Happy New Year

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HAPPY NEW YEAR

Patch Of Faith Makes Miracles Happen At Holidays

The results are in and the facts are irrefutable. A patch of faith can make miracles happen. In the beginning many questioned this result, but the skeptics have been silenced. Having faith in God works, especially at the Holidays.

The truth is it works all year long, but many of us only remember our faith at the Holidays or when tragedy hits us.

At times like this we try and patch our faith together so that we can prove to ourselves, and our families that we really are worthwhile people. Well of course we are. Why would you ever question yourself that way?

Why all the attempts to be politically correct and to avoid certain symbols of the Holidays and certain salutary greetings when all that is needed is a patch of faith that let’s you know it’s how you feel and your traditions, not what you say that counts.

Why all the uncertainty about what we should and shouldn’t say and do. We used to know instinctively how to act. We used to have enough faith in ourselves so that we didn’t have to patch ourselves together to get the true spirit of the Holidays.

How about reaching back into our pasts and remembering the Holidays we spent with our parents as we were growing up and how wonderful everything seemed to most of us – how miraculous. We didn’t need anyone to tell us to get in the mood in those days, it was a given.

How about looking around at our family and friends and marveling at how much we have to be thankful for? How about rejoicing at the wonder of it all? Why is it so hard just to relax, enjoy and do what comes naturally?

I guess I’m old fashioned. I always appreciate the gifts God has given us more at the Holidays. I always make a ton of resolutions for the New Year, and I always forgive myself when I break them.


I want to wish you all, as it applies to each and every one of you, a very happy Hanukah, a merry Christmas, and a happy New Year.




You can find out more about a patch of faith and finding inner peace at
http://www.faith-patch.com

Virtual Reality World Becomes Real

It happened gradually as we played the video game over and over. I thought I was making adjustments to what the players looked like and how they acted – making them more ferocious and terrifying. Must have been the Game Master, not me, that was making the changes. In an instant it happened. My virtual characters became real.

I took a Quantum leap of faith and decided that this must be God’s will. When I think back on what happened next, it was really obnoxious of me to think I could influence the game of life even in video form. The truth is, some things are just beyond our human abilities.

When the changes occurred, war turned to peace as the fighting factions laid down their weapons and became peace-loving neighbors. This is a concept I never would have considered. I couldn’t believe how friendly my warriors had become. They actually tried to help people instead of killing them. Why hadn’t I thought of that? I guess growing up in an atmosphere of terrorism and fear, the idea of peace and love thy neighbor eluded my comprehension.

When I thought I was making changes to the video game of life, it never occurred to me to be a good neighbor and try and help others. The thought that God wanted us to live to in harmony with each other and with nature never entered my mind. I thought that religious differences leading to religious wars were a way of life. Thank God the Game Master knew better. Sometimes I think the two of them are one and the same.

Maybe it’s God, the Game Master, who is playing with our lives as in a virtual reality game. Maybe it’s His will that we strive for peace, not war. Maybe if we just let the game of life play out instead of trying to influence the ending, we could reach a better conclusion.

I think it’s time we stopped trying to move our Quantum Qubits around and allow God to shape the essence of our lives. Life is not a video game. We should stop trying to replicate what hasn’t worked in the past. Let’s make peace, not war. Let’s allow the Game Master to show us the way.

Excerpt From Johnny Oops - CHAPTER 20 – SHARING

I watched her from the patio of our glass door poolside apartment in Tory Pines, California not far from the USCD campus as Jody, standing on her toes on a small step stool, cleaned the top of the Venetian blinds. She was wearing a bathing suit top and a pair of pink panties.

I’d finished school early because a professor cancelled my class and I decided to go back to Jody and surprise her. I couldn’t get my mind off her. I stood there watching her clean, imagining the smell of her, her warmth when I hold her, and how she presses up against me with no reserve. I couldn’t take this for long. I was getting too excited.

I quietly slid the patio door open. Entered the living room and said, “Surprise, I’m home.”

She was startled and said, “Lover boy, what are you doing home?”

Pouncing on her, I picked her up from the stool she was on, gently lowered her to the ground for a kiss and said, “My class was canceled. The old professor got the virus that’s going around. I went for coffee and started thinking about you so I cut my afternoon class and came home. Wish you would stop calling me lover boy, honey. I hate that.”

“Let me go, lover boy. I will try. Want to go for a swim?”

“How about a swim in the shower honey?” I cuddled her and started nibbling on her ear. The pure animal scent of her neck was enough to arouse me. She playfully pushed me away.

“Why Johnny Oops, whatever am I going to do with you, you sexed up maniac?”

I was not about to be that easily put off and grabbed her around her waist, pinning her arms to the side and smothered her with kisses. I barely managed to say, “You want to fool around?”

“Yes I do, lover boy. I certainly do.” This time she didn’t pull away. She started to undress me, and now it was she who was nibbling, and not on my ear.

“Do you think it can be this way forever darling? ” I said. By this time we were both in heat and rolling around on the floor of the living room.

“I think so. You know I usually get what I want, Johnny.”

“You are everything to me, Jody. I want to share my whole life with you,” I said as passion took over and I entered her face to face with Jody sprawled out on the leopard print area rug beneath us, grabbing me by my hair, pulling me closer and urging me on.

“Honey, thanks for not calling me, lover boy again,” I mumbled as I gave in to the moment, and exploded, giving way to a grunt of relief.

We stayed locked in each others arms for a few minutes and then Jody sighed and said, “You are my lover boy. You always will be. How about that swim now? You’ve gotten me all hot and sweaty.”

“I’m ready for a swim. I’m ready for anything with you, Jody.”

Life can’t get any better than this. Jody is everything I ever dreamed of in a woman. I don’t want to be with anyone else. This is the only reality I crave. I’m blessed. This is as good as love gets. This is my future. God, I hope things don’t change. I want this to go on forever.

Carbon Tax Cap And Trade Catastrophe -- Excerpt -- Home Grown Terrorist

Driving home John, the number two man in the FBI, felt the power of his new Mercedes as he opened it up on the highway. It leapt to sixty miles an hour in nothing flat. Too fast John thought, too damn fast. He was thinking about what was happening with the Iranians, not his new car.

As he sped to his new temporary hotel apartment home in his new Mercedes, he was shaking his head wondering what was going wrong in America and why? He felt like one of those people one saw interviewed on TV after a tragic school shooting or a murder struck there small community, and they mumbled in a daze that they thought it couldn’t happen here. No, not here in the good old USA: no homegrown terrorists suicide bombings, no dissatisfied underclass, no greedy banks ruining the economy, no Iranian backed junta ready to take over. But it was happening. It was all too real. The shear horror of what was taking place hit John with full force. He had to pull over to the side of the road to compose himself. How could these people possibly make a deal with the Iranians?

As soon as John got home he called his boss Casey, the head of the FBI, and said they had to meet in Philadelphia, that it was urgent. Casey told him to make it the following morning around 10 AM and got off the phone muttering that this better be worth it.

The following morning John met Casey at their favorite Deli as planned. The first words out of his mouth were, “The Iranians gave me a brand new Mercedes for setting up Ross Phalen. I feel like a crook.”

Casey replied, “You mean more like a traitor. What do you expect, you’re a double agent?”

“I’m only doing this because it’s in our National interest.”

“Are you sure?”

John said, “I don’t like the way this conversation is going. I have something urgent to tell you. I feel like I am being set up to take a fall if something goes wrong.”

“Not by me John. Just be sure you aren’t setting yourself up. You are walking a fine line. Now what is this urgent information you have to tell me that forced me to cancel an important meeting with the future Director of Homeland Security?

“I have to tell you, Casey that the Iranians handle things in a more pleasant manner than you do.”

“I am not in the pleasant business, John. What do you have?”

“Okay Casey, you asked for it. This is the down and dirty of it. Dawa and an associate who is a professor of economics at New York University by the name of Alhali Huseini met me for lunch yesterday. After giving me the car for a job well down, they told me they had a new project for me. I was to find a respected reporter for a major newspaper and give him the story that our major banks and investment brokerage houses were hiding off balance sheet losses of about two trillion dollars in CECOFS and it could very likely wreck our economy. I am to get the details from the good professor when I’m ready to talk to a reporter and reveal this monumental scandal.

The Iranians say they are in a conspiracy with the Chinese who will sell a trillion dollars worth of the CECOFS to drive the price down to near zero as they were inflated to more than four times their real worth to begin with by the banks so they could show huge profits and recover from the sub prime disaster of 2007 – 2009, from which they have never really fully recovered. I am also to fill in some of the more aggressive bloggers on the Internet so the story will have legs.

The Iranians figure this could cause our financial institutions to crumble, and out economic system to self destruct leaving them in a position to put a junta of their choosing in control to take advantage of the ensuing chaos without the need to explode another terrorist bomb. There is more, but I can’t remember it all. The Russians are in on this in some way. I have a week to find a reliable reporter and destroy the United States. Do you have any thoughts?

John thought Casey was going to choke on his buttered bagel.

Casey said, “What the hell is a CECOF? How did this happen? Who let the banks and brokers get away with this? Where were the Banking Commission, the SEC, and all these new regulatory agencies Congress created in 2010 when all this phony profit stuff was happening? How could the banks have concocted these financial instrument and priced them at four times what they are worth? What the hell do you expect me to do about this? This could be a catastrophe. It could cause our economy to collapse.”

“The CECOF stands for Carbon Emission Credit Option Funds. I don’t know who let these financial institutions get away with this scheme. I don’t know how they manipulated the price of the options. My guess is they now have these computer geeks who make up these crazy formulas, and I’m not even sure the CEOs of the major financial institutions know what kind of a pile of manure they are sitting on top of. These computer geeks get paid fortunes, as I understand it to come up with exotic financial formulas. All they have to do is change a decimal point here and a symbol equaling something else there, and they can inflate the value of whatever phony financial instrument they have created.”

Valuing saving the Nation from pollution and Global Warming is a very subjective thing. These computer guys can have a field day determining what these Carbon Option certificates should trade for. They can raise their value by determining that the underlying Carbon fines they are supposed to protect against are going to go up sharply because Global Warming due to carbon emissions is much more of a problem now than it was six months ago. “

“Who knows what ephemeral nonsense they base their valuations on? The problem is that people and financial institutions have been buying them at these inflated values. It has something to do with the initial Cap and Trade legislation Congress passed in 2010 where certain companies got Carbon Credits verses the new taxes they were supposed to pay as fines for not curbing carbon emissions, and then traded them to other companies that needed them more because they had worse carbon emission problems and fines to pay. It’s all very confusing, and the legislation made it even more difficult to comprehend as politics dictated, which companies got what Cap and Trade credits, not actual need.”

“The problem has been exacerbated because these inflated CEOF’s have gotten into a lot of pension plans whose investment officers thought they were doing the patriotic thing. “

“The heads of these Investment Companies go along because they don’t really understand the underlying liability to their Companies, and they want big bonuses for showing profits phony or not. It is like a giant game of musical chars. Unfortunately it looks like the music is about to stop and our Country is going to be without a seat at the table of credit worthy Nations. As you have told me, greed must have driven them to this. Sounds familiar, sounds like I’ve heard this song before. I don’t have the answers. I’m only speculating based on my limited knowledge. What I expect you to do is to tell me what to do. I need answers from you. I could arrest Dawa, Alhali, and there boss Wady Hussein, but I don’t know how deep their organization is, and this information will probably get out anyway. What do you want me to do?”

Casey frowned and said, ‘Do nothing until you hear from me. I have to see the Secretary of the Treasury, the head of the Federal Reserve, and the President. I can’t make a decision here on my own. This is too big. I can hardly believe it. Wait until you here from me.”

“I only have one week.”

“Just go home and do nothing and say nothing for now. I will get back to you as soon as I can.”

“Why do I have the feeling that either way I’m going to be screwed by you or the Iranians”?

“Look at it this way John. If we screw you at least history will recognize you as a patriot instead of a traitor when the truth eventually comes out if it ever does.”

“Great, but will any one I care about know the truth? What about my family? What about me?”

“Don’t leap to conclusions John. You have been reading too many spy novels.”

“Why do I feel like you wrote them?”

“Go home John.”

As John drove home he noticed that sweat was starting to form on his upper lip again. He tried brushing it away with his sleeve, but the fear wouldn’t go away. He didn’t trust Casey any more. He didn’t trust Wade. He didn’t trust anybody. He felt alone, horribly alone. He missed Alice. He yearned for the good old days when he was a junior officer in the New York office of the FBI, and weekends meant mowing the lawn, ice cold beer, hamburger barbeques, and making love to Alice. He could almost smell the burgers.
*****


Hi, this is Arthur Levine, the author of the novel Homegrown Terrorist. To read other excerpts, or to leave a comment please go to http://johnnyoops.blogspot.com

The Haves And The Have Nots And The Don’t Haves

The current thinking by the Administration and the Democrats in Congress is that it’s time to take money from the people that have an abundance of it and give it to those in need, who are therefore by definition considered poor.

The problems with this is that the Rich and not so rich, want to keep what they have worked for and don’t want to give any part of it to people who may or may not have worked at all, as opposed to living on the public dole. The poor – by definition those who don’t have a gold pot to relieve themselves in – want what all the Rich and almost rich folk (Middle class) have. They want material wealth.

It may be that these two groups will be on opposite sides of the question of capitalism verses socialism or much worse for eternity if we enact any more social welfare legislation. It is almost inevitable that our children will have to pay the bill for the debts we are now creating in the name of social justice, fairness, redistribution of the fruits of your labor to the masses, and the policy of giving more to those of us who have less.

What ever happened to incentives and hard work, and entrepreneurship? What ever happened to the freedom to pursue your dream? What ever happened to the free enterprise system? Will your children have the right to try and become successful on their own as you did?

The irony of all this is that it may well be the children of the Have Nots that will have to pay our National Debt assuming that their parents are successful in getting the bulk of the wealth away from the wealthy and willing. This thought will probably have me laughing in my grave, although I’m not sure which camp or group my grandchildren will fall under of Haves or Have Nots in this game of financial redistribution of the National Wealth.

The big question I guess I have is who is going to want to build a business, hire employees, and try and make a profit, if the government is going to take what you make and give it to those that don’t have it, won’t work for it, can’t create new inventions, and don’t have sufficient incentives to make money? We better find out how this works in Sweden and France because this is the direction we are heading in. Maybe under socialism you don’t need to work. Maybe the government supports everyone, but if this is so, where do they get the profits to tax to pay out to the rest of us – the Don’t Haves.

Where is the social justice in all of this?

What is the sense of having clean air when you can’t breathe free?
*****


Hi, this is Arthur Levine, the author of Johnny Oops and Home Grown Terrorist. To read other articles like this or excerpts from my novels please go to http://johnnyoops.blogspot.com.

CHAPTER 4 – WHY? – Excerpt From Homegrown Terrorist

A series of homegrown terrorist attacks in New York City left the population in a state of panic, and law enforcement straining to contain the situation. One of the first steps in calculating the nature and scope of the homegrown terrorist threats they were facing, was to determine who the known terrorists were and why they’d acted as they did. John Stamper, acting head of the FBI in NYC, enlisted the aid of his two loyal associates Jim and Eric to attempt to build profiles for the eight known bombers. They only had to go through a few files before a common thread became obvious.

These young men and women were not driven for the most part by religious fanaticism. They were propelled in their disastrous actions by an overriding feeling of hopelessness, and a wish to somehow make a statement that would change the social context in which people like them felt trapped. In their desperation, they ‘d made a determination that no life was better then the life they were currently living. If an afterlife could be provided that would be an added bonus, but not the real reason they were willing to become suicide bombers.

Able Knowi was a twenty-three year old Moslem of Iranian decent. His parents had both passed away when he was nineteen in a car accident. They ‘d been hit by a limousine, which was returning from a lush party in the Hamptons on Long Island, NY with a carload full of hookers. Able had received only a pittance from the insurance company for the limousine company. He lived in a hovel of an apartment in Astoria, Queens, one of the outlying boroughs of New York City, where he’d grown up in relative poverty.

Able was not really a practicing Moslem, going to the local Mosque only occasionally to try and make friends. He was basically a loner who had little money, no job, and practically no friends. It was at the Mosque that he started hearing some of the radical jihadist propaganda that certain radical clerics were spouting with impunity under the guise of free speech. Able was convinced he had no future. Somehow and through some medium he became self radicalized – teaching himself how to become a jihadist. After a period of self indoctrination, Able thought he had found the answer, and blew himself up in the Bangles and Bows Toy Store with a home made bomb constructed from blueprints obtained on the Internet and supplies from the local hardware store, killing and injuring many innocent civilians. There were no links as far as the FBI knew to any known terrorist organizations, and as far as they knew, Able operated on his own with no help from any one.

It all seemed so easy. Blowing himself up was going to be the answer to all his problems. He was going to change America and solve his personal problems at the same time. He was going to become a terrorist – a jihadist. He was going to Heaven where he would be treated like a king and have seventy-two virgins at his command. This last part was the bonus benefit to a wasted life with no purpose and no future he could perceive, except to make a statement as a homegrown terrorist. .

The scariest part of all this was the self-radicalization aspect. He had virtually taught himself how to become a terrorist. As far as the FBI knew he had no contact whatsoever with Iranian terrorists or any other terror organization. The question was how did he do it? How did he learn to make a bomb? How did he teach himself to become a jihadist? He must have been receiving instruction from somewhere or someone. What had convinced him to create a holy war or jihad in the name of a Moslem religion he hardly believed in? What had convinced him that Americans were foreign devils when he himself was an American by birth?

Anna Costa was twenty-nine years old and of Puerto Rican decent. She was a fairly homely girl with buckteeth and a crooked nose. She lived in Flushing, New York with her mother. They hadn’t seen or heard from her father in years. They lived on welfare payments. Anna had dropped out of high school in her junior year. She had no skills, no job, and no boyfriend. She felt hopeless. She had been arrested for shoplifting at a local discount store, and had been treated badly by the store security guards who man handled her and strip-searched her in a dressing room. They discovered she had no stolen property on her person and let her go, not even bothering to apologize. Anna felt violated

At a Sunday Church social, to which she had gone in a vain attempt to meet a man, she met another lost soul who convinced her that there was nothing for her in this life: no future, no man. He convinced her that she would find what she was looking for in Heaven. He told her he had found the way to a better world, and would help her find her way there herself. He told her the way was to become a jihadist and exact revenge against America for leaving her in her current circumstance of poverty. He convinced her that her mother would cry for her, but would be proud of her for helping to destroy America whose fault it was that she was so unhappy. He convinced her that she didn’t have to be Moslem to go to Heaven and be welcomed by Allah. All she had to do was to commit Jihad – war against America.

Anna set off a bomb in Grand Central Railroad Station in New York City killing and injuring one hundred and forty people at rush hour in the main terminal building including herself. She was smiling when she set off the bomb and mumbling something unintelligible. She was on her way to Heaven to meet her new husband she thought. In her case the bonus of going to heaven was an important part in her decision to blow herself up, but it wasn’t what caused her to become desperate enough to become a homegrown terrorist; that part was caused by her feeling of total hopelessness. The FBI hadn’t been able to pin down if the new friend she met at Church was a secret Iranian agent working for a specific terrorist cell, but they had their suspicions.

Austin Blake was a feckless young man from a well to do family. He was twenty-two years old and had recently dropped out of college. He was a druggy who had been in and out of drug rehab, disowned by his parents, and currently living on the streets. He was trying to keep warm over a vent on the sidewalk in front of Dales Department store, which he had just been thrown out of for loitering, when the thought struck him that there must be a better way. He had no friends and no hope for the future. He hated America and what he perceived had been done to him. He wanted to make a statement and change things. He knew he was a useless bum who had no future. He felt hopeless.

Two weeks later he blew himself and eighty-nine other people up on the main floor of the same Dales Department Store in New York City on 43rd street and Ninth Avenue, which he had been thrown out of earlier. In his drugged out state, he’d convinced himself that he was going to a better place where everything would be all right, and where he would be loved by his new family and friends. He died smiling and mumbling something unintelligible.

This trend towards self-radicalization scared John more than anything else. Who knew how many of these crazies there were out there who thought they could commit jihad against America and find a better life for themselves in Heaven? The question was how were these people, who had little or no connection to each other all finding the same way to self-radicalize themselves and make the same kind of homemade bombs? Who was teaching these people what to do? Were the Iranians really involved, at least on an organizational level?

John Unridge was perhaps the most disturbing of the group. He was a matriculating student at Downswitch University on a full scholarship who was on Dean’s List and had a bright future in front of him. He came from a middle class Ohio Methodist family, and had never been in trouble of any kind. What could have possessed him to become a suicide bomber? What made him hate his country enough to kill himself and scores of innocent strangers who had never done him any harm?

John had been turned on by one of the Moslem groups who were tolerated if not supported at Downswitch under the guise of free speech and equal rights for all, but this group did not appear to be a terrorist cell or have connections to foreign terrorists. They’d simply put the idea of jihad in Undridge’s head. He had self-radicalized himself. John was the only one who left a note, which said in part that he was sacrificing himself to demonstrate against the social inequities in America that had developed an impoverished underclass for which he felt partially responsible. He also stated that his parents who’d given him everything weren’t to blame for him turning out the way he did. He ended his note by saying, “We are coming.”

John Stamper shook his head in disbelief. He couldn’t understand how any of this was enough to make someone kill himself or herself and innocent people. He couldn’t understand how a bright young man with a great future and good marks in school, who apparently had friends and was popular, could fall for this line of bull from an on campus non confrontational Moslem group. Where was he getting the information on how to become a terrorist? Where had he learned to make a bomb? Why did all the bombs appear to have used a commonly constructed explosive device? Where have we gone wrong? What were these homegrown terrorists mumbling when they exploded their deadly bombs? How many other young men and women were ready to sacrifice their lives for warped principals, and what did the statement “We are coming,” mean? Who’s coming?

John Stamper turned to his assistant Eric and said, “I don’t fathom any of this. It’s beyond me.

Eric shook his head in agreement. “You got me boss. I don’t have a clue.”

This is part of what scared John so. The whole thing didn’t make sense. It wasn’t rational. It defied logic – “We are coming.” Who was coming? Who was we? How do you fight something that makes no sense? How were they going to beat this insidious virus that virtually leapt from the mind of one lost soul to another, constructing a virtual community of dissidents who had practically no physical association with one another?

The profiles the FBI established were based on the most extensive investigation of the terrorist’s actions in the weeks leading up to the bombings, and cell phone videos taken by alert spectators at the various bombings. A pattern of self-radicalization had become obvious in every case investigated. In each case these warped and misguided individuals had taught themselves how to become terrorists and how to make bombs.

Much of the information was gathered from pictures of the terrorists from their embedded microchip identification chips. They were identified by their DNA, and from camera shots of the terrorists. Cameras on most New York City blocks were a given in this day and age, similar to what London had installed years earlier.

We could go on and on analyzing all eight known terrorists, but the pattern was undeniable. All of them felt hopeless and lonely for one reason or another, or committed to some higher calling as radical as it might be. They had all taught themselves how to put the bombs together. The bomb components were readily available at your local hardware store. Most of them thought they were going to Heaven where there dreams would come true, so they had borrowed heavily from Moslem jihadist teachings, and all of them thought they were making a statement against American society.

No one knew what they were mumbling when they died, or how they’d learned how to self-radicalize themselves. Someone had to be pulling their strings. These people weren’t smart enough to do this on their own. Only the lone wasp in the group, John Unridge, had thought to leave a note or make a statement, that was before the videos of some of the suicide bombers started to circulate on Social Networks on the Internet.

Hi, this is Arthur Levine with an excerpt from my recently completed novel – Homegrown Terrorist. To read more excerpts from this novel, or to leave a comment, please go to http://johnnyoops.blogspot.com.