treat myself as a VIP -- a very important person. Why not? I deserve such treatment. Because I'm special. Maybe that sounds egotistical. But that doesn't bother me. Better that than people I know with low self-esteems. They often harm themselves. Because they don't fully believe in themselves. Occasionally, I believe in others almost as deeply as I believe in myself. That goes for the two true loves I've had in my life. Of course, that goes for my current Italian true love. I want her to believe in herself. And she pretty much does. Though like most people, she may have an occasional doubt. But she shouldn't. She's got everything that's essential in life. Including love. I treat myself nicely. By wooing her. I deserve her. And she deserves me. That's the way I look at it. Yes, we deserve each other. No doubt about it. --Jim Broede

Now he knows where Sardinia is.

Sat next to a guy at the baseball game today. And he started the conversation. I like that. Usually, I'm the instigator. He's from California. Lived there all his life. And he's just retired. Which is good. Because he doesn't look old enough to retire. Spent 36 years as a fire fighter. With the Los Angeles Fire Department. That's one of the last cities I'd want to live in. But the life there seemed to do him good. He's a Los Angeles Dodgers fan. But he was pretending to be a faithful San Francisco Giants fan. Because the Chicago Cubs were playing the Giants, and his wife and in-laws, seated next to him, are Giants fans. 'So I make off as if I'm for the Giants,' he said, 'to keep peace and harmony in the family.' He even cheered when a Cubs player hit a home run. 'I like to see home runs,' he said. He wanted to know where I'm from. I gave my usual spiel. That I divide my time between Sardinia/Italy and Minnesota. He had no idea where Sardinia is. But he knows now. And that I'm America's goodwill ambassador to Sardinia, home of my Italian true love. --Jim Broede

The easiest path to happiness.

Maybe there's only one person I can make happy. Me. Ultimately, happiness stems from an attitude. An individual attitude. I see so very many unhappy people. But seems to me they don't have to be unhappy. They choose to. I've struck this theme often. Right here in my blog. Because I'm fascinated by the concept of happiness. It's one of my major pursuits. I can't stand to be unhappy. If I'm down in the dumps, so to speak, I find my way out. Pronto. I try to make other people happy. Mainly my friends. But I can't do it. They have to resolve to be happy. Themselves. I can't instill happiness in anyone but myself. I can suggest ways to become happy. But I can't impose happiness in another being. I know people that go into the doldrums. Frequently. Some of 'em would like to pull me down with them. But I refuse to go. Because it's against my nature. Maybe the miserably unhappy want company. Well, I give 'em company. But my kind of company. Happy stuff. Take it or leave it. It's their choice. Always their choice. I'm a good listener. Because I like to psychoanalyze people. Especially unhappy people. Odd as it may seem, unhappiness makes some people sort of happy. They're masochists. They like to punish themselves. That's sort of sick. But hey, to each his/her own. For me, the easiest path to happiness is to fall in love. With someone. Or with something. I've been in love with life for a long, long time. --Jim Broede

More than anything, I'm a dreamer.

American-style capitalism. Seems to me that some day, the world will look upon American-style capitalism as immoral. Just takes time for it to sink in. That it ain't right. That it's downright corrupting. Unfair. Because it promotes a relatively few getting rich. At the expense of the many. Encourages a wide gap between the rich and the poor. Survival of the richest. Capitalists, of course, keep arguing that everybody has the opportunity to get rich, monetarily speaking. But there are other ways of getting rich. By shunning monetary wealth. That guy Jesus. Didn't he say something about it? About a rich hombre's chances of getting into Nirvana or Valhalla. About the same odds as a camel passing through the eye of a needle. Millionaires and billionaires seem to ignore that. They think it's possible to buy one's way into Paradise. Maybe they know more than Jesus. I'm not sure that I do. I ain't a Christian. And I doubt that Jesus would be a Christian today. In the modern-day sense. Maybe that's why I choose not to be a Christian. Or for that matter, choose to avoid any form of organized religion. I'm a free-thinker. A freelance monotheist. I'm my own man. Think of myself as a romantic idealist. A liberal. A lover. A dreamer. Yes, I dream of the day when capitalism is scrapped. No longer a viable economic system. Won't happen in my physical lifetime. But hey, maybe it's a possibility in a spiritual paradise. In a place where there's no moola. Where the spiritual life prevails. Goes to show that maybe more than anything else, I'm a dreamer. --Jim Broede

Doing the right thing.

Sorry if this offends rich people. I want them to pay more to support the rest of us. For the common good. I want more social programs. For those of us who choose not to be rich, monetarily speaking. I want everyone moreorless guaranteed the basic necessities of life. Shelter. Decent medical care. A good education. A pension/social security. And let's tax everyone to make this possible. But let's especially tax the rich. I have nothing against the rich staying rich. But maybe not as rich as they are now. Just a little less rich. To make all this possible. Yes, I'm for redistributing some of the wealth. Because some rich people and big corporations are reaping obscene profits. And exploiting the underclasses. America isn't a poor nation. There's plenty of wealth. But it's mostly in the hands of relatively few people. The millionaires and the billionaires. They have far more than they need. So let's spread it around. In ways that benefit society as a whole. Serving the common good. I know this isn't a popular idea with the wealthy. But it's the right thing to do. --Jim Broede