Jack’s Winning Words 10/7/19 “I want you to act as if your house is on fire.”  (Greta Thunberg)  Our Fire Dept encourages every resident to have a plan of escape in case of fire.  Do you have one?  My plan is to run to the bathroom (there’s a good exit window there).  When there’s an emergency, it’s important to know what to do.  Greta is that teen-age Swede who spoke to the U.N. recently about Climate Change.  Is there something on your mind that’s an urgent concern?  ;-)  Jack FROM TL:  My, you present a lot of thought in 6 lines!  You are truly special, gifted and appreciated – each day!===JACK:  6 lines seems to work for me and my message...not too long, and not too short.  Each person who receives "the words" is important to me. FROM RS IN TEXAS:  Yes...climate change.  Unfortunately, many of our politicians not only want to not admit it's urgent.....or that it exists at all.  November 2020.===JACK:  I remember extremes of heat and cold and rain and snow when I was growing up, but the melting of the polar regions is something new. FROM OUTHOUSE JUDY:  Not really.  There are always concerns but not emergency concerns.===JACK:  ...but, you know what to do in case of an emergency, don't you?  Call 911 or 463.===JUDY:  Lol.  Yes.  I have a fire fighter son-in-law.  We have the emergency points all set up.===JACK:  Good!...but did you "get" Call, 463?  Think about that some more!===JUDY:  Yep...  GOD!===JACK:  Did you ever hear the song, "Hello Central, give me heaven?"  You can Google it.   FROM WALMART REV:  Good Morning, Jack!! I always seem to have a "mote or two, or possibly a beam" in my eye I'm praying about . . . I think I'll keep them in my prayer closet and between my Father and I instead of revealing them today!! I might disappoint you, if I tell you?! 0;-)===JACK:  The Bible sometimes uses words that I think I know, but what is a mote?===REV:  A mote is "a tiny piece of a substance", used as an analogy in Luke 6:41 KJV===JACK:  Which of these do you have in your eye?:  Atom, crumb, flyspeck, dribble, granule, molecule?  All are motes! FROM DR J:  Im with her… Greta. She’s right! The house is on fire… and I like this quote too===JACK:  I wanted to quote Greta in a way that would get the point across without using a sledge hammer.  FROM ST PAUL IN ST PAUL:  sometimes i run to the bathroom for reasons other than a fire...===JACK:  Pants on fire?===SP:  Well, sort of! FROM HAWKEYE GEORGE:  A most interesting read===JACK:  Do you remember what you were doing when you were 16?  What were your passions?  I can't remember that I had any.===GEORGE:  Ahh, 16: girls and basketball.===JACK:  I don't remember that we were into causes. FROM NORM'S BLOG:  It is common wisdom that when threatened most people react one of two ways – flight or fight. The flight response can take many forms – actually running away, lying to yourself and others, or just pretending not to notice. The fight response usually takes the form of some action to deal with the threat.  I would submit that the “house” that Greta alluded to is one that we all live in – the planet Earth – and the threat is not a fire but the effects of climate change. The response of many to this threat has been to ignore it or to create and spread the lie that it is not happening. That is a flight response. It is real. It is happening. Our house is on fire.  The flight response has not worked, nor will it ever work.  We must turn and fight this fire in our house. Making that choice can leave you feeling a little like those pictures you see every now and then from California when wild fires are raging. Perhaps you’ve seen the ones with the homeowner standing there with his pathetic little garden hose trying to save his house by himself. It is a feeling of helplessness and being alone in a futile battle.  That does not have to be the case.  You are not alone. There are many organizations out there that are rallying support against climate change. Some focus upon trying to get big companies to change their polluting ways; others focus on the political process and back candidates who get it and are committed to making changes to save the planet. Still others primarily focus upon educating the public and changing the mindsets of citizens who are still in flight mode by fighting against the misinformation being spread by the polluters themselves.  It’s time to take a stand and fight! It is your house. It is on fire! What will you do? Flight or fight?===JACK:  As was said in My Fair Lady,  "By Jove, I think (he's) got it!" FROM BLAZING OAKS:  Racial equality in the Justice System, is certainly an ongoing urgent cause, but that radiates out into racial biases everywhere, doesn't it?  It will always be an ongoing concern, even tho we've made some strides in recent history. I worked for the Republican candidate against Harry Truman in High school (couldn't vote, of course)...knowing what I knew later, Harry Truman would have had my vote!! A change in the White House would be so welcome today by many of us!===JACK:  I guess it's my theology, not my politics, that has changed since "youthful days," and I'm OK with that.  There's something to be said for the words, "higher education."  Of course, a lot depends on the educator...and I had some good ones.  A God-given discerning mind is important, too.===OAKS:  So true! Reading widely, as you and I do, helps===JACK:  Reading widely and wisely! FROM GOOD DEBT JON:  The shape of peoples personal finances will likely cause more trouble than weather. People don’t often take a threat seriously when it is slow moving and imperceptible. When you weigh the threat of financial ignorance against climate change there is no comparison.  We have 200 plus years of evidence on finances and saving/investing that has empirical results.  The climate alarmists have since 1970 been wrong with each and every prediction and even reversed 180 on whether we would freeze or burn and drown.   Every climate alarmist depends on flawed models and the assumption earth is static and incapable of changing again. I am for technology and innovation solving the CO2 problem (planting trees seems to be one answer) if it is a problem.  Climate change is the new moniker for control of people and the economy.  If it is to be solved or is solvable then a ten billion dollar x-Prize would bring more innovation than simply taxing and central control of world economies.  I am optimistic about millennials, they are saving more and trusting government less.  The savings rate for millennials hit 8.1 percent according to the St Louis Fed last week.  We can and should be collective in our caring and gratitude though we must be individual in responsibilities.  Greta is simply contrived just as John-John Kennedy was in the picture of him saluting his dads casket in 1963.  Though as far as contrived media goes, I favor and admire the Kennedy stunt which was later admitted to. ===JACK:  The Kennedy salute...contrived?  Now, you're going to tell me that there's no Santa Claus...and Climate Change is not as bad as the World Financial Picture?  I don't know if that makes me less concerned or more concerned about the future?  I think that it's time for you to write a new book.  We, the people, don't always know as much as we think we know.===JON:  Climate change not as bad as most (66%) of folks "personal finance's". World finance? Too big for me to fathom.  ===JACK:  The "Headlines" push and shove most of us around.===JON;  Agreed. Anxiety is the lifeblood of media. I'd go so far as to call it soft-terrorism. The media is used to shape rather than report.===JACK:  The media may not be perfect, but I think that soft-terrorism is too harsh.  An administration with no "checks" can become a dictatorship.