Rick Raw: Heart Tests Inspire Mystical Experience

By rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

As a result of suffering chest pressure for a week, which I couldn’t explain, I decided to go get checked out by a cardiologist, Dr. Constantin, associated with St. Lukes Hospital,. The tests consisted of a gamma scan of my chest, an ultra sound scan of my heart, and a stress test on a treadmill hooked up to a heart monitoring machine. Dr. Constantin’s clinic is modern and high tech. The personnel are friendly and efficient, which was a change from my usual medical office experience.

Of all the tests, the ultra-sound scan was the most interesting. Ultra-sound technology has come a long way from the blurry black & white images of yesteryear. Today’s ultra sound is digitized on a computer screen. There I was, looking at my own beating heart, watching the valves open and close. I was fascinated and mesmerized by this strange pulsating organ. "It’s alive–it’s alive!"

Soon, as the tech moved his K-Y Jelly coated wand around my chest, I pondered the big questions of life and death. As I viewed my hard working heart, I realized that it could suddenly stop, and I’d find out what was on the other side. In my mind, seeing my heart working justified getting the tests.

My half-brother died of a catastrophic sudden-death heart attack. He was only 65 years old. He had just retired from the police force and had been playing racquetball. He was sitting on a bench cooling down after a match and he just keeled-over and died. At 67, soon to be 68, I’ve passed that milestone. Still, the chest pressure that drove me to he doctor felt like Mike Tyson was holding me down by pressing my chest. It freaked me out. Dr. Constantin said that I did the right thing getting it checked out. The doctor will study the data from the tests and I’ll see him on July 30 to get the results.

The heart is nothing more than a pump, composed of muscle which pumps blood throughout the body, beating an average of 72 times per minute for every minute of our lives. My regular heartbeat is 84 bpm. On the treadmill, the highest I could get it up to was 110 bpm. The technician was frustrated that I couldn’t get it higher. She turned up the treadmill’s speed and nearly killed me. Finally, my knees gave out, but 110 bps was the highest it would go. Like all muscles, the heart needs exercise. We run, walk, or do other aerobic exercises to make the heart workout by forcing it to beat faster, thus making it stronger.

Seeing my beating heart also made me think of how fragile I am. I tried to imagine how many times my heart had to beat over my 67 years. What if I lived to a hundred? Then I thought about the electrical system that generates the power to keep the heart working. This led me to my lifelong studies of quantum physics, which tells us that everything in the universe is connected. And, we humans are connected to the higher energy–God as it were.

To me, spirituality is secular, since all humans have direct access to the higher energy. I call on it often. Some call it prayer, but it’s just semantics what we call it. Some people like to wrap it in the Biblical symbolism of organized religion, which gets you to the same place. Just turn on that switch in your head and you’re connected to the higher energy. Ask and it shall be given!

Yes, a person can actually die of a broken heart, which emotionally wrecks the heart. Our heart can ache for lost love ones. Thus the heart does play a role in our emotional life–literally and figuratively. When we fall in love, our heart feels good as it beats with healthy verve. It’s our engine that drives the bus that is us.

Seeing my heart working had profound effect on me. It was a mystical experience that verified my belief in the higher energy to which we are connected. My heart, like all the beating hearts in the world, is part of the whole –the great pulsating and expanding universe.

Rick Raw: The Dumbing of American Youth–Generation Stupid

By Rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

Could Jay Leno’s "Jaywalking" segment really represent a disturbing trend of the dumbing of America’s youth? Leno goes out on the street and randomly interviews young people testing their knowledge of current events, government, and history. I wondered if these people were shills (plants) purposely acting dumb for the shock value. According to Leno, the people and their stupidity are real. He swears the random interviews are not staged.

Then I delved into this subject more deeply and discovered that recent statistics revealed that reading has declined, not only among the poorly educated, but 67 % of college graduates do not read novels or non fiction books for pleasure. In contrast, it could be argued that the Internet is a vast unlimited source of knowledge and this is where today’s youth do the bulk of their reading and research.

Interestingly, though, the statistics agree with Leno’s straw poll because many of his street interviews are with college students or recent college graduates. The questions are so simple it’s ridiculous, like Leno holding up a picture of Condolezza Rice and asking the person who she was? A young woman, who claimed to be a recent college graduate, didn’t know. Incredibly, most of Leno’s interviewees are dim-bulbs. One young woman, who said she is attending college, couldn’t identify a picture of George W. Bush or his Vice President, Dick Cheney. And so it goes.

Leno’s "Jaywalking" segment is funny but disturbing. But it’s just a snapshot of the problem.
Sage pundits attribute the dumbing of America’s youth to the proliferation of the video gaming culture over print media. Moreover, a rising number of college students graduate with a pedestrian grasp of geography, current events, and history. It could be the fusion of anti-rationalism with anti-intellectualism, causing this paradigm shift of intellect. Self-absorption and frivolous concerns, like the merits of nail polish, or reaching a high level in "Grand Theft Auto IV" seem to occupy young people’s minds.

More significantly, a shocking number of today’s youth admit they get their "news" from John Stewart’s The Daily Show, which is a parody of the news. We journalists know that today’s youth are not reading newspapers. With no new newspaper readers buying subscriptions and advertisers going to television and the Internet, print media is on life support, facing extinction in the near future. Soon newspapers will be a quaint relic of the past like drive-in theaters.

To make matters worse, attention spans are declining in direct proportion to the youth’s intellect. I know this to be true because I’m a movie critic. Over a 24 year period of reviewing films, I’ve noticed that popular movies are aimed at the short attention span culture, with less dialogue and more special effects to keep the vid-kid generation visually stimulated. Explosive action is what they crave, not dramatic scenarios. The release of so called "art films" has drastically declined in the 2000s. Even if a low budget indie film wins an Oscar, it doesn’t benefit from an Oscar bump in attendance of yesteryear. The truth is, no one cares about quality films.

The coup de grace of the dumbing of America’s youth is not only their lack of knowledge, but the fact that Generation Stupid is proud, even arrogant that they deem intellect unimportant. In high schools, bright kids are ridiculed as nerds for being smarter than a five year old. The notion of curling up in front of the fire with a good book is seen as archaic by today’s youth--part of their parents’ generation.

Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of talented, smart, and ambitious youth coming of age. It’s just they are in the minority. As long as vast numbers of young people spend their spare time playing mind-rot video games that glorify violence, then their intellect will decay like rotten fruit.

Rick Raw: Office Rudeness Epidemic –Civility is Lost in Today’s Cut-throat World

By Rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

Lately I’ve noticed that attorneys and doctors hire receptionists and office personnel who do not necessarily have people skills. Rudeness is epidemic. Lost on most professional employers is the fact that the first contact a potential client or patient has with their business is with the receptionist or other person who answers the phone. That phone voice creates the first impression of the business. The person answering the phone (he or she--mostly she) can drive away business just by the tone of her voice.

Recently I needed a lawyer. Most of the offices I called I got curt replies, and rude responses from women who have no idea how to talk to people in a pleasant business-like manner. Then when I hired an attorney, paying him a substantial amount of money, he was never available. So I had to talk to his assistant, who would never take my calls, claiming she was too busy. When she finally called me, she was rude and had an accusatory tone with me.

Can rude office bitches be the norm in today’s world of acrimonious communications? Well, excuse me, but pissing off your clients and patients is not my idea of encouraging long term business success. Last week, I called a cardiologist because I was having chest pressure and I was concerned I may have a blockage in one of my arteries. I got the same bitchy, care-less attitude from the woman on the other end of the phone. The first thing she did was send me a ten pages of forms to be filled out. Go to any hospital, and you’ll meet this archetype office bitch.

Wow, it’s a good thing I wasn’t having a heart attack. My primary care physician is a friendly, competent doctor, but his office personnel are a pack of bitter women who hate their jobs. By now, my medical history should be available on the Internet for me or my specialists to access, which makes filling out forms unnecessary. Man, I hate filling out forms for every doctor I see. In today’s world of instant communications, duplicating information on forms is stupid.

Yeah, I know I’m going to be accused of being a sexist prick, but I ask this pertinent question: What the hell is wrong with young women who work in professional offices? Well, the problem rests solely on the shoulders of the business owners who hire anyone off the street for a pitiful salary and expect them to be nice to their clients or patients. They get what they pay for! More significantly, having people or communication skills is not a priority when these cheap bastards hire office personnel. Of course, it should be.

These professional dunderheads do not realize that a receptionist is an important job. Her phone skills are very important. Yet, invariably, the person hired immediately cops a negative attitude about her low wage job. I hear it in their voices and it’s pervasive. The receptionist should be an office manager who knows a lot about what’s going on in the office. Yet, in reality, they know almost nothing about the office in which they answer the phone. It’s an extremely annoying problem.

As for me, I’m always polite and gracious on the phone. I know that dealing with the public can be frustrating, and there are many rude people who call into offices. Still, civility is lost in today’s cut-throat world of sharks and money grubbing swine. Being polite is almost a quaint idea from the past. Yet, it doesn’t cost anything to be cordial to people, either on the phone or in public. The old adage that if you’re nice to people, they will respond accordingly doesn’t apply in today’s world.

My advice: If you can’t be cordial on the phone then don’t take a job as a receptionist. Likewise, professionals should be very selective who they hire to answer the phone. Let’s bring
back civility in voice communications.

Rick Raw: Rising Price of Gas Reaching Critical Mass which Will Force Positive Change

By Rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.com www.rickatnight.com

Traditionally, Americans adjust to changing economic situations like the price of gas and food. However, I ask: How high does gas have to reach before Americans start getting serious about conservation and alternative fuel sources for their cars. Today, at an average of $4.00 + per gallon, the price of gas it is reaching that point--its critical mass, in which Americans will shift their thinking, and start taking steps to conserve energy. In this respect, as gas rises to $5.00 per gallon and beyond, the crisis will have positive consequences. Of course, it will cause a lot of misery as well, with many businesses like restaurants and entertainment venues going bankrupt as a direct result of people cutting back on discretionary spending.

When the public starts demanding hydrogen fuel cell and electric powered cars which produce zero pollution from their exhaust pipes, then the car manufacturers will meet the market need. There is already a waiting list for Toyota’s popular Prius hybrid car that gets 50 miles per gallon. Shell is planning hydrogen gas stations that manufacture the hydrogen at the solar powered sites. Norway has a 600 mile hydrogen highway with this type of technology for hydrogen fuel cell cars.

In contrast, prestige car dealers are pushing luxury as a perk of the rich in commercials that feature an arrogant guy commuting to work in his Cadillac Escalade, saying, "It’s worth every penny." In other words, he’s so rich he could care less about he price of gas. But the buying trend in car dealerships across the country is for smaller more fuel efficient cars. The big SUVs and bulky pickups are not selling. In fact, people are trading in their gas guzzlers for hybrids and flex fuel cars. Diesel powered trucks can be converted to run on bio-fuel made from French fry oil picked up from fast food chains and sold at special fueling stations. The savings and eco-friendly exhaust offset the fact that your truck smells like a French fry.

The positive effects of rising gas prices has been reflected in the latest gas buying statistics. Americans are buying less gas than a year ago. Consumption is dropping, down from 9.4 million gallons to 200,000 fewer barrels per day than in mid-September of last year. Sadly, this will not lower the price because America is not the world’s leader in consuming gas anymore. China is now the world’s leader in gas consumption and, as a consequence, pollution.. So, the worldwide demand is going up, which is driving prices up. The truth is, petroleum plants just can’t keep up with the demand for black gold.

Global warming, caused by rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, is now a real threat to the planet has made an impact on the Zeitgeist. More importantly, the price of gas has caused a paradigm shift in the public’s collective mind-set toward eco-conservation. We have reached the point that most every American citizen recognizes the need to switch to alternative energy sources and radical new ways to get around.

Yes, the excrement has hit the fan, and people are waking up to near future catastrophes as the ocean level rises, and large coastal regions like Miami and Manhattan face serious flooding. Sometimes, we need a wake up call or a slap on the face, like the gas prices skyrocketing to absurd levels, to hurt us financially, so we are forced to consider real change to survive.

Now, America will have to face the new reality and consider transportation options like using mass transit, riding bicycles to work, or buying fuel efficient vehicles. That guy in the Cadillac Escalade commercial may feel smug in his wealth and luxury, but his mockery of the ordinary person who struggles to make ends meet could get his obscenely large fuel sucking phallic symbol trashed.. The Escalade and the Hummer are now symbols of greed, waste, and anti-conservatism.

Rick Raw: Attacks on Michelle Obama are Unsubstantiated Right Wing Dirty Tricks

By Rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

When Bill Clinton ran for President, the right wing viciously attacked Hillary saying she was a 60s radical and other outrageous falderal. Bill Clinton’s unprecedented popularity didn’t leave conservatives much ammunition to attack him. So they went after Hillary. After Bill Clinton won and Hillary became involved with reforming health care, she was plummeted by continuous scathing criticism from the right. The chorus of negative cacophony reached a deafening level.

Deja vu all over again. Rush Limbaugh, the ultra-conservatives’ chief blowhard, is leading the Michelle Obama smear campaign, blasting her as an angry black woman who resents white people, hates America, and may have terrorist sympathies. And, it’s going to get uglier as the race for the White House heats up. Fox news anchor E.D. Hill called Michelle’s playful fist bump with Barrack a "terrorist fist jab." More significantly, Limbaugh and his gang of conservative thugs said that Michelle once denounced "Whitey" from her church pulpit.

Of course, the fact that Michelle is an intelligent strong woman who expresses her opinions makes her fair game for attack. Right wing conservatives think that candidates wives should stay in the background and keep their mouths shut. But like Hillary’s past political activities, Michelle is on the stump for her husband and she says what she wants, which rankles conservatives, who look at all women like 50s female sitcom characters.

The reality is, Michelle is her husband’s closest advisor–his intellectual equal. Michelle and Barrack have a truly modern partnership that conservatives envy. She is a graduate of Princeton and Harvard Law School and she had a successful career as a lawyer and hospital manager. When she claims to understand the downtrodden, I believe she is sincere, but she leaves herself open to accusations of being a hypocrite. Some pundits say she is whiner, complaining about the cost of piano lessons and summer camp for her kids, while addressing the concerns of poor blacks who are out of work and desperate.

Yes, Michelle and her husband were bringing in over $500 grand a year, but that doesn’t mean she can’t have compassion and can’t understand the problems of the poor. In other words, her affluence does not necessarily rule out her altruism and sympathy for those who struggle to make ends meet.

However, the truth is–Michelle’s husband’s candidacy is historic and it happens in the arena of down and dirty presidential politics in which dirty tricks and false rumors are rampant. Nonetheless, the Obama campaign managers are trying to soften Michelle’s image. She is now emphasizing her humble roots in a working-class home on the South Side of Chicago. Last week she guest hosted The View, portraying herself as a friendly, accessible wife and mother. Yet, every day, Limbaugh and his colleagues are spreading lies about her. It’s only going to get worse as the campaign reaches its climax near the November elections.

Still, Michelle is troubled by what she sees as the broken American government that only her husband can fix. And many of us agree with her. She may soften this rhetoric in the next months but she has strong views and will express them. She’s not going to stay home and bake cookies. Michelle sees herself as her husband’s political partner. So, I say, her honesty and refusal to be gagged by right wing muckrakers is refreshing and I know that she will help her husband in his difficult job as president. It’s about time we laud strong intelligent women. You go girl!

Rick Raw: McClellan’s Tell-All Book Rings True, But He’s A Weasel for Writing It

By Rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

Scott McClellan is a weasel. During his entire tenure as Press Secretary, he was Bush’s yes-man, going out to the press room podium and uttering the President’s lies, but all the time he knew Bush was lying, which makes him a second hand liar. Yet, McClellan stayed on to reap the benefits of the job, rather than be a man and resign earlier.

Yes, his book rings true, but no one likes a snitch, especially one who professed the administrations policies so vehemently as Press Secretary. He’s the type of kiss-ass traitor that lurks around many offices, spewing the company line but not believing a word of it.

Well the jokes on him. McClellan’s book, What Happened caused a backlash even among Bush haters for his blatant hypocrisy for pretending to be Bush’s friend and supporter, then stabbing him in the back. Sure, I hate Bush, but this nasty little turncoat makes me sick. I, and many people with a modicum of morality, would not pretend to be someone’s friend and then turn against him just to be in the national spotlight and sell a book.

Scott McClellan says in his book, that "while I was spinning, I harbored private doubts." McClellan depicts the White House as "ruthless, duplicitous, and obsessed with getting its message out at the expense of both the truth and governing." He goes on to say that "Bush and his aides decided to invade Iraq first, and then waged a relentless political propaganda campaign to convince Americas to support that terrible strategic blunder."

Duh! Anyone with half a brain saw through Bush’s lies. We didn’t need confirmation from this turdy-wordy little gnome. Every time McClellan took that podium, savvy journalists could tell he was lying, covering for his boss.

When the terrorists pulled off the terrible 9/11 attack, its mastermind, Osama bin Laden was hold-up in Afghanistan. There was no al Qaeda in Iraq. Suddenly, Secretary Rice was telling the Hill that what would it take to convince them–"a mushroom cloud over Washington." Then Colin Powell appeared before the Senate Armed Forces Committee with charts showing mobile chemical weapons labs. Powell was livid and embarrassed that none were found. He quit immediately when the truth came out. The whole thing was a smoke screen by the administration to justify invading Iraq. In the end, it was all about oil. We didn’t need McClellan’s book to confirm our conclusions that Bush and his gaggle of profiteers were lying sacks of dung.

Christopher Hitchens in Slate.com said, "McClellan’s book is without value. For one thing he doesn’t supply anything that can really be called evidence. For another, he never says Bush and his aides flat-out lied about believing Saddam Hussein had WMDs. The worst he can do is charge them with obscuring nuances and ignoring the caveats that should have accompanied their arguments." Sorry Mr. Hitchens but "ignoring the caveats" sounds a lot like lying to me. It’s tantamount to saying, "Oh, My sister was in a car accident," but leaving out "the caveat" that she was killed.

Tim Rutten said in The Los Angeles Times, "How can you believe him. To date, roughly a dozen former Bush administration personnel have published memoirs expressing their dismay with the White House." And so it went, McClellan’s book was panned by everyone who knew the truth, but just can’t stomach tattletales who rat on their friends. Now no one will want Scott McClellan around as a so called "friend."

Rick Raw: Obama–On to the Presidency–Now We Must Take the Leap of Faith

By Rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

Clearly, Senator Barack Obama is an unknown entity in his historic victory over Hillary Clinton in the hard fought nomination process. Now his supporters, including me, will take the leap of faith to vote him into the presidency. For we believers, his inexperience as a freshman Senator was overridden by his reassuring oratory and confidence on the campaign trail. During every speech, Obama seemed to be talking to each of us, individually, addressing our concerns. As a senior citizen struggling to pay back taxes, I cheered when he promised to end taxation for seniors drawing social security. His platform was based on common sense and logic, not the typical platitudes spewed by other entrenched Washington politicians, telling the voters what they wanted to hear.

Indeed, Obama’s clinching of the Democratic nomination was the most important accomplishment of any African-American since Martin Luther King sparked the Civil Rights Movement with his "Gone to the Mountain" speech. For me, his race had absolutely nothing to do with my decision to support him. Obama transcends racial issues.

Obama’s victory as the Democratic nominee has given hope to all of his supporters who welcome his promise of change and thinking outside the beltway. Obama has already redefined presidential politics, giving the issues back to the people. He listened to us-- he absorbed our anxieties–he brought the long past Kennedy enthusiasm back to ordinary people.

Now, Obama must make his most important decision since winning the nomination–deciding on a running mate. Of course, the logical choice is Hillary Clinton. She has a mighty voter block that is presently pissed off. If Obama doesn’t’ reach out to Clinton, conceivably she could contest the seating of delegates right up to the convention in August. Yes, what to do about Clinton is a huge problem for Obama, given there is left-over bitterness in his camp. There is a sense that if they buckle under to Clinton, it could hurt Obama’s chances to beat McCain. If Obama chooses someone other than Clinton as a running mate, her voter block might vote for McCain out of spite. Whatever, he decides he will get criticized.

Just as Clinton supporters proved, she convinced millions of people that she would be the best choice for president. In contrast, there is a large anti-Clinton contingent that think she’s the devil in a pant suit. And then there is the matter of what to do about Bill, who seems to have turned into an angry old man snipping at reporters and becoming an embarrassment to Hillary. Obama must be asking: "What would Bill’s role be in an Obama-Clinton administration." The last thing Obama wants is Billy-Bob lurking around the White House hitting on the female staffers.

Perhaps, Obama should not go with Clinton as his veep. His message of change would be in tact and I still think he could beat McCain. As a compromise, Obama could promise Clinton an important position in his administration as his Chief of Staff or Secretary of Defense. I’m sure that would satisfy the Clinton supporters. Bill would be out of the picture. He could travel on the lecture circuit or spend his days in hotel lounges picking up women.

The Hillary question is a conundrum of Biblical proportions. Obama needs to make this decision soon to get it behind him and concentrate on the campaign ahead.