This might be the understanding of the American mind.

My AOL somehow sends ALL my email to spam.  Don’t even try to solve that problem.  But I sloshed through all my spam looking for communications I applied for.  Well it became time consuming.

So I decided to UNSUBSCRIBE to emails every day for a month.  I do not know the answer to my suspicion and you may actually know more about the internal workings.  It appears that when an advertiser gets hold of your email they might then sell your email yet again. This allows them the legal right to say you solicited them.  Like the Bible says, Book Club begat Viagra begat feminine products begat any product sold by Amazon begat you get the idea.

Based on the resistance I receive from UNSUBSCRIBING, there must be some financial reward with the number of subscribers (willing or unwilling)

First the UNSUBSCRIBE button is in small letters on the bottom of the ad.  Oftentimes is will say click here next to a group of other click heres.  Seems like they are trying to confuse you.  Then sometimes the print color is faded and difficult to see.  Sometimes they place a big UNSUBSCRIBE button because they know you are looking for small print.

There are a bunch of sites from foreign countries (I believe they are foreign because they make common spelling mistakes that even the most impaired Americans would not)  Their gimmick is to advertise using a different email address several times a day.  This way you can’t block them and they do not have an UNSUBSCRIBE button.  What gets me is how they might think I would ever order a product from them with this overt technique.

Then I receive these personal job ads that are American based but also do not have an UNSUBSCRIBE button.  They also use multiple emails making it difficult to block.  What is their thinking, “Here you must take this job!”.  But I filter them as they come in figuring they might run out of names.

There must be some kind of UNSUBSCRIBE cottage industry because some sites send to a page that looks similar.  I say looks because  butthe tricks they use to keep you from leaving the sites are mention worthy.

Some sites just say press here and then say something like Thank You or Sorry To See You Go. I feel guilty and sad when I leave.  Not.

Some sites try the guilt thing by pointing out that you requested the email and We Miss You Already or  Press here and reorganize the amount of mail you receive from us.  They place roadblocks from you getting to that UNSUBSCRIBE button.

It seems strange that I don’t remember requesting advertising on feminine products but they are there.  If I want to UNSUBSCRIBE I have to enable links.  Funny I don’t enable links to view the ads I didn’t request but I have to do this to UNSUBSCRIBE.  Then I realize that in some cases pressing the enable links button resets the ad to the top, taking me away from the UNSUBSCRIBE button.  Some sites don’t do this.  The ones that do have a convoluted process that may not even say UNSUBSCRIBE, instead using the Manage Preferences, Manage Account or contact us.

In some cases the UNSUBSCRIBE page makes me type out my email.  Other pages allow my computer to inject the email.  Some send you to a page requesting you reconsider because you did request these ads.  They cleverly place a RESUBMIT button above the lighter shaded UNSUBSCRIBE button.

Then a friend tells me (do not know this to be accurate) that because of the cascade of names sold to advertisers, they increase the ads because they now know you are there.  Sounds like the government.

I will persist.  I found that I really don’t want to share information because I can’t control things.  So I will change my email provider.  They actually are the basis of their own demise as people can only take so much. (apparently me more than others)

I dropped off of FaceBook but they are really sneaky.

I realize how effective the advertising adage of “stay in their face” is and theydeception they will go through to keep you there.  Like voters they don’t get it.

My dad had a very quiet way.  Until he retired.  He became an opinionated, in your face kind of guy.  I stood amazed at the transformation.  He said what was on his mind and he did not hold back.

Today I sat with older people who said they noticed similar changes in their parents.  It sounded like not all the opinions expressed by the parents did not have the desired results of the children.

Then I thought of my nurse friend from Texas who grew up a die hard liberal.  She believed that everyone should share equally, she wore clothes that reflected her generational stance.  Then she wanted a car and a house and went to work for the “establishment.”  She became a conservative and now rants against the liberal thinkers.

She does not like the amount of taxes and how it’s spent.  I pointed out that the Congress is a Republican Congress.  She fired back, “Are you stupid.  They behaved the same way when they had a Democrat Congress only worse.  They have an ideology centered around money and greed.”

“So why are you a conservative?” I asked.

“It’s not a party.  It’s a way of thought you moron,”  she said.

“Please explain,” I said. I felt bad at the non PC moron comparison, but I adjusted.

“Even liberals have conservative values, like me.  When they get older they see how stupidly they fell for all this media stuff.  They start saying what they really think before they die, but it is too late.  The financial/social idiots have control.  Just like in all the global takeovers,”  she said.  She did not spare my ignorance.  I had the flashback to my dad speaking his mind and me speaking (meekly) my thoughts.

It dawned on me that we were speaking about conceptual blending.  A truly human ability. To take a concept and merge it with another concept and form a new blended concept.  The problem comes in when one does not have a firm concept to begin with or a concept that is tainted.

In discussing this with her I brought up religion.  She acknowledged that the minority of religious views shown through the media have this tainted view of nearly everything.  “Can’t even do math without it being a gift from God,” she added.  She continued, “The narrow mindedness of the far right pales to the narrow mindedness of the left — not the far left, just the left,” she said.

“Explain,” I said as now I became interested.

There is a tolerance on the right, even among the religions, except for those nut jobs on the far right.  Just their existing is proof of the right’s tolerance.  But there is no tolerance at all for anything on the left.  It’s their agenda or nothing,” she gulped for air.  “Bush did things wrong so they elect a guy who is a muslim, who never had a job and he does what Bush did only with numbers that are horrifying.  And people have no jobs, he lies about the numbers, no wages to support the crazy spending and when the Congress tries to thwart the insanity, people claim its because of racism.”

“So what are you saying?”  I asked.

“The Left made Trump.  They have lied so much that when a person comes along and tells what he thinks and it’s the truth, he appears refreshing.  He may be real hope and change.  When the heavily flawed ACA comes about they will blame whoever is in office and not put the stupidity for that abomination where it belongs.”

This made me think and what I think is politically incorrect.

“establishment”

We, as Americans, have a war on everything.  We have a war on wage inequality, a war on drugs, a war on sexual preference, a war on racial interests, a war on religious beliefs, a war on women’s rights, even a war on correctness.

Rather than say that’s stupid or a political distraction (which it is) I want to go in a different direction.  I know that if something ever occurred to the United States, people would drop their need for wages, put aside their drugs. not care about the sex of the person beside them, hold hands with different colors, pray in the language of their neighbor, even allow for inappropriate behavior.  Because inside we are all Americans.

Why not show how good we are before something forces us to be real Americans

This quote from George Orwell unfolds before us.

I just watched Bernie Sanders get muscled off the podium by ywo girls from “Black Lives Matter.”  I like Bernie.  He tells us all the problems in a great way but he never gives a solution.  If he did I fear he’d back awat as he did from the force of the two girls.

Hillary Clinton has lied so much she makes Obama look like a truth sayer. Lying does not cost you an election as we have seen.  In fact, the fun in reading the news is the media spin on the truth.

Political correctness may have run its course and the pendulum might be swinging back.  The Donald does not say things that are politically correct but he is revolutionary in his words of truth.  He says what we are thinking.  There are some great lines ahead.

I used to be a Megyn Kelly fan.  Somehow I see as part of the system now.  She would have denigrated looking into someone’s past and cherry picking a statement about Rosie O’Donnell.  Hell, I’ve said that about O’Donnell and worse  The only other person who could change Washington is Ann Coulter but she’s not running.

We really could have Hope and Change.  But like Huxley said, you won’t like the truth.

Jimmy Durante a comedian, actor, singer from the 40s 50s and 60s used to sign off his performances with “Goodnight Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are”  I heard a story and I can’t confirm it but I wish it to be true(after all this is the internet)  that Durante worked as a door to door salesman in his youth.  He came to a house where he met a Mrs. Calabash who encouraged him to follow his dream.  He lost contact with the dear woman but never forgot her influence on his career and hence the shout out at all his performances.

We all have a Mrs. Calabash.  Some of us are fortunate enough to have more than one.  But there is always a special person.  Mine is my sophomore year of high school biology teacher.  He is long gone but I salute him daily.  Mr. Tabor here’s to you.

He made demands on young minds that are discouraged today as politically incorrect, possibly prohibited.  He used red ink, he gave failing grades, he asked how you came to not grasp the material (exposing your lies about doing your homework)  It wasn’t only what he said but the way he said it.  You’d of thought he was auditioning for a Shakespearean play.

He gave out daily quizzes to see if you were grasping your assignments.  He’d give out eight to ten true/false statements and he’d add, “If you get them all wrong, I’ll give you an A”  To some that seemed a reprieve.

He gave you the opportunity to look inside of yourself.  He hit a nerve in my development.  I try to imitate his language, his manner and his thought process.  All I come away with is me.  I think that’s what he wanted.

I’m sure each of us students came away with a different take on Mr. Tabor.  I wonder what life is for people who don’t have a Tabor or Calabash or worse a negative role model or who have a role model but don’t see it or acknowledge it.

Quite often it’s a teacher, a parent, or a friend.  So I bid you to acknowledge that one person who keeps creeping into your consciousness as an influence and acknowledge them for what they did for you.