Michael Savage

My opinions on Michael Savage have slighly changed over time since my last post about him. I still find him pretty harsh, yet I listened to him several times and I must say he is a very intelligent man. He actually sounds like a pretty good guy if you look beyond that harsh surface. I have heard him make some wonderful remarks in terms of family and government. He still has his moments of self-righteous criticism, yet I feel he is bearable to listen to most of the time.

 

Justice

I know it’s been a while since I blogged and lots of my blogs haven’t really kept with the theme I started out with. Sorry about that. Now I must be on with another rant, even a plea if you will.

I have a friend back home in Mo. who is facing charges of what I believe is molesting his step-daughter. He never really actually told me what the charges are, but it is serious. I’ve never thought of him as the type of guy that would do something like this and I don’t believe he did it. He, of course, maintains his innocence. It is his word against hers basically. There is no proof whatsoever against him and the case was thrown out of court once already due to lack of evidence as well as his step-daughter’s history of making claims of being sexually assaulted, raped, etc. against other males.

This time around though something’s different. He doesn’t know what, but indeed something is. His lawyer who was confident he could win the case in the beginning is now telling him that he doesn’t have a chance and will have to accept a plea bargain which as most of you know requires him to admit guilt and will still have a tremendous impact on his life from here on out. He will have a difficult time finding work, which he already is simply due to the charges. He’ll have a difficult time living life in general and will be on the national list of perpetrators. I’m sure there’s an assortment of other troubles and trials he’ll face as well just due to the label that will be placed on him.

I believe, as does he, that there is some foul play involved at this point. His wife’s parents have never liked him. His step-daughter moved in with them around the time this all started. They’ve tried and tried to get his wife to leave him as I understand, even before all of this came about. They “know people” as it were and I’m not sure, but I believe they are moderately wealthy, at least in terms of small town society. This is all taking place in a small town so you can see how if you start thinking about it and putting pieces together you may become suspicious. He believes they may have paid off his lawyer. No one can be sure without an investigation though.

At any rate, I believe he is innocent. I’ve known child molesters. He really doesn’t fit that bill. Unfortunately, he cannot afford another lawyer as he’s out of work and the lawyers he’s consulted with all want money up front. If there happens to be a lawyer licensed in the state of Missouri who has a heart and is willing to do any pro-bono work I would urge you to contact me at the following email: thelaymansjournal at gmail.com

Please be in touch soon as time is running out fast.

 

Feeling the Squeeze?

I recently watched a clip of Ron Paul on youtube where he had discussed the economy and stated that we are in a recession right now. He explained that the lower and middle class are feeling the recession fully while the upper classes are not really aware of it because of the transfer of money from the lower/middle class to the upper class.

The fact is that right now the lower and middle classes are struggling to stay afloat given the state of our economy. Many of us are making it, but just barely. Others aren’t and are being foreclosed on losing homes they’ve lived in for several years. I would agree with Mr. Paul that we are indeed in a recession and I personally feel it may become a depression very soon. The financial institutions have overextended their services to folks who honestly cannot keep up with their debt. Of course it is the people who suffer most in these situations and it could have been prevented had the banks not handed out loans to people who couldn’t handle the payments.

 

Note to the Britney Spears Bashers

I’m sorry but I really have to rant about the folks across the country who are bashing Britney Spears with every breath they take. We’ve now come to the point where there are even ads depicting her holding a baby over her head. Those members of the press, web marketers, and bloggers who continue to persecute this poor girl please listen…

People, you’ve gone way too far. It isn’t just Ms. Spears that you ridicule, point fingers and condemn to hell, but she has certainly taken the brunt of it in recent years. Are you really so insecure that you must keep on with this childish notion that you are perfect and she is not? What are the motives behind your words and actions? Do you realize how utterly immature you are acting? It would appear not.

I’m no fan of Britney Spears myself, yet I have become quite weary of seeing and hearing all of this anti-Britney nonsense. There are much more important things that you people can spend your time, airspace, webspace, adspace, or newspaper space on, but instead you throw insults at this person who is obviously going through some rough times in her life. Where is the compassion?

Even more sickening is that many of the rude comments I’ve heard are coming from people who would call themselves a Christian. Folks, there is no room in Christianity for self-righteousness. If you must say anything at all to or about Ms. Spears perhaps you should consider saying something encouraging to her. Something that might actually help her out of her troubles.

How many of you crude people actually spend a good deal of your time with your children training them to grow into positive and productive adults? I’m sure many of you sit on your rear blogging about what a bad parent Ms. Spears is while your kids are sitting in their room playing with dolls, video games, or even talking on their Disney cell phone with friends. And who knows what else they might be doing. Maybe you should pay attention to your kids and quit harping on other people for their parental imperfections.

We live in a country that is “free”. We can pretty much say what we want and do what we want so long as it’s within the law. Most make a big deal about this country being founded on the principals of the Bible even to the point of whining when someone wants “In God We Trust” removed from our money. It’s a shame you people cry about every little bit of your perceived persecution, but then you turn around and speak hate towards others. I see very little evidence that you believe in God at all, at least in the God of the Bible. Maybe you should think about what God you truly are serving, particularly if you are so worried about “In God We Trust” being printed on your money.

In conclusion, leave this girl alone. Reach out your hand and throw her some encouragement instead of insults. Maybe she’ll straighten up then and be able to live a better life and it just might help you to live a better life too.

 

If a 17 year old can make a million bucks, why can’t I?

As I arrived at work and did my morning duties (checking email, reading news, eating…) I came across this article on aol.com and I couldn’t help but ask myself, if a 17 year old girl can start an internet “business” like this and make a million bucks off of advertising then why can’t I? The youngins these days seem so technologically inclined it almost hurts. I began learning html web design in 1997 and still to this day I’m not that great at it. I mean sure I can create a website and I even know a little about css, but nothing I design ever really comes out looking as good as say whateverlife.com. Anyone with good web design skills and a bit of a niche for graphic design along with a good idea can create a website that will generate advertising revenue. This is something I’d really like to do as stated previously on the layman’s journal. I thought that perhaps getting a blog together would be the answer and it very well may be. I guess it is just a matter of getting my own domain and incorporating the ads into the site. I’d like to design my own too. This free template is cool n all, but it just doesn’t quite say “the layman’s journal” you know?

If anyone would be interested in helping me put together my own logo graphic please let me know. It wouldn’t hurt to have a little assistance with the web design as well I reckon. I wouldn’t be able to pay any monies or anything, however in time after ads were in place I would be more than happy to share a portion of the revenue with anyone who helps out.

My goal in such an endeavor wouldn’t be to make a million bucks so much as just to generate a steady income stream, even if it’s only a few hundred bucks per month.  I’m not greedy folks. I just want to be “free” from financial burdens to provide a better life for the family.

 

The leakage continues

Sorry I haven’t posted in a while. It’s been a busy couple of weeks.

So yeah, the dining room is leaking again. It has gotten bad and I haven’t had the money to put into repairs. Right now there’s a tarp spread over that portion of the roof and stapled down. Water is still getting through and it’s leaking in during big rains (which we’ve had very few of).

The wife and I were thinking we would just knock down that whole room (as it was added about 25 years or so after the house was built) as rebuilding a bigger and nicer one, but now we’re not so sure. The roof is not tied into the main roof system which is probably a good thing considering all the troubles. Lately we’re just talking about fixing it and leaving the room as is. It would be much cheaper of course, but I still would like to rebuild it properly. It would add space and likely increase the value a good deal. Either way we plan to sell the house or rent it out after it’s all fixed.

It will be the first house in our venture into real estate investment which is something we’ve talked about off and on over the last few years. We would like to get enough rental properties to give us enough income to pay 100% of our expenses. This would make my full-time salary money in the bank and also give me the option to quit my full-time job if I so desired, which I don’t at this point, but someday in the future I will. Anyone with advice in this department would be more than welcome to contact me at thelaymansjournal@gmail.com. We really could use a mentor to help get us started. Someone honest and experienced. We don’t intend to be like  lot of these other real estate investors who take advantage of folks to make more money. That’s not us. We want to help people like us. We want to invest in homes and actually fix them rather than just pretty them up with some paint and new (looking) appliances. To me it would be more beneficial to society to fix the homes and let the buyer(s) do the cosmetic work. That makes more sense doesn’t it? I mean, the cosmetic work is less laborious and less expensive than doing roof repair or replacing an old worn out a/c unit. After doing repairs we would sell or rent the houses for a reasonable price.

That’s where we are with the house now. I’m hoping to get started on fixing this roof really soon. Surely it will all work out and we’ll have a dry home once again.

I started this blog a few weeks ago now and I’ve had a overwhelming response. I just want to say thanks to all of those who are reading… all two of you. Haha. My stats say I’ve had 100 hits or so. I guess that’s more than two. I have no comments or any of that though. If you have any please do leave them.

 

Millionaires in the Making

I was just browsing this Millionaires in the Making blog and I can’t help but get so aggravated when I read these sorts of things. I get the same feeling when I read articles that show sports stars signing multi-million dollar deals, for playing sports. Sure I realize that sports are entertainment, but really, this is ridiculous.

The part about the “Millionaires in the Making” that truly aggravates me though is the fact that I’m reading the income of these folks who are apparently on their way to being millionaires and they’re bringing in $70k+ per year and several of them are two income families.  It really bothers me that in this country that we speak so highly of, you must have two full-time incomes to live “comfortably” or you must go to college for several years (going into debt in that process) and get a very good paying job such as a lawyer, business person, doctor, etc.

I don’t know why I let it get to me so much, but it bothers me. It seems that the rate of inflation is so far beyond the increase in salaries that if you don’t have two incomes or one high income you get so far behind. It makes me wonder if 20 years down the road our economy will expect a three or four income family out of us. Will our children have to work along side the parents to make ends meet? (Child labor is illegal right? But it’s OK for our teenagers to work at fast food restaurants so they can spit in our burgers.)

Maybe I’m too simple-minded. Maybe I’m just too lazy to put more effort into making a better salary. Or maybe we live in a country with a messed up economy that desires to make life really stressful… Or perhaps they have other ulterior motives.

Either way I feel rather hackneyed after slogging my way through the years as if there was a 1 ton weight on my shoulders mostly due to financial stress. Don’t get me wrong I’ve made my financial mistakes and I know I must deal with the consequences of them, but I am at a point now where most all debt is paid off with exception to the mortgage and one simple credit card which will be expunged by years end. And still our budget is so tight there is little, if anything, left for us to really “enjoy” the apparent luxuries of life like going on a family vacation, buying a new t.v.,  fixing one of our broken down cars, or even going to watch mister millionaire play baseball. Is there any end to the financing of every little project?

It just doesn’t seem right being that we live in “the land of the free”. If we are free, why do I feel like such a slave?

Meanwhile, Joe Shmoe just signed a contract to play baseball for $10,000,000 per year. Congratulations Joe!

 

Breaking posts…

I would like to know how people are breaking their blog posts up to shorten them. I’ve seen on several blogs that it will have the first paragraph or so of a post and then a link that says “read more” or something of the like. I haven’t figured out yet how to do this so if someone reading this can elighten me please do.

tl

 

No ads here

Now that I’m browsing the faq’s I see that ads are not permitted on the free hosted blogs. In that case I’ll continue until I am able to upgrade to my own domain where I can have the ads.

Oh well, I need the blogging practice anyway.

tl

 

So here I sit…

So here I sit at work on a Monday afternoon with nothing to do. Since there’s nothing on my plate at the moment I thought I would elaborate on why I have created this blog.

As I mentioned previously one of my primary aims in having a blog is to create supplemental income via ads and such as outlined on problogger.net. That isn’t the only reason though. I also want to be able to connect with other folks who are also laymen so that we may all learn from one another and struggle our way out of layman status in each of our respective fields.

Some of the subjects, or shall I say interests I’ll cover are:

EV’s (electric vehicles) – I have a great deal of interest in converting my 1995 Honda Civic to an EV.
Home Improvements – Being a fairly new homeowner I’ve found out that in order to keep up with repairs you must do a good deal of the work on your own, unless of course you have a very good paying day job or two full time incomes in your household.
CADD (computer aided design drafting) - This is my full time occupation in which I have over 12 years of experience so I wouldn’t necessarily consider myself a layman in this category, but I could certainly exchange tips with others in the industry or help some newbies along and give them advice pertaining to the field.
Misc. – The rest of what I’ll be blogging about is mostly miscellaneous subjects such as politics, religion, parenting and family, etc. I’m certainly no expert in this areas, with exception to parenting and family, but then I have a lot to learn there as well.

tl