The palate is a part of the mouth. The term "cleansing the palate" is often used when referring to wine or food tasters, who eat something bland to remove the taste of the previously sampled item before assessing the taste of the next item. In other words, one removes the after taste so that it does not infiltrate the next bite or sip. Meals of several courses are often planned with that in mind, if not in actually providing an intermediary palate cleanser, then at least planning the order of courses so that a previous dish or beverage does not overpower the next one or ruin the flavor through unplanned combination.
The societal lack of "cleansing the palate" is one of the greatest obstacles to achieving, or even commencing, sanctity today. For example, one of my least favorite activities is to have my mind set on writing a blog posting that glorifies God, but I am interrupted with the need to blog about the dirtier works and sins of humans. However, because my heart, mind and spirit are always turned toward God, even as my fingers have to type less pleasant (but vital soul saving) blog entries, I do not have to "cleanse the palate" of my spirit and my mind, since my heart is always turned to God. White bread is often used as a gourmet palate cleanser, and so it does not seem a coincidence that one can think of God, through Jesus Christ, the living bread and staff of life, and remain cleansed in one's heart, mind and soul even when one must discuss distasteful things, such as sin and depravity in modern society, and the consequences of hell fire for all eternity.
However, since the vast majority of humans are not sanctified to God, but I do believe that many wish to be (however, they confuse it with the egocentric objective of being "very spiritual"), you need to realize that society and its dirt are a barrier to sanctification, as it requires extraordinary effort these days to "cleanse one's palate."
Let me introduce an old time admonishment, that is slang and said casually. In the old days when someone said something dirty (as in pornographic), profane (toward God), or cussed, often the listener would reply to that person, "You kiss your mother with that mouth?!"
This was in more innocent and good hearted days when often that admonishment was actually enough to make the hardened bad talker stop and be somewhat abashed. That's like back in the days when moms weren't competing to be as dirty as the celebrities, and when their children upheld their mother's level of decency. So yes, a simple expression like that caused many a cusser or dirty talker to stop in his tracks and blush. He would genuinely be ashamed to think of what had come out of his mouth, and that yes, that is the mouth that would kiss his mom on the cheek. That admonishment was a verbal palate cleanser.
Today it is just about impossible to cleanse the palate, spiritually. I don't mean to cleanse the palate to do some high and mighty worshipping or great spiritual work. I mean to go back to the normal state that one should be in nearly one hundred percent of the time! One should be living a life of having a cleansed palate, but one that is interrupted on occasion by the realities of life.
I'm not speaking of cussing here. I am speaking of living constantly within the increasing dirtiness of the world.
Here is an example of those who have to struggle because of the dirt of the world. It used to be that if you were a law enforcement official, it would be a very rare event when one had to investigate child pornography, child solicitation or child rape. The average cop might encounter one horrific example in his or her entire career! And that event would, of course, be a very low point and one that he or she not only had to prevent from depressing them, but also did not bring the sadness of it home to their family.
Now look at what the world, through human beings own choices, has brought to this example. Entire police departments have to assign full time officers to trolling through the filth of the Internet, identifying and capturing pedophiles and other child abusers. These officers have to look at more in FIVE MINUTES than most cops had to look at in their entire career. It is impossible for law enforcement people to ever cleanse their palates or have a cleansed palate, because they are standing within the tidal wave of filth.
I worry about professionals, and amateurs, who do this type of work with sincere hearts because I know that despite what they may say, it changes them forever and is a soul robbing experience. People often bandy about praying to the Archangel Michael, but this is an example where I recommend that those who must, because of their vocation, wade in such palate destroying filth, that they look at Michael as a role model, as the archangel who faces the worst of what Satan is, and yet remains totally pure and sanctified to God. Think of his role modeling as a palate cleanser. Also, do not be an egomaniac who thinks you are not affected and can do this for years at a time. Wading in filth, even for a "noble purpose" is a barrier to sanctity and your process of sanctification. Why? Because it takes up space in your mind and your heart, even as you combat it, that ought to be set only on the pure sights of God. You are having to "kiss God's cheek" with that mouth.
Isaiah 6:5-7
Then I said, "Woe is me, I am doomed! For I am a man of unclean lips, living among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!" Then one of the seraphim flew to me, holding an ember which he had taken with tongs from the altar.
He touched my mouth with it. "See," he said, "now that this has touched your lips, your wickedness is removed, your sin purged."
Isaiah, the greatest of the prophets who prophesied the Messiah, Jesus Christ, knew that even as pure as he was, he could not be living as a human among humans with filthy lips without being at risk once he faces God, so upon the sight of God he is terrified of this knowledge. God respects this wisdom exhibited by Isaiah and thus the seraphim cleanses Isaiah's lips with burning coals from God's own altar. This is why you can look to God and his angels, such as Michael, with confidence and trust if you, through no fault of your own, are put within the filth of the times.
But what about the vast majority of people who wallow in and produce the filth? What about the many mothers today who purchase "booty enhancing" jeans and who have "tramp stamps" tattooed over their rear ends? Why should their children worry about with what lips they kiss such mothers?
It is impossible to have the television on, or the radio, to keep one company, as I used to like to do, without now being subjected to a "Viva Viagra" commercial about how long a man can have an erection, or some thinly veiled reference to oral sex. How many of you turn off the TV or the radio the instant that such filth comes on? Not so many I reckon. How many of you hold stock in those companies, or work behind the scenes on that type of marketing, all day every day? How can one be sanctified, have a cleansed palate for God in your average day, when you are in the tidal wave, either willingly or unwillingly, of filth?
Young people, this is one of the things I am trying to help you to understand, a time that was gone before you were born, but has become worse each year, as you've been growing up and have become young adults. Do not worry that I am being a fun destroying prude, LOL. If you think that, reread the example I have used, which is of the average police officer who maybe once in his entire career encountered terrible child pornographic filth or solicitation. Do not believe the liars of today who say it "always was there but just hidden." I mean, duh, how dumb do they think you are? Cell phones, computers, message boards and the Internet did not exist. Thus there was no way to cultivate the occasional pervert's taste into violent addictive action as there is today. Today there is a field full of weeds, rather than a field of wheat that would have the occasional, easily identified and controlled weed. You have been given, deliberately, or at the very least because they have been asleep at the wheel, a society of a destroyed cleansed palate, by your parents and their parents.
The sickening spread and virtual explosion of violence against even the tiniest infants (and even pet animals) and the total perversion of the beauty of intimacy, including sex, is happening because people are not living the way they used to be, which was with mental and spiritual cleansed palates... ones that they knew had to be restored to that normalcy of the cleansed palate, in between encounters with that which is unclean.
But to be unclean and uncleansed is the "new normal." That is the shocking and still, for me, who have seen this with my own eyes, the most difficult thing to comprehend how society has imploded and rotted from within, while calling that being "liberated." I don't think the police who spend their entire shifts hunting the worst baby raping perverts that have ever existed among humans feel particularly "liberated." I don't feel liberated when I sit down to blog and someone on the radio makes an oral sex allusion. Do you feel liberated, really? Young people, you certainly should not feel liberated. You have been chained in a meat market, out of reach of the place of the cleansed palate. Thus you cannot enjoy as you should the goodness of intimacy, of passion, or handle appropriately confrontations with filth, when they occur. Genuine liberation is to be able to operate from a clean base of stability, and thus you have a wide range of appropriate responses.
So if you are interested in being sanctified, as every human being should, which means to put God and his will first and foremost in your life, so that you can reap all the goodness of life as it exists now and have hope for the eternal bliss, you must be aware of the tide that you take for granted as "normal" that brings unclean and unease into your spirits and hearts, hindering sanctification. Shut it down, the unclean, wherever and whenever it is in your reach. Don't "put up with it" (like letting the TV drone on with filth) because as I said, as the holy man Isaiah knew, it besmirches even the unwilling.
What can you do on a practical level? First of all, this is one reason why frequent daily prayer is so helpful. People have started thinking too much of prayer as "asking God for something." Realize, instead, and remember that prayer is the ultimate palate cleanser. Prayer neutralizes filth because it removes you from it as you realign and reset your focus on what is true and good. So prayer is not just a tool for asking God for help. Prayer is the ultimate palate cleanser.
Then, as I have alluded to above, make your own space as clean as possible. For example, I stop visiting news web sites that when I click on them I immediately have some gigantic picture of fat boobs stuffed in my virtual face. Don't give them your clicks and don't let them plant those images with you. So clean up your space even though it's a daily battle, but think of weeding out the field (not taking weed, LOL). If you pull out each one as it pops up, eventually they diminish.
Also, be a trend setter and set your own example. Like I said I am no dreary prude. But there is a heck of a difference between a sharp dressed young man or woman and one who feels that I and the world need to see their tramp stamp or booty crack. There is a quiet young man who sometimes comes in for pizza where I regularly lunch and I totally love his clothes. He is so hip and yet modest. If you cultivate your own cleansed palate of taste in your own dignity and hipness, then your posse and others will follow you. You will be helping everyone with their own hip sanctification! Seriously, you do not want to be the one, like so many girls today, who wants to show off her stuff to every guy, hoping that guy goes home and hates his wife or girlfriend for not being as "hot" as her. Trust me, she'll be "hot" alright, in a way she eternally regrets. Again, this is not because God doesn't like showing off the human body. It's because God knows the hearts of all and their every thought, and he knows when people dress slutty so that they can harm the custody of the eyes and hearts, and thus sanctity and happiness, of others. Marketing people and greedy merchants better wise up to that too. How many erotic commercials fuel child molester fantasies? A lot of them and I know because as I said, I know what crime and society was like "before" and "after."
I hope, as always, that you are having a good day and that you have found this to be helpful.
Showing posts with label Police. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Police. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Sad news of police officer killed keeping the peace
Whenever a law enforcement official, fire or safety department member, a service person or, of course, any person is killed, it is sad. It's not the scope of this blog to address each one.
But I had to speak up in tribute about the loss of a particularly gracious police officer, a member of the Mobile (Alabama) Police department, Brandon Sigler, who was killed last night. The city of Mobile is not far from where I currently live, and so I watched the sad news on the local TV channel tonight.
Of all the pathetic things, this officer was gunned down as he tried to keep the peace in the apartment complex where he lived as (get this) two women were in a cat fight with each other. As he tried to break up the fight the boyfriend of one of the women drove up and shot the officer dead.
Family, neighbors, his fiancee, friends, colleagues and former team and school mates are all in shock and all who were interviewed had only one thing to say: That there was nothing at all bad that one could say about him, that everyone appreciated him (both black and white), and that all he did was to try to keep the peace and the neighborhood safe. Even the perpetrator is filled with remorse but now, of course, it's too late.
And so I wanted to say in some consolation, as much as is possible under these circumstances, and with great respect:
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God (Matthew 5:9).
http://www.wkrg.com/crime/article/mpd_officer_shot_and_killed/75766/
But I had to speak up in tribute about the loss of a particularly gracious police officer, a member of the Mobile (Alabama) Police department, Brandon Sigler, who was killed last night. The city of Mobile is not far from where I currently live, and so I watched the sad news on the local TV channel tonight.
Of all the pathetic things, this officer was gunned down as he tried to keep the peace in the apartment complex where he lived as (get this) two women were in a cat fight with each other. As he tried to break up the fight the boyfriend of one of the women drove up and shot the officer dead.
Family, neighbors, his fiancee, friends, colleagues and former team and school mates are all in shock and all who were interviewed had only one thing to say: That there was nothing at all bad that one could say about him, that everyone appreciated him (both black and white), and that all he did was to try to keep the peace and the neighborhood safe. Even the perpetrator is filled with remorse but now, of course, it's too late.
And so I wanted to say in some consolation, as much as is possible under these circumstances, and with great respect:
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God (Matthew 5:9).
http://www.wkrg.com/crime/article/mpd_officer_shot_and_killed/75766/
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Case study: Local police, support and issues
Four stories in the news today that are useful case studies. Let me be the first to say it's not easy being the police. I come from a family that used to be huge law enforcement supporters. My father was deputized as a deputy sheriff when he returned from World War II and he carried a service revolver.
One of the biggest challenges for local law enforcement is that they must be prepared in an instant to respond in the entire gamut of possibilities: from being a good and compassionate neighbor who helps someone out, all the way to finding oneself in combat in a terrorist crime situation.
I am concerned, as I've observed the police for over fifty years now, that many of them have difficulty being open to the entire range of responses, from easy going compassion to having to be "Rambo" on the spot. I'm not going to assign blame because there are a number of reasons, some valid, that many have lost their perspective. I'm also going to point out that many are outstanding at maintaining that entire range of perspective, but sadly, I have encountered too few of them. I do read about them and applaud them when they do appear in the news.
But it is something that the police must be sensitive to in order to maintain public safety and support, support from people like me. I hope that I have readers of my blog who are in law enforcement and who will add this to their training or at least a point of discussion back at the station house over a cup of coffee.
Case study one:
http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/18380375/detail.html
A woman who has her bleeding dying dog in her car is pulled over by a policeman and delayed for five minutes because in her haste to get to the vet she passed in a no pass zone, and the dog died. Read the details at the link. Now there are two sides, the people who think the policeman should have let her go right away as soon as he knew the situation, and those who defend the policeman.
Whenever there are two opposing views, by definition the problem is "too late" to solve. Here is what I suggest. Police need to be reminded of the good neighbor part of their function. In Yiddish we call that being a mensch, a good guy who does a good deed. He should have not only let her go, but he should have, if duty allowed, escorted her at least part of the way to ensure that a distraught woman at 2:30 am with her dying dog gets to the vet. For crying out loud, how difficult is that to understand? That would have been the correct decision. But because that decision did not occur to him because, as I said, many police no longer understand that role in the community, I do not think he should be punished. I do think it is a chance for all the police to think about how easy it would have been to be a mensch instead.
My dad, the deputy sheriff, worked as a night watchman at a chemical plant. If he was on night shift he would often drive me to elementary school in our family car. One morning the car broke down. A local cop drove me to school in his cop car (yes, I sat in front, ha... and boy are those seats hard). That is what it used to be like; cops were mensch. Try to rediscover that. For inspiration watch the old movies where a common humor device was a scene with a woman in labor being driven by frantic husband, being pulled over by a cop for speeding, and then the cop races them to the hospital.
Case study two:
http://www.livingstondaily.com/article/20081230/NEWS01/812300315
This young and promising cop was shot and killed as he tried to be a mensch, a mensch in the wrong situation. He pulled over a teen who was driving at night without a license. Instead of taking him to the station and calling in the parents, he takes the kid to his residence in a local apartment in order to hand him over to his parents. In the apartment the kid gets a gun and shoots the cop stone cold dead.
Police see it all and I guess they take risks that the rest of us think, what? It used to be that if a teenager did wrong, especially in a risky part of town, the cop took him to jail and part of being a "mensch" was that the parents had to come get the kid and everyone was embarrassed into learning a lesson. I wonder why this officer did not take the kid to jail, and thus paid with his life. The case study is to understand that letting someone off the hook in a dangerous situation is sometimes not being a mensch. Cops have posted that they do this routinely, taking the kid home to work it out with the parents. You aren't social workers. You don't know what you are walking into. For everyone's safety, go back to how it used to be, that a wayfaring teenager got an embarrassment and a scare by being taken to the station where his or her parents are then phoned to come in.
Case study three:
http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/18380850/detail.html
Today a gunman, apparently an employee, open fire while ranting about religion at a ski resort, killing the manager and escaping in his car. However, a policeman was on patrol nearby, spotted the car, pursued it and when the perpetrator opened fire, the cop shot back, and killed the suspect in a gun battle. The cop is a SWAT member and had his rifle.
All I want to do is say, "Good job officer!" Two things happened correctly here. One is that even in sleepy burgs bad stuff happens and this cop was on patrol close to the scene. Patrol is SO important. So kudos to the police on patrol and those who schedule them. The second is the importance of gun practice. Doubly fortunate this is a SWAT guy, but cops, remember that you should practice, practice, practice. Who knows how many lives this officer saved with his precision shooting in a shoot out situation? We could have had another California on our hands if this guy had gotten away and fired along the road or once he was in populated areas again. I know some cops drag their feet at going to their gun practice. Do it!!!
Case study four:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28422200/
A former Utah state trooper is suspected of being the gunman in the random killing of two people on highways in Texas. He died of a self inflicted gun wound. He is also suspected of robbing two people prior to the killings. He had to resign as a trooper due to addiction to pain medication. He became addicted after suffering a traffic injury while on duty which caused deep pain and led to his addiction. He was a faithful Mormon, family man and suicidal. He had moved with his family to Texas after having to resign the force to take a computer salesman job, and could not earn enough due to the economy.
This is one of the most tragic things that I have read in a year that has been chock full of tragedy and horror. Why is there not a private or public program that could have treated him, comprehensively, in a way to keep his dignity, after he had to resign? The United States has a very bad history toward military and law enforcement regarding comprehensively and compassionately treating pain, trauma and addiction, and allowing them to continue to earn a comparable living while obtaining treatment! Now three families all with young children have suffered a crushing loss of their fathers, right before Christmas. One of the victims was a truck driver about to fly home to be with his family.
Local communities have a responsibility to take care of the service people who fall, in more ways than one, in the midst of serving them. Was there no one wealthy enough in Utah to get this guy the help he needed, in return for how he kept them safe for so many years? Someone send him to genuine rehab in his community, and give him a job that was still of the dignity of service that he had to surrender?
We make our law enforcement super heroes and then super dogs, and it seems like everyone has forgotten the middle humanitarian ground of local community support.
I hope that you have found these case studies helpful and that ultimately somehow the powers that be make some policy changes, and those in the community also have a conversion of heart about how the police should behave at their highest standards and also in turn be treated with the highest respect, caring and concern that they would merit. I say this as someone who has not been treated well by local police in my own hometown just several years ago, but that does not stop me from trying to be of good guidance.
One of the biggest challenges for local law enforcement is that they must be prepared in an instant to respond in the entire gamut of possibilities: from being a good and compassionate neighbor who helps someone out, all the way to finding oneself in combat in a terrorist crime situation.
I am concerned, as I've observed the police for over fifty years now, that many of them have difficulty being open to the entire range of responses, from easy going compassion to having to be "Rambo" on the spot. I'm not going to assign blame because there are a number of reasons, some valid, that many have lost their perspective. I'm also going to point out that many are outstanding at maintaining that entire range of perspective, but sadly, I have encountered too few of them. I do read about them and applaud them when they do appear in the news.
But it is something that the police must be sensitive to in order to maintain public safety and support, support from people like me. I hope that I have readers of my blog who are in law enforcement and who will add this to their training or at least a point of discussion back at the station house over a cup of coffee.
Case study one:
http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/18380375/detail.html
A woman who has her bleeding dying dog in her car is pulled over by a policeman and delayed for five minutes because in her haste to get to the vet she passed in a no pass zone, and the dog died. Read the details at the link. Now there are two sides, the people who think the policeman should have let her go right away as soon as he knew the situation, and those who defend the policeman.
Whenever there are two opposing views, by definition the problem is "too late" to solve. Here is what I suggest. Police need to be reminded of the good neighbor part of their function. In Yiddish we call that being a mensch, a good guy who does a good deed. He should have not only let her go, but he should have, if duty allowed, escorted her at least part of the way to ensure that a distraught woman at 2:30 am with her dying dog gets to the vet. For crying out loud, how difficult is that to understand? That would have been the correct decision. But because that decision did not occur to him because, as I said, many police no longer understand that role in the community, I do not think he should be punished. I do think it is a chance for all the police to think about how easy it would have been to be a mensch instead.
My dad, the deputy sheriff, worked as a night watchman at a chemical plant. If he was on night shift he would often drive me to elementary school in our family car. One morning the car broke down. A local cop drove me to school in his cop car (yes, I sat in front, ha... and boy are those seats hard). That is what it used to be like; cops were mensch. Try to rediscover that. For inspiration watch the old movies where a common humor device was a scene with a woman in labor being driven by frantic husband, being pulled over by a cop for speeding, and then the cop races them to the hospital.
Case study two:
http://www.livingstondaily.com/article/20081230/NEWS01/812300315
This young and promising cop was shot and killed as he tried to be a mensch, a mensch in the wrong situation. He pulled over a teen who was driving at night without a license. Instead of taking him to the station and calling in the parents, he takes the kid to his residence in a local apartment in order to hand him over to his parents. In the apartment the kid gets a gun and shoots the cop stone cold dead.
Police see it all and I guess they take risks that the rest of us think, what? It used to be that if a teenager did wrong, especially in a risky part of town, the cop took him to jail and part of being a "mensch" was that the parents had to come get the kid and everyone was embarrassed into learning a lesson. I wonder why this officer did not take the kid to jail, and thus paid with his life. The case study is to understand that letting someone off the hook in a dangerous situation is sometimes not being a mensch. Cops have posted that they do this routinely, taking the kid home to work it out with the parents. You aren't social workers. You don't know what you are walking into. For everyone's safety, go back to how it used to be, that a wayfaring teenager got an embarrassment and a scare by being taken to the station where his or her parents are then phoned to come in.
Case study three:
http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/18380850/detail.html
Today a gunman, apparently an employee, open fire while ranting about religion at a ski resort, killing the manager and escaping in his car. However, a policeman was on patrol nearby, spotted the car, pursued it and when the perpetrator opened fire, the cop shot back, and killed the suspect in a gun battle. The cop is a SWAT member and had his rifle.
All I want to do is say, "Good job officer!" Two things happened correctly here. One is that even in sleepy burgs bad stuff happens and this cop was on patrol close to the scene. Patrol is SO important. So kudos to the police on patrol and those who schedule them. The second is the importance of gun practice. Doubly fortunate this is a SWAT guy, but cops, remember that you should practice, practice, practice. Who knows how many lives this officer saved with his precision shooting in a shoot out situation? We could have had another California on our hands if this guy had gotten away and fired along the road or once he was in populated areas again. I know some cops drag their feet at going to their gun practice. Do it!!!
Case study four:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28422200/
A former Utah state trooper is suspected of being the gunman in the random killing of two people on highways in Texas. He died of a self inflicted gun wound. He is also suspected of robbing two people prior to the killings. He had to resign as a trooper due to addiction to pain medication. He became addicted after suffering a traffic injury while on duty which caused deep pain and led to his addiction. He was a faithful Mormon, family man and suicidal. He had moved with his family to Texas after having to resign the force to take a computer salesman job, and could not earn enough due to the economy.
This is one of the most tragic things that I have read in a year that has been chock full of tragedy and horror. Why is there not a private or public program that could have treated him, comprehensively, in a way to keep his dignity, after he had to resign? The United States has a very bad history toward military and law enforcement regarding comprehensively and compassionately treating pain, trauma and addiction, and allowing them to continue to earn a comparable living while obtaining treatment! Now three families all with young children have suffered a crushing loss of their fathers, right before Christmas. One of the victims was a truck driver about to fly home to be with his family.
Local communities have a responsibility to take care of the service people who fall, in more ways than one, in the midst of serving them. Was there no one wealthy enough in Utah to get this guy the help he needed, in return for how he kept them safe for so many years? Someone send him to genuine rehab in his community, and give him a job that was still of the dignity of service that he had to surrender?
We make our law enforcement super heroes and then super dogs, and it seems like everyone has forgotten the middle humanitarian ground of local community support.
I hope that you have found these case studies helpful and that ultimately somehow the powers that be make some policy changes, and those in the community also have a conversion of heart about how the police should behave at their highest standards and also in turn be treated with the highest respect, caring and concern that they would merit. I say this as someone who has not been treated well by local police in my own hometown just several years ago, but that does not stop me from trying to be of good guidance.
Friday, December 12, 2008
Severe scolding for cops parents citizens officials
Here is another example of how the freak show society of the past twenty to thirty years has totally missed investing in the good, and has instead invested in the bad.
Several days ago, in a town not too far from where I now reside, a star senior year high school football player died in the doorway of his car, of a shot from his own hunting shot gun. He had been pulled over by a policeman in a patrol car, and according to events as they have been reported thus far, the police officer was in his or her car running on his computer a check of the car he had just pulled over. Therefore, we are given to understand, the officer did not see what happened until he or she heard the gun shot and found the young man dead under the gun. These circumstances suggest either suicide, which the family finds painfully difficult to believe, obviously, or an accident. The young man was apparently an avid hunter, owned the shotgun and carried it in his car, often went hunting before school classes each day, and apparently had been hunting that day. The local police have kept a distance from the family, including when they first heard the young man had been shot, and have turned the investigation of what happened over to the state police. Now, here is my point.
None of this would be as mysterious and painful if the police car had a forward pointing dash board camera that records all events that take place in front of the police car, and thus in the direction of the action whenever the police car pulls another car over. These cameras have a proven track record of protecting via recording the truth of events both the police and the general public.
I am astonished that every police car in the country that is involved in patrol does not have one of these cameras already and, in fact, should have had those years ago. But no, what has society invested in? It seems every teenager, rich or poor, has cell phone cameras so that they can take naked pictures of themselves and their neighbors, plus lead lives of cyborgs and robots by constantly “texting” their friends. The same towns, cities and rural areas that fill the hands of their children with cell phone cameras somehow didn’t think of outfitting law enforcement cars with cameras to protect both the honest police and the public from the dishonest police. How much more stupid can this society get?
This is hardly surprising when one considers the geniuses who designed the American space vehicle known as the space shuttle. Billions have been poured into that vehicle, and for decades it flew without any of the engineering geniuses ever planning for cameras to monitor and inspect the accident prone and vulnerable exterior. They probably have cameras filming the astronauts take a crap, but it never occurred to them to have exterior cameras to ensure the integrity of the outer skin surface of the vehicle until, you guessed, not one but two space shuttles were destroyed and their crews killed, due to ignorance of routine launch damage to the craft’s tiles from striking debris. Wow, suddenly the geniuses decide to put cameras on the shuttle (and repair kits), only after a generation of children have already had "cams" and on line cameras on their computers so they can transmit every word of wisdom and sex act to their friends on the Internet.
I cannot understand a society that invests in the “new, hot technology” to loosen morals of their children (such as they are) and distract them from being children (you know, studying) yet is too plain ignorant to first outfit the adults in services, such as law enforcement, with dashboard cameras. Ironically employers have already leaped to record for “safety” purposes just about every move that employees make on company premises, but the police do not all have dashboard cameras and the adult public has not insisted on it? Then again, this is a society that did not really invest in bullet proof vests for police officers until Yoko Ono donated money for that cause after her husband John Lennon was killed. Where are the priorities? Where are the geniuses in this society? What do they do with themselves when they are not counting their piles of money, and donating to “good causes” like of course the “performing arts” or combating disease in foreign lands?
The family of the young man who died in this nearby town should never have had a moment of question about what happened because every patrol car, including the one in this tragic incident, should already have had a running and operating dashboard camera. There should be nothing hidden and unknown; it should all have been on a dashboard camera. It is a disgrace that there is even one police car without a dashboard camera in this country, to say nothing of the thousands that roam around, doing good and sometimes doing mischief, unmonitored. Everyone goes like morons to go see Batman drive his high technology bat mobile, but they are too foolish to insist that their local police have dashboard cameras in their not so glamorous but far more important and real cars.
And, by the way parents, I have some advice. There is no such thing as “privacy rights” for minors who live at home with you. If you can afford a car for your teenage child you have the right to insist on certain safety rules and you certainly should look into the dashboard cameras that are for monitoring teenage use of cars. If you think that in the good old days teenagers took off on the family horse to have “privacy” and “freedom” you are sadly delusional. In the good old days no child or teenager did anything without a bevy of adult chaperons and community extended family observing their every move, since children and teenagers simply do not have good judgment as yet. The same, by the way, applied to using the family sword or firearm. In the good old days teenagers did not go trucking around with the family gun, or worse, their own gun, without being with adults. Even if this young man was the most responsible gun owner in the world, look at what happened: an accident. Every parent who has a live at home teenager with a car should seriously consider installing monitoring devices to ensure mature and wise behavior. If your teenager objects they obviously have something to hide. Like I said, there is no such thing as “privacy rights” for minority children who lack the maturity to exercise such rights.
Just ask the many traumatized family members whose children have, through speed or inexperience, been killed driving their cars just to school, often loaded with family members such as sibling children or peer group friends. Teenagers have very poorly developed driving skills; it is just a fact of judgment and lack of months or years of experience. Monitoring ensures such basics as driving at the speed limit, and not “blowing away” stop signs and so forth. You are doing your child a favor, and yourself, if you not only teach but demand responsible behavior, and invest in tools to monitor his or her driving rather than paying for a car and a cell phone so they can film each other’s genitals and broadcast them on the Internet, and then speed to their next school event. I am sick and tired of seeing grieving parents, broken bodies of children and teenagers, and lawsuits and finger pointing when good and firm parenting, including understanding the mental and emotional limitations of minority children, including mature seeming teenagers, could have avoided much of this. “Why does God allow this to happen?” God wants everyone to be freaking mature and responsible people who invest in the good and not the bad. Lord Almighty, how moronic he thinks all of you are, when you ask him how he can “allow” such tragedy, but you pay for naked buttock picture taking by teenagers but not for safety features to monitor their use in their own cars and also in the patrol cars of those who are supposedly protecting the community. But then again, it took two space shuttles with their full crews to blow up and kill them all before the engineering geniuses thought of putting monitoring cameras on them, so I guess God is expecting too much of the “average Joe.”
Several days ago, in a town not too far from where I now reside, a star senior year high school football player died in the doorway of his car, of a shot from his own hunting shot gun. He had been pulled over by a policeman in a patrol car, and according to events as they have been reported thus far, the police officer was in his or her car running on his computer a check of the car he had just pulled over. Therefore, we are given to understand, the officer did not see what happened until he or she heard the gun shot and found the young man dead under the gun. These circumstances suggest either suicide, which the family finds painfully difficult to believe, obviously, or an accident. The young man was apparently an avid hunter, owned the shotgun and carried it in his car, often went hunting before school classes each day, and apparently had been hunting that day. The local police have kept a distance from the family, including when they first heard the young man had been shot, and have turned the investigation of what happened over to the state police. Now, here is my point.
None of this would be as mysterious and painful if the police car had a forward pointing dash board camera that records all events that take place in front of the police car, and thus in the direction of the action whenever the police car pulls another car over. These cameras have a proven track record of protecting via recording the truth of events both the police and the general public.
I am astonished that every police car in the country that is involved in patrol does not have one of these cameras already and, in fact, should have had those years ago. But no, what has society invested in? It seems every teenager, rich or poor, has cell phone cameras so that they can take naked pictures of themselves and their neighbors, plus lead lives of cyborgs and robots by constantly “texting” their friends. The same towns, cities and rural areas that fill the hands of their children with cell phone cameras somehow didn’t think of outfitting law enforcement cars with cameras to protect both the honest police and the public from the dishonest police. How much more stupid can this society get?
This is hardly surprising when one considers the geniuses who designed the American space vehicle known as the space shuttle. Billions have been poured into that vehicle, and for decades it flew without any of the engineering geniuses ever planning for cameras to monitor and inspect the accident prone and vulnerable exterior. They probably have cameras filming the astronauts take a crap, but it never occurred to them to have exterior cameras to ensure the integrity of the outer skin surface of the vehicle until, you guessed, not one but two space shuttles were destroyed and their crews killed, due to ignorance of routine launch damage to the craft’s tiles from striking debris. Wow, suddenly the geniuses decide to put cameras on the shuttle (and repair kits), only after a generation of children have already had "cams" and on line cameras on their computers so they can transmit every word of wisdom and sex act to their friends on the Internet.
I cannot understand a society that invests in the “new, hot technology” to loosen morals of their children (such as they are) and distract them from being children (you know, studying) yet is too plain ignorant to first outfit the adults in services, such as law enforcement, with dashboard cameras. Ironically employers have already leaped to record for “safety” purposes just about every move that employees make on company premises, but the police do not all have dashboard cameras and the adult public has not insisted on it? Then again, this is a society that did not really invest in bullet proof vests for police officers until Yoko Ono donated money for that cause after her husband John Lennon was killed. Where are the priorities? Where are the geniuses in this society? What do they do with themselves when they are not counting their piles of money, and donating to “good causes” like of course the “performing arts” or combating disease in foreign lands?
The family of the young man who died in this nearby town should never have had a moment of question about what happened because every patrol car, including the one in this tragic incident, should already have had a running and operating dashboard camera. There should be nothing hidden and unknown; it should all have been on a dashboard camera. It is a disgrace that there is even one police car without a dashboard camera in this country, to say nothing of the thousands that roam around, doing good and sometimes doing mischief, unmonitored. Everyone goes like morons to go see Batman drive his high technology bat mobile, but they are too foolish to insist that their local police have dashboard cameras in their not so glamorous but far more important and real cars.
And, by the way parents, I have some advice. There is no such thing as “privacy rights” for minors who live at home with you. If you can afford a car for your teenage child you have the right to insist on certain safety rules and you certainly should look into the dashboard cameras that are for monitoring teenage use of cars. If you think that in the good old days teenagers took off on the family horse to have “privacy” and “freedom” you are sadly delusional. In the good old days no child or teenager did anything without a bevy of adult chaperons and community extended family observing their every move, since children and teenagers simply do not have good judgment as yet. The same, by the way, applied to using the family sword or firearm. In the good old days teenagers did not go trucking around with the family gun, or worse, their own gun, without being with adults. Even if this young man was the most responsible gun owner in the world, look at what happened: an accident. Every parent who has a live at home teenager with a car should seriously consider installing monitoring devices to ensure mature and wise behavior. If your teenager objects they obviously have something to hide. Like I said, there is no such thing as “privacy rights” for minority children who lack the maturity to exercise such rights.
Just ask the many traumatized family members whose children have, through speed or inexperience, been killed driving their cars just to school, often loaded with family members such as sibling children or peer group friends. Teenagers have very poorly developed driving skills; it is just a fact of judgment and lack of months or years of experience. Monitoring ensures such basics as driving at the speed limit, and not “blowing away” stop signs and so forth. You are doing your child a favor, and yourself, if you not only teach but demand responsible behavior, and invest in tools to monitor his or her driving rather than paying for a car and a cell phone so they can film each other’s genitals and broadcast them on the Internet, and then speed to their next school event. I am sick and tired of seeing grieving parents, broken bodies of children and teenagers, and lawsuits and finger pointing when good and firm parenting, including understanding the mental and emotional limitations of minority children, including mature seeming teenagers, could have avoided much of this. “Why does God allow this to happen?” God wants everyone to be freaking mature and responsible people who invest in the good and not the bad. Lord Almighty, how moronic he thinks all of you are, when you ask him how he can “allow” such tragedy, but you pay for naked buttock picture taking by teenagers but not for safety features to monitor their use in their own cars and also in the patrol cars of those who are supposedly protecting the community. But then again, it took two space shuttles with their full crews to blow up and kill them all before the engineering geniuses thought of putting monitoring cameras on them, so I guess God is expecting too much of the “average Joe.”
Saturday, May 3, 2008
Woe to Philadelphia
When will people care? That city has been a dangerous pit ever since I was a child and it has only got worse and worse, a hell hole on earth. And today it has sunk to a depths that astonishes even me. Maybe the "city of brotherly love" better get its GD act together. Read what an outrage is this latest robbery of the innocent (using an AK-47 assault rifle at a Shop Rite) and murder of a family man cop. Maybe Tom Hanks ought to be starring in a film about bringing human rights, safety and decency to this city instead of well, you know, the Hollywood delusion of reality.
http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/local&id=6120000
snip
PORT RICHMOND - May 3, 2008 (WPVI) -- A gunman shot and killed a police officer during a bank robbery this morning.
According to Philadelphia Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey, at least two armed men robbed the Bank of America branch inside the Shop Rite located at 3547 Aramingo Avenue around 11:26 a.m. Ramsey says there may have been a third suspect involved in the hold up.
The suspects fled in a vehicle described as a black or blue Jeep.
One suspect was shot in the 500 block of E. Louden Street and later died at Einstein Medical Center.
The second suspect, and a possible third, are still at large. Police are conducting an extensive search for the suspects and interviewing possible witnesses.
Police say they are looking for three suspects. They are described as follows:
Suspect 1-A tall black male with a medium build. -During the robbery he wore sunglasses, female Muslim garb from head to toe, and carried a shoulder-type bag.
Suspect 2 -Possibly a female, standing 5'6"-5'7" and was wearing light brown Muslim garb. -Her race has not been determined.
Suspect 3-Male with a stock build, standing 6'2"-6'3", with a medium brown complexion. -Shoulder-length dreadlocks, which may or may not be a wig. -He was wearing a white hospital or construction-type mask. -He was wearing blue jeans a light-colored shirt, possibly flannel.
Sergeant Liczbinski, a 12-year veteran of the department, was recently promoted to the rank of sergeant. He would have celebrated his 40th birthday this coming Tuesday, May 6th. Liczbinski is survived by his wife Michele, sons Matt and Stephen, and daughter Amber.
***
Read the comments by the people also. It's just so out of control; the people have been living in fear for decades and it's a disgraceful blot upon this country how it only worsens and does not improve. Read the description of the suspects. If true they dressed as WOMEN while carrying an AK-47 to terrorize innocent people they were robbing and to kill an officer. Or at the very least trying to present a Muslim image. It's just a DISGRACE in every way that God or mankind can measure this situation.
Prayers for the slain officer and his family. It really makes me wonder how they can work at all in such thankless positions.
http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/local&id=6120000
snip
PORT RICHMOND - May 3, 2008 (WPVI) -- A gunman shot and killed a police officer during a bank robbery this morning.
According to Philadelphia Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey, at least two armed men robbed the Bank of America branch inside the Shop Rite located at 3547 Aramingo Avenue around 11:26 a.m. Ramsey says there may have been a third suspect involved in the hold up.
The suspects fled in a vehicle described as a black or blue Jeep.
One suspect was shot in the 500 block of E. Louden Street and later died at Einstein Medical Center.
The second suspect, and a possible third, are still at large. Police are conducting an extensive search for the suspects and interviewing possible witnesses.
Police say they are looking for three suspects. They are described as follows:
Suspect 1-A tall black male with a medium build. -During the robbery he wore sunglasses, female Muslim garb from head to toe, and carried a shoulder-type bag.
Suspect 2 -Possibly a female, standing 5'6"-5'7" and was wearing light brown Muslim garb. -Her race has not been determined.
Suspect 3-Male with a stock build, standing 6'2"-6'3", with a medium brown complexion. -Shoulder-length dreadlocks, which may or may not be a wig. -He was wearing a white hospital or construction-type mask. -He was wearing blue jeans a light-colored shirt, possibly flannel.
Sergeant Liczbinski, a 12-year veteran of the department, was recently promoted to the rank of sergeant. He would have celebrated his 40th birthday this coming Tuesday, May 6th. Liczbinski is survived by his wife Michele, sons Matt and Stephen, and daughter Amber.
***
Read the comments by the people also. It's just so out of control; the people have been living in fear for decades and it's a disgraceful blot upon this country how it only worsens and does not improve. Read the description of the suspects. If true they dressed as WOMEN while carrying an AK-47 to terrorize innocent people they were robbing and to kill an officer. Or at the very least trying to present a Muslim image. It's just a DISGRACE in every way that God or mankind can measure this situation.
Prayers for the slain officer and his family. It really makes me wonder how they can work at all in such thankless positions.
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Article that matches one of my prayer intentions
In the Catholic faith a "prayer intention" is the cause to which your prayer for intercession is dedicated. So when someone prays for the "Pope's intentions," you are adding your prayer support to whatever the Pope has as his list of causes and concerns for that which he regularly prays. It is very powerful to pray to God and "offer up your prayer" to be joined to the intentions of the Holy Father. This is because without even knowing what his specific intentions are, you are trusting him and trusting in God to deliver what is the best and most good for all.
I too have regular prayer intentions. One of them is that the police who have to deal with terrible cases of child abuse and murder are strengthened by St. Michael the Archangel. St. Michael the Archangel is the role model for how one can deal with great tragedy and evil in the world, seeing terrible things done by terrible people, and still be able to retain purity and peace of mind. I am reminded of this when I read this article about detectives who are able to solve a case that is most cruel and tragic, and of how they feel when they must attend to such cases of child murder and abuse. Join in my intentions.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/headline/metro/5732144.html
I too have regular prayer intentions. One of them is that the police who have to deal with terrible cases of child abuse and murder are strengthened by St. Michael the Archangel. St. Michael the Archangel is the role model for how one can deal with great tragedy and evil in the world, seeing terrible things done by terrible people, and still be able to retain purity and peace of mind. I am reminded of this when I read this article about detectives who are able to solve a case that is most cruel and tragic, and of how they feel when they must attend to such cases of child murder and abuse. Join in my intentions.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/headline/metro/5732144.html
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Prayers for a critically shot police officer
Prayers for a critically shot police officer
I don't normally blog about everyone I'm praying for, because every day you can see in the newspaper or TV all too many people suffering in dire straits. But I am praying, and want to profile this young man so that the wonderful example of interfaith prayer can be elevated.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime_file/2007/07/12/2007-07-12_untitled__2medical12m-1.html
A mother's sobs and the prayers of a Russian Orthodox priest echoed through an intensive care unit yesterday as the family of critically wounded Police Officer Russel Timoshenko hoped for a miracle.
For nearly half an hour, Archpriest George Kallaur prayed at the young cop's bedside in Kings County Hospital while Timoshenko lay hooked to a battery of life-sustaining machines - and his mother wept openly for her only child.
Then Kallaur asked the parents to leave the room, and for 20 minutes he performed what's called a "deaf and blind confession" for the unconscious officer.
"I thought I saw some movement out of the corner of my eye in the arm area," he said. "It could have been my hopeful thinking. But I hope not."
snip
Hours later, he went to the hospital to tell the family one of the suspects had been caught. Outside the 71st Precinct, 150 Orthodox Jews held a prayer vigil for Timoshenko, even though he is of a different faith.
"The Jewish community is in pain," said Rabbi Shea Hecht, who led the service. "I'm hoping they're going to lock three people up for a very long time."
An officer watching from the steps said all the cops were grateful for any prayers. "It means a lot," he said.
***
Blessings for the Orthodox Jews who have taken the time and care to pray for him, a great mitzvah. Blessings and prayers for the young man, his family, his priest, his fellow officers, and for all the honest police around the world who strive and sacrifice to keep everyone safer.
I don't normally blog about everyone I'm praying for, because every day you can see in the newspaper or TV all too many people suffering in dire straits. But I am praying, and want to profile this young man so that the wonderful example of interfaith prayer can be elevated.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime_file/2007/07/12/2007-07-12_untitled__2medical12m-1.html
A mother's sobs and the prayers of a Russian Orthodox priest echoed through an intensive care unit yesterday as the family of critically wounded Police Officer Russel Timoshenko hoped for a miracle.
For nearly half an hour, Archpriest George Kallaur prayed at the young cop's bedside in Kings County Hospital while Timoshenko lay hooked to a battery of life-sustaining machines - and his mother wept openly for her only child.
Then Kallaur asked the parents to leave the room, and for 20 minutes he performed what's called a "deaf and blind confession" for the unconscious officer.
"I thought I saw some movement out of the corner of my eye in the arm area," he said. "It could have been my hopeful thinking. But I hope not."
snip
Hours later, he went to the hospital to tell the family one of the suspects had been caught. Outside the 71st Precinct, 150 Orthodox Jews held a prayer vigil for Timoshenko, even though he is of a different faith.
"The Jewish community is in pain," said Rabbi Shea Hecht, who led the service. "I'm hoping they're going to lock three people up for a very long time."
An officer watching from the steps said all the cops were grateful for any prayers. "It means a lot," he said.
***
Blessings for the Orthodox Jews who have taken the time and care to pray for him, a great mitzvah. Blessings and prayers for the young man, his family, his priest, his fellow officers, and for all the honest police around the world who strive and sacrifice to keep everyone safer.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
