We face competing stories on the internet and in main stream media. We can’t always tell what is true when faced with these stories.

Some people deal with this truth ambiguity by going with the story that they hear the most often. Some ask their friends what they believe. Some choose to believe whatever they think serves their interests best. Some try to accommodate power structures in their lives like what the government says or what their boss says. Some pick a story to favor while holding doubt about all stories as a general principle. Those approaches don’t get closer to an understanding of what is the truth.

And most of those methods of trying to weigh the value of information aren’t actually going to produce a good analysis of information.

To handle a mix of true and untrue information, flow chart analysis can help you.

Start by writing down information that you are sure of and write down how you came to your conclusion. It is helpful to use first hand sources and to write down what they are. Write down how knowing that one truth means that other competing stories aren’t true. Keep track of who has told you something that you have determined isn’t true. Remember that source was misleading.

Next write down various stories that you think might be true but that have competing stories in the coverage that you are reading or hearing. Write why you favor one story over another. Then acknowledge your confidence level. If you can’t decide between two competing stories, write down what it would mean if each is true as opposed to the other. That can stem your sense of ambivalence and indecision. Continue trying to determine which story is true or whether neither is true.

Ask yourself whose interests are served by your being in a state of ambivalence and uncertainty. Remember that your interests are better served when you know what is true so that you can act based on what is true. Remember that after everything becomes clear, a sure course of action is likelier to present itself.

Remember that misleading people with false information is not ethical or in the best long term interests of society.

Buy a copy of Political Catsup with Economy Fries available at Amazon.com.

I went to Macy’s yesterday, to get a Christmas gift. There was a sign on the door saying that masks are required in the store. I didn’t put a mask on but went resolutely on with my shopping. No one ordered me to mask up. I think that retailers know that there’s no health reason to wear a mask even though employees can’t work without wearing one because of government regulations. Shoppers show up without a mask on and no one makes us wear one. In the face of signs saying they are required and even in the resounding echo of announcements stating that masks are required no one insists. And no one believes that they do any kind of good. This is true at my grocery store, at the home supply store, at the greenhouse nursery and I don’t wear a mask at any of them.

I went early when Macy’s first opened and I’ll admit that it may not have been their peak business time period. Also, it was raining a little. I walked into the store and the only people there seemed to be employees. Each employee greeted me enthusiastically. I went to the home section to buy towels for a lady who is getting too old to enjoy shopping (so no gift card). I was amazed that the color I was sent to purchase was on sale and at a reduced price. Everyone was courteous and I was courteous.

But I worry that Macy’s might not be there much longer. I worry that covid rules are really about shutting down in person shopping. That means that covid rules are about ending jobs for all those store clerks. And ending the old economy. Regulations to restrict people are about restraining in-person commerce by making people uncomfortable when they go to the store. They threaten and bully people so they won’t go to Macy’s.

The problem is that harming the old economy won’t ensure the triumph of the new. Just having an online source as an alternative doesn’t create commerce connections the way they existed before. Jobs won’t be there and people’s interactions with each other won’t be there either. If everyone can put in an online order, won’t everyone just shop for themselves? Will there be a reason to go discover unexpected products that delight and amaze the gift giver and gift recipient? I’m worried that shopping on-line may not offer as many deals but just one homogeneous monopoly price. And a lot of people will not be able to afford to online-only shop when jobs are restricted by algorithms that screen out certain groups instead of hiring any person that can do the job.

It has been convenient to order on-line when I can’t get pants in my size like happened last winter and fall season. Of course, on-line shopping doesn’t let me check the fit before I buy. In the case something fits poorly, I have to either send it back or alter the fit by retailoring the item. And there isn’t as much happenstance discovery the way there is when you go to a store in person and see everything at once all around you. On-line shopping offers most of all convenience but not the same kinds of choices or prices. This 2021 season, the on-line stores don’t have as many discount sales as in-person stores, at least for the items I’m shopping for this Christmas. Last year there were more on-line discounts than this year. I think that’s because of growing inflation. Our inflation has been caused by a rapant fascist attack against the dollar through the printing press and covid regulatory restrictions.

The cost of fascism’s alliance between politics and economics is that neither the politic or economy work well. They each get in their own way. Politicians are too busy making corrupt deals to benefit themselves and their cronies and they don’t plan good policies for the nation. Commercial interests that screen employees by algorithm instead of by job skill leads to business that doesn’t achieve business goals. People in politics and business have wanted more power to make society more amenable to their interests but they aren’t achieving any practical goals. Politics stops being moral and the economy stops making money. Politicians and businessmen who have decided that vaccines should be mandatory achieve partial success at that single goal while they neglect myriad other better goals. Connections between people are better connections than algorithm arranged networks. On-line connecting isn’t the same kind of value and experience as shopping in person.

If you want to learn how our economy has entered the Twilight Zone, that is, become restrained by excessive and inappropriate covid rules, buy a copy of Political Catsup with Economy Fries available at Amazon.com. My book explaines the nuts and bolts of political and economic changes over American history from the founding. It will help you understand the connections between political policies and economic outcomes by carefully defining terms and taking you through policy changes that have affected the American way of life.

Empathy, of course, is the ability to observe others and put youself in their place, imagining how it feels to be them. According to Neil Gaiman, one of the important benefits of reading fiction is that it creates for readers a sense of empathy with characters in the story. Fiction provides readers details about other people’s lives that we don’t normally have as we go about our own everyday life and that helps us imagine ourself in another person’s life and circumstances. Gaiman believes that this empathic insight gifted to us as readers of fiction makes us better people. Has reading fiction made you more empathic in your life? It has me.

Tolerance is the abilty to remain unprejudiced against people who choose differently than you do. Tolerance is that “live and let live” attitude that has been a common axiom of everyday life. Tolerance seems to have become less common in our days of blanket attitudes being broadcast in social media or mainstream media. Each person only lives their own singular life and it is finite. Since different people want different things, it has been common to accept that in seeking happiness, each person should have room to follow their own path which will differ from that of some others or even most others. Robert Frost wrote about “the road less travelled,” praising it by implication in his famous poem. Avoiding harming other people by imposing one’s own expectations on them has always been another part of being tolerant.

Sociologists know that people have a trait of grouping themselves with others that they can recognize as being like themselves. If you pass out a bunch of t-shirts to a large group in 5 different colors, people will automatically group with others of their color t-shirt. And further, people like to imagine that their group is better than the other groups. You can observe people trying to outperform other people in other groups by using whatever ability their group has to distinguish itself. This can be fun but it can also lead to problems like intolerance and lack of empathy for people in other groups.

If you want to learn more about history, politics and economics, and especially if you want to understand how we got to where we are right now, buy a copy of Political Catsup with Economy Fries available at Amazon.com.

As we go forward in the holiday season, let’s remember to be tolerant and empathetic towards others who aren’t like people in our group. Whether you are in this group or that, it’s helpful to remember that we are all human beings. We each have important abilities to share and develop and these abilities are needed in the world. The Grand Human Potential is shared among millions of human beings. No person has the entire evolutionary gamut of human potential but instead we each have only a small and limited part of the total of human potential. Having more empathy and tolerance might help you to explore past whatever is frustrating you now in your own life. Maybe more tolerance and empathy will lead you down new pathways.

If you feel that you lack empathy, and you want more empathy, try imagining how it feels to be someone else. Or try reading some fiction or writing a story where you try to imagine the feelings of several different characters. If you feel that you lack tolerance, ask yourself how tolerance can serve you as you go forward being more accepting of people who are different from you in the choices that they are making. There are many paths being followed right now by many different people. You can be tolerant of differences. If you ever are ready to try something new, other trailblazers will be sure to have preceded you, thank goodness. It’s kind of wonderful that so many possibilities exist in life. Aliveness is all about having many life affirming possibilities.

Music can be wonderful. It can be an expression of emotion and emotion can be how we keep our sense of value and proportion close to our hearts. Emotion can summarize for us the things that we have learned by reminding us about how we felt when we experienced them. Emotions have a physical component. Anger feels different in our bodies than compassion does. Music can connect our mind to our emotion and even to how that emotion feels inside of our body. Music can enrich us with an enhanced awareness about what our state of being alive means to us.

When you feel that the world isn’t understandable and you don’t know what you should do, music can remind you of good things that you know about and care about. When we face challenges, music can inspire us and lift us up to give us a higher connection with nature and the spiritual part of the world and the spiritual part of ourselves that we don’t always remember. What we value matters. Our love of nature and of other people matters. Music can help us to be held within the embrace of this beautiful side of our experience of being alive.

I like a lot of different kinds of music. I can be taken into the beat of rhythmic sound. Sometimes the cleverness of musicians amazes me. Most of all I like being inspired to feel more when I listen to beautiful sounds in music. A talented musician finds something good in their life that they distill into potent sounds that vibrate into someone’s hearing and make their life experience better. What a great way to inspire others.

Music of course can remind us of the past when we hear music from another era. How have you changed since then? If you can remember who you were when you first heard music from the past, would that version of you understand the you of today? Was the yester-you more or less optimistic, more or less idealistic, more or less fun? Can music restore the past you to bring gifts to the present you, perhaps gifts that you have forgotten that you once had? Are your values the same as they were? What values will you invest in going forward to bring to the you of the future?

To learn more about history, economics and politics, buy a copy of Political Catsup with Economy Fries available at Amazon.com.

This morning I went to look at the VAERS data set. Here’s the address: http://vaersanalysis.info/2021/10/01/vaers-summary-for-covid-19-vaccines-through-9-24-2021/

This data came from numbers compiled by the CDC. The data set is likely incomplete.

I looked at the number of adverse events and deaths that have been reported so far. The numbers are astonishing. It’s mind blowing that a significantly harmful vaccine is being required for employment by many employers when so many people have been killed or harmed by it.

We’ve seen a lot of malfeasance in the way that recent events have transpired but now what we are seeing seems criminal.

There’s a saying that “Crime that pays is crime that stays.” That employers are requiring an m-RNA shot as a mandate for continuing employment is a crime against all of their employees. It is especially a crime against the harmed and dead. It’s even a crime against those that remain under threat for a future health complication because of the m-RNA shot.

This m-RNA experiment has an unknown outcome even now. I’m worried about all the people who have gotten the experimental m-RNA innoculation.

End the experiment.

Buy a copy of Political Catsup with Economy Fries available at Amazon.com, to discover the nuts and bolts of how we got to this place of rampant tyranny.

First, stop listening to scary messaging. I know that it’s almost Halloween but internet and media have been doomsday messaging non-stop for years now. When the media makes you feel bad, notice that. Put your attention elsewhere. Perhaps you have unrealized depths of talent to produce something wonderful in your spare time. If you replace passive viewing of your television and internet with an activity that produces a bonified bonus for you and your family, you will win twice. You’ll win better feelings and better attitudes that include more optimism and you’ll produce something wonderful. During the Great Depression, my Grandmother made beautiful quilts that are still admired now. You can make something too.

Second, create your own messaging by doing select readings silently or aloud of uplifting stories or watch your favorite CD’s that provide encouraging messages. There are hundreds of authors who have written about almost any topic you are interested in. Even if you decide to watch a scary CD now because it’s almost Halloween, it reminds you that you aren’t in that scary situation. Your old movies are familiar and they aren’t quite the same as the media’s brainwashing. If you can’t stop thinking about messaging that makes you feel afraid about the economy or a virus then focus on something else, like how you might remodel your bathroom someday. Spend a lot of time pricing out and selecting the components. There are many websites that you can visit to imagine what you might like in the future. Focus and imagine what you might do later. You’ll find that this concentration on a future project will reprogram your dreams and banish negative concepts that the media has been feeding you for years. And it’s a positive image for a future improvement. Make a positive future your new focus in whatever way encourages you.

Buy a copy of Political Catsup with Economy Fries, available at Amazon.com.

Third, take back your health by eating well and exercising well. The banishment of the best doctors and nurses in our medical system because they resisted taking the m-RNA innoculation shows that your healthcare will be mostly up to you. There are critical shortages of qualified care givers because of tyranny afoot in our nation. Whatever isn’t specified in the law is tyranny. Take positive steps to insure your wellness by taking the best care of yourself that you can. Look at books on nutrition and exercise. Find out more about natural immunity and how to boost it. Do it when you are well and do it even if you are sick. Respect your wonderful body. Improvements are possible by taking gradual steps to move and stretch and eat nutritious foods. Plant your own fruit trees and do some gardening. Fresh tomatoes and lettuces are so much more flavorful. The bees and the birds will flock to your garden in droves when they see all the blooming that you make possible by planting what grows and feeds you.

Aeschylus (b. 525 BC, Greek writer) wrote “Against necessity, against its strength, no one can fight and win.” Do what is necessary for your happiness and you will make progress and leave negative messaging behind.