U.S. is #22. Admit it.

We Americans can't execute on our plans any more, because whatever we do we have to wade through vast swamps of our own BS. This goes for healthcare, infrastructure, crime and terrorism. 

My favorite TV host and the smartest political commentator of all times, Bill Maher has brilliantly summarized it. We don't get $&*!t done, people! And China can! India can! We can't! 

                                                                        

Actually, Finland can, too.

Quiet voices, but tough decisions: shouting doesn't work.

Shouting is a sign of weakness. It is an attempt to send a strong message. But the others just get used to the noise, or else they've heard shouting before and they know  the shouter won't actually do zilch. 

They know they can just endure some shouting and keep on being the way they are. 

This truth applies to parenting, families organizations -- everywhere. 

Screams and cussing pollute the atmosphere with spiritual filth, which is the only effect they really have. Better to be the the one who does not need to shout to get attention. 

#InCaseYourMomDidntTellYou

Happiness requires strength.

Being happy requires guiding oneself on the right path with a firm, steady hand. 

Sticking to the right long-term strategy is staying on course. Emotions, temptations and whims are random winds pulling and pushing which ever way.

Many end up as a shipwreck because they are too weak to stay the course. But choosing to be strong or weak, we encounter pain at some point. There is no such thing as painless life.  

#InCaseYourMomDidntTellYou

If they did it twice, they will keep doing it.

The greatest firmness is the greatest mercy.

Two times is a pattern. If a person in your life does/says something you cannot stand; decide if you can just put up with it. If not, they should not be a part of your life. 

Maybe you don't love them that much, if this little thing is a deal breaker. Maybe it's not little but really non-negotiable, like infidelity, physical abuse, drugs. 

Either way, "giving them a chance" involves chance, which is gambling. Gambling some months or even years of your time on Earth, and some other, truly great opportunities. Maybe, maybe, maybe -- knock on wood -- they will change. Actually, they won't, but maybe-maybe-maybe. In a year or two. Or in ten. Your life, though is evaporating right now. 

So, either shut up and put up with it, because you need them as they are. Or if you cannot, then just  tell them to see you when they are a different person. 

This may be harsh on on them -- and on you -- but short-term pain is better than a major life disaster.

 

#InCaseYourMomDidn'tTellYou

The Constitution is in people's minds, or else it's nowhere.

We Americans may not realize it, but to a citizen of Romania or Somalia, our daily mentions of The Constitution -- with straight face -- come across as a childish naivete; a delusion of eternal Hippies who don't understand true dynamics of power. Simply because our world has not brutal enough to compel us, to bully us into growing up.

Only about five years ago have I fully grasped that significance of the habitual reference to The Constitution. It is not a child's pretend game, it is reinforcing a central pillar of the American society. 

The Constitution is in people's minds, or else it's nowhere. A piece of paper in the Library of Congress cannot be a central pillar of anything, nor can it protect anyone. It is people and their commitment that makes our Constitution alive. And that would fade away if its significance hadn't been reiterated daily. Corruption would become an accepted norm.

Is America at crossroads like Russia in 1917?

In the year 1917, after the fall of Russian monarchy, that country had a choice of a dictatorship and a dictatorship. The head of the newly formed Provisional Government, a relatively young politician Alexander Kerensky had attempted to steer the democratic course, an option that wasn't really on the table. 

The result was the greater of the two evils, a horrendous regime under Stalin, on par with the German Nazis, though not quite as bad. 

Is America at crossroads today, 100 years later, trying for a sane middle ground? 

Could it be that the only two realistic options are the crazy left and way-less-than-perfect right. Is American political dynamics at risk of repeating the Russian mistake?

No, our options are not the same as Russia's in 1917, not dictatorships. But if everyone is hell-bent on having their way exactly, down to the last letter, then nobody will get anything. We'll end up in unmentionable substance up to our eyebrows. Just as Russia. And we aren't going to like it.

Eat that Shakespeare, boy!

We don't teach literature right. A kid comes into the classroom, and comes back out the same, untransformed, having completed some boring and annoying assignments, but just the same as before. So no education happened. We need to teach the children to actually appreciate beauty. Teachers stick something "classical" under their noses. Children react as if it were a pile of tasteless, unseasoned greens. Eat it, it's good for you! Eat it, I said. No candy, until you eat it! No cookies! No reality TV! Eat your Shakespeare, boy!

Students need some emotional resonance. Whoever came up with the whole idea of that checklist-based rote in literature courses? Shakespeare: this, this and that. Faulkner: that, that and this. Got it? Okay. Now you are educated.

Go write an essay; go recite a monologue. There's a good lad. The teacher checks off another B-, the kid goes back to his or her seat, both much relieved: it's over.

That's not education, that's a waste of time. If there was no actual emotional reaction, the whole thing was pointless.

Beauty has therapeutic value. It heals our psyche. I am sure we could prove with hard facts and figures that Bach and Shakespeare, Michelangelo and Picasso lead to us having better doctors and engineers. There is actual business value to beauty.

That is why schools should instill sense of beauty and good taste in children, not have them cram a few irrelevant plots and passages. Those are usually forgotten after the finals.