Showing posts with label Pope Francis. Show all posts

Saturday, March 15, 2014

A Week in Review - March 15th, 2014

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Daniel Hanning of The Other Shoe[/caption]

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Welcome back My Dear Readers to The Other Shoe. If it is Saturday then it is time for ‘A Week in Review’ here at The Other Shoe! Even with my health giving me fits, I managed to publish six articles, including this article. We saw another episode of ‘The Horror in Smithville’ and the very first edition of my introduction to the darker side of the web, The Deep Web. So, before my fever gets any higher, and without further adieu I bring you this week’s edition of ‘A Week in Review’!

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· Sunday Funnies – March 9th, 2014 : “Welcome back My Dear Readers to The Other Shoe. It is 9PM on Saturday March 8^th, 2014. I have been sitting here and working on my blog… ‘A Week in Review’… an update article… adding a video to an already posted article… and corrections to ‘The Horror in Smithville” for the past FIVE HOURS! I am extremely tired and the pain in my neck is horrific. The only reason that I am writing this right now… not waiting until Sunday… If I can finish it today and get it posted and scheduled for publication? I can REST until Sunday afternoon!” With gunk building in my chest, and flirting with a regular fever. I do not think there will be a ‘’Sunday Funnies’ for you to enjoy this Sunday. Apologies all around, and things could change… Let’s see if Alexander engages in any antics, tonight!

· March 10th Personal/Medical Update and Blog Status : “My Dear Readers just prior to the first onset of my respiratory infection? The traffic at just the primary location of my blog was peaking at about 150 visitors per week. That is an average of twenty visitors per day, but some days (of course) saw more traffic. I understand… I accept the reality of blogging. I understand the fickle nature of traffic and the genuine need of people for new content. Whereas I do not mean to judge, really I am the same way. I am a ‘news junkie’ and I read three to four different sources for news every single day. Not six months ago I would watch MSNBC non-stop from 7AM until 7PM six days a week.” Since I published this update, earlier this week, my condition has not improved. I am looking for a doctor, with an open appointment soon. Once I see an infectious disease specialist, and get their results. I will publish what has crawled inside me, and turned into death.

· Introduction to The Deep Web – Part One : “The Deep Web is the other part of the internet (world wide web) that most of you, My Dear Readers, have never (and will likely never need to) access The Deep Web. Now, you may well ask “How do you know if I have, or haven’t, used The Deep Web?” Good question answered quite easily. Have you installed ‘Tor’ on you computer? If you answered “No” then I am correct that you have never accessed The Deep Web. Conversely, if you answered either “Yes” or “Not Tor, but another Deep Web Browser” then I was incorrect in my statement.” The Deep Web is not for the average user, and one can really get taken advantage of in short order if care is not exercised. Next week I will go over some precautions that you can take to protect you while venturing into this darker corner of the World Wide Web.

· The Horror in Smithville – Part Two : “We are getting to know Timmy and Archer, and the Marref family, in these first few pages. Currently, we are building to the much-anticipated ‘Marref Family Chicken Dinner’. To be followed, shortly thereafter, with an evening of a little homework, a little television, then off to bed… and an extended night of talking and planning under the cover of darkness… and their respective beds.” Welcome to the second episode of my venture into the horror genre. AS it clearly states here, we are getting to know all about our main characters, twain. In next week’s episode… perhaps some horror we shall read? Only one way to know for sure, be there and read!

· Pope Francis – First year as Pontiff : “Yesterday, on the event of the anniversary of his first year as the Vicar of Christ, Pope Francis tweeted “Please pray for me” to his millions of followers. I, personally, received his tweet… and immediately answered his request. My Dear Readers, for all of you that knew me; in Pearland, in college, as a young man, and even in Colorado Springs, you know that I am not a religious man. I have attended church, off and on, all my life. I have attended; Lutheran churches, Methodist churches, The Church of Christ, The Church of England, and even three different synagogues. However, there is something different about Pope Francis. Something that speaks to me on a very base level, he speaks to my soul.” Pope Francis is the single most timely Pope in modern times. His messages about; financial inequality, the fallacy of ‘Trickle Down Economics’ and America’s love affair with greed are much needed. While a vocal few will take pot shots at this Pope, and still other’s prattle how “He’s not my Pope”, all in vain efforts to avoid the truth. Time will tell that this man… this Pope dared to lecture mankind, and one nation in particular, about the disgusting level of greed and corresponding poverty.

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With that, My Dear Readers, I leave. Leave to get some much-needed rest, and even to sleep. My health just keeps failing me, yet I will push and work to bring as much as I can in any given week. This blog means the world to me, as all of you do, too. Hopefully, soon, I will know the source of my malady.

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I will be here, next week… and the week after, too. Here’s to another great week right here at The Other Shoe!

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As always I am deeply honored that you come here and read my works.

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Thank YOU!

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The Other Shoe eBay Store[/caption]

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The Other Shoe's Daniel Hanning[/caption]

Monday, November 18, 2013

Pope Francis Schools Palin and Buchanan

Welcome back My Dear Readers to The Other Shoe! It appears as though I HAVE MY BLOG BACK WORKING! I just now noticed @ 9:15PM Monday November 18th, 2013. I am going to start writing and posting as much as I can, starting tomorrow. However, I just HAD to share something I read about Pope Francis. This new Pope is one I can really get behind. He is a Pope of the People! If I were Catholic, I would be very proud to call him Pope. Now, to the point of this posting.

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Yesterday, on the Blog for His Holiness, Pope Francis gave Sarah Palin and Pat Buchanan a Holy Bitch-Slap! He took on these wanna-be 'Conservative Poosers' and took them to Sunday School. Here is what he said about Pat Buchanan:

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"This is a man who has dabbled in Holocaust denial and has a documented history of anti-Semitism,” Francis wrote. “Of course he doesn’t want the Church to become more inclusive. He’d probably like it if we segregated mass services from now on.”

“Opening up the Church to all of God’s children is the just and moral thing to do,” Francis continued, “and I won’t be persuaded otherwise, especially by a man who couldn’t even beat Bob Dole in the ’96 Republican primaries."¹

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After soundly taking Pat to the wood shed, he then turned his brilliance and holy wrath on Sarah (I cannot even complete ONE term of an elected office) Palin:

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"The Holy See also had harsh words for former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, another of his American conservative critics. Palin—who, unlike Buchanan, is not a Catholic—said Thursday that she is “taken aback” by some of Francis’s decisions and is dismayed by his “liberal” comments.

“What does Palin know about leadership?” Francis wondered. “This is a woman who couldn’t even make it through one term as governor of Alaska before resigning, and who, let’s be honest, was probably the worst vice presidential nominee in American history.”

Francis also questioned Palin’s grasp of religious tenets. “I’m not convinced she knows the first thing about the Bible,” Francis wrote. “In fact, I’m not even confident that she knows how to read.”²

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Oy Vey!

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“In fact, I’m not even confident that she knows how to read.” (Sarah Palin by Pope Francis)

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Well, my birthday is not until Wednesday... but the Pope just gave me my BEST Brithday present two days EARLY!!

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I am thrilled to see that the Pope has the courage to take on these purveyors of hatred and ignorant rhetoric. Perhaps, now, many more American writers and journalists can take cover (with the Pope's words) and come out and lambast these ignorant rehtoric parrots. It is about time that this ilk were soundly put in their place. So very happy that I lived to see this wonder of God.

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As I mentioned above, it appears that my primary blog is back up and running properly. Now, I will start work on publishing more content on a more regular basis. My health is slowly improving, and I apologize for allowing my pain and fevers to keep me away from you, My Dear Readers. Thank you for your understanding and support. See you, more, soon.

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As always, I am deeply honored that you come here and read my work.

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Thank you!

EDIT: This article is satire. The 'news' source is a pseudo new site, meant for laughs. I apologize to all that may have not known of this web site, or that this article was satire.

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1. - http://www.newslo.com/pope/#sthash.vuNkAlPN.dpuf

2. http://www.newslo.com/pope/#sthash.vuNkAlPN.dpuf

Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Unbridled Capitalism vs. Human Strife

Welcome back, My Dear Readers, to The Other Shoe. Today I am going to write about a concern I am facing with regarding my publications at The Other Shoe. I like to write about news and policy that strikes a personal note, to me. Policy that effects my life, or the lives of people close to me. For the past three years I have written articles on a myriad of subjects. I have never written any article just to lambast a party or political party member.

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I do not write articles to bias anyone. I do my best to write articles that are, at their core, unbiased. I avoid writing about junk ‘news’ or who is investigating whom. I do not hide the fact that my personal politics are ‘progressive’. I admire President Teddy Roosevelt and President Franklin D. Roosevelt (coincidence or what?) It is my heartfelt belief that America is built on the shoulders of the working class. I believe that concentrating wealth is a ‘Bad Thing’ and has resulted in two major economic downturns (The Great Depression and The Great Recession) have brought economic strife through out our great land.

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. I am not alone, in that school of thought. As a matter of fact, the majority of ‘Ivy League’ and non-religious (secular) economists agree. Wealth, in America, is built from the ground, up! I also think that our nation’s overall health can be judged by how well the least of us are doing. That America, like many other great civilizations (ancient Athens, Rome, Egypt to name a few) is built by the lower and Middle class. That without health, and a certain amount of wealth, in these working classes your nation will collapse.

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I learned, in college, history of many past civilizations. There does need to be a wealthy and or ruling class, but without the poor and Middle class’s wealth in mind? Your civilization will collapse. I do not, however, believe that any people should be allowed to take advantage of programs for the; poor, seniors and the disabled. I do not think they should become a way of life. (As a side-note, there are more studies that show this phenomenon is less common than certain politicians claim). I do not believe in Social Darwinism. That just reeks of White Supremacy and Ruling RACE ideals. I have read Ayn Rand’s ‘Atlas Shrugged’ and ‘The Fountainhead’. I have also read L. Ron Hubbard’s ‘Dianeticis’.

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Having said, I no more believe Objectivism any more than I believe that aliens are responsible for all our ‘Bad Emotions’. I was born to, and raised, in a genuine Middle Class family in the 1960’s and 70’s. We were not rich, but we never went without. In my life I have lived.. poorly. With little income and living hand-to-mouth. I have also had the great fortune and (with hard work) lived and worked in Beverly Hills! I have saved money, often, in my life. I had quite a bit of savings, when I was struck with this malady. I hated that, in fact, I went through it faster than it took to save. When I first got ill and could not work.

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I do not think it is good for our country for millions of Americans to be homeless. I do not think it is in the best interest of our nation’s future for children to go hungry in the single wealthiest nation in the history of mankind. Regardless of why the child’s family does not have money for food? The child should never go hungry. Period. Neither do I believe that a child of three or four should weigh a hundred pounds (or more). Aye, there’s the rub! See, like a ‘canary-in-a-coal-mine’ I think there is an social… natural indicator of something institutionally wrong. That in one single neighborhood there can be a child nearly starving, going to bed every night hungry. And two blocks over, there is a child the exact same age and they are morbidly obese. THAT, My Dear Readers, is like a canker sore for everyone to see. This, obviously to me, is a sign of an underlying illness (sociologic and economic) much in need of a cure.

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However, like mankind’s shift from the polytheisms of ancient man, to today’s monotheism. The cure of which I speak would be as; difficult, instrumental, and world shaping. Imagine that, for just a moment. For the past two millennium (two thousand years) mankind (for the most part) now believe in the monotheism of One True God.

However, for nearly ten times the length in time (it is estimated that mankind worshipped many ‘God’(s) for roughly twenty thousand years) polytheism was the truth!

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We all learned of the Grecian ‘God’(s); Zeus, Athena and Apollo to name just a few.[1] These “God’(s) were worshipped for nearly a thousand years. (from 800 BC to 200-300 AD)[2] In the land of Ur (ancient Mesopotamia) dates back to 3,800 BC and in Ur they were polytheists that believed in Gods in the sky. The father of Abraham (the father of the Hebrew faith, and the beginning of Monotheism) was a maker of statues of these ‘Gods. It was Abraham that is the single man that set in motion the change, for all mankind, the shift from polytheism to our modern day monotheism. The Hebrew Bible (the Torah - Tanakh) was the very first book of its type.[3] The very first time mankind had written down the stories that made up their faith.

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Mankind has not always believed in “One True God”. In reality mankind has spent more millennium convinced that there were many ‘Gods’ than mankind has spent practicing monotheism. That’s right! We, the people of this planet, are new to this monotheism. It took a thousand years, for this new religion to take root. Many millions of the followers of; Judaism, Christianity and other monotheistic religions DIED in the pursuit of this new faith. This faith that taught “One God rules all things” and not what had been worshipped and believe for ten times two-fold millennium before. However, here we are in a world where practitioners of polytheism are referred to as pagans. A world where billions of human beings believe in the ‘One True God’ be his/her name be; Yahweh, God or Allah.

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It is this kind of monumental change mankind is facing, today. Capitalism is actually kind of new. It is not always been the engine that drove commerce. For a time, not so long ago, England and Spain built these huge Armadas. Fleets of ships that roved the seas. They would do some exploring, but that was not the reason for their existence. These huge fleets of ships, these Armadas, were built for one reason. Theft!

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Each country used their armada to steal gold and spices and treasures from the ‘New World’ going back to Europe. This was from around the later part of the Sixteenth century and the beginning of the Seventieth. For several decades… and I found this so flipping amazing when I studied it in college… These two World Powers actually considered stealing from each other ‘Commerce’. They based their entire economies on trading wealth back and forth. Looking back across time… it is pretty nearly hilarious. However, at the time it was happening? They were deadly serious. They were stealing gold and artifacts from cultures they conquered and killed (not creating anything, just killing and stealing). Then, as they were brining these treasure back (again, stolen loot) the opposing faction would attack and steal (yet again) the ill-gotten loot.

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OK So, you see, back in the latter sixteenth century and well into the seventieth the two largest powers on the planet Earth built their whole economies on theft! The Spaniards would steal from the Incans. While taking the gold and treasure back from the New World the English would raid their ships and steal the loot stolen from the Incans. Then, when the Spanish royal family was low on loot, and just couldn’t get a ship home with the stolen loot. Then the Spaniards would take their armada and steal back the stolen Incan loot. Round and round this went, for several decades, until one day one side woke up and decided that this economic model is unsustainable.

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My point is that this seemed, for a time, a perfectly normal and viable engine for commerce. Just as the monotheist looks back on polytheism and thinks to themselves how stupid (FYI this is reflected in the tradition of ‘April Fools’ – Pagan vs. Christian). We now look back on the circle of theft that sustained huge Armadas as foolishness. It is in my heart of hearts that do believe that one day (and it may be soon) mankind will look back on the capitalism as the same kind of cannibalistic engine for an economy. That capitalism was an improper and even immoral engine to drive a people’s economy.

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Then, today, I see an article about the newly sworn in Pope Francis. Pope Francis recently Tweeted:

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““My thoughts turn to all who are unemployed, often as a result of a self-centered mindset bent on profit at any cost.”[4]

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He regularly cites the pitfalls of unrestrained capitalism. Speaking on Vatican Radio in May of this year;

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“A society that “does not pay a just wage”, that “does not give work” to people; a society that “that only looks to its balance books, that only seeks profit” is unjust and goes against God.”[5]

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Further;

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“"Not paying a just [wage], not providing work, focusing exclusively on the balance books, on financial statements, only looking at making personal profit. That goes against God! How many times – how many times – have we read in 'L'Osservatore Romano' .... A headline that impressed me so much the day of the Bangladesh tragedy, 'Living on 38 euros a month': this was the payment of these people who have died ... And this is called 'slave labor!'. And today in this world there is slavery that is made with the most beautiful gift that God has given to man: the ability to create, to work, to be the makers of our own dignity. How many brothers and sisters throughout the world are in this situation because of these, economic, social, political attitudes and so on ... ".[6]

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And even further;

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“Today - the Pope said - we can no longer say what St. Paul said: "He who will not work, will not eat," but we have to say: "He who does not work, has lost his dignity", because "he cannot find any opportunities for work". On the contrary: "Society has stripped that person of dignity." [7]

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Finally;

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“Today, it would do us good to listen to the voice of God, when he spoke to Cain, saying: "Cain, where is your brother?". Today, however, we hear this voice: "Where is your brother who has no work? Where is your brother who is subjected to slave labor?. Let us pray, let us pray for all these brothers and sisters who are in this situation. So be it"[8] .

I find it reassuring that on the very day I am ready to publish this article. These quotes I find from our current Pope. Comments, so rarely seen from head’s of state, about the crippling income disparity that runs rife through out our land.

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I do not think that the Pope is attacking capitalism or the wealthy. That is a strategy that would likely fail. I believe that the Pope, like myself, is urgently warning mankind of the pitfalls of unrestrained capitalism! That living just by the bottom line of a ledger is not a viable plan. That we, as a people, as a nation, and a species have to work to create more and equal opportunity. Least our societies collapse.

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That brings us to the end of (what took three and a half days to write) this article. As always, My Dear Readers, you deeply honor me by coming here to read my words. In closing, I want you to rest assured. I mean no harm or offense to anyone. Thank you!

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