Manns Medium

You know I used to think that the reason why many of my fellow veterans commit suicide was due to their inability to find jobs, feed their families and keep a roof over their heads.  I used to think that it had quite a bit to do with not finding the same type of cohesiveness that they found in the military and it was because they just can’t seem to catch a break and all these so-called programs established to help them are nothing more than a smoke screen and some wealthy person looking for a tax write off of some organization making a name for themselves at the expense of those who suffer.  I used to think that this was the entire case but events of today have led me to believe there is one other thing. Today I was trying to speak to landlords about property that they advertised as empty and what I discovered paled in comparison to any of those reasons listed above.  I ran into people who appeared to be far too busy to speak even after leaving their number on the ad...

If you have ever tried to rent a home or apartment, you know that the most important and often repeated phrase by any landlord is “have to check your credit”.  While this may provide landlords a moment of control and sanity, it violates the rights of potential tenants and lends them to be pre-judged based upon a piece of paper which may or may not be correct.  Lord knows how often you find mistakes on your credit report and the gamut of games you have to play to get it cleared.  This always happens after the fact, however, and the opportunity to relocate, secure and settle your family is lost.  Now the character of that potential renter is damaged, the degree of depression it casts upon that renter is palatable and an inquiry is added which will decrease that all important number which all things are based upon called a score.  But the most damaging thing out of all those is that this act of insanity continues because landlords, far and wide, have been allo...

Recently I found myself getting more and more annoyed with African-Americans whose only take on the recent rash of police shootings is that race is what was behind it.  I don’t disagree with that but those with the opportunity to get in front of a camera must also realize that it is not the only reason.   In an effort to try and fix the entire problem instead of the issue that only blacks feel, we need to look at one more blatantly obvious sign that many are blinded to. It’s not as much about race as it is about the perception of wealth. Take for example the thought pattern that runs through the head of any officer who is about to pull over an influential person.  The first thought is not about whether they are guilty of the reason why the officer is pulling him over but that what the results may be after he does so.  You can bet that he/she knows that if they were to even think about pulling them over, they had better have all their ducks in a row.  T...

I know that I keep asking the same question but I still do not have an answer to it and how many more people must suffer because those who are in a position of authority don’t have the intestinal fortitude to recognize when it is time to remove people from a stressful position before something worse happens.  I saw this because it has happened again and will continue until someone wakes up and smells the coffee.  From Jason Hanna, Martin Savidge and John Murgatroyd for CNN comes “Video shows trooper shooting unarmed man, South Carolina police say” The scene is described as “ One moment, a man reaches into his vehicle after a South Carolina trooper asked for his driver's license.  Seconds later, the trooper shoots him, and the man asks why. Days afterward, prosecutors aren't satisfied with the answer.  Authorities released dash-camera video Wednesday showing what they say is Sean Groubert, a decorated South Carolina Highway Patrol trooper, shooting Levar Jones, w...

The media all ablaze with the latest news regarding the airstrikes.  Many with the ability to hold serve on camera making lob shots into an art form and those with the authority to right the ship are missing or absent from the bridge. To make my point, consider when it comes to foreign affairs the usual suspects are quickly rounded up by cable news shows thinking that booking them will increase viewership and ratings.  Only what they don’t know or care not to know is that they are being used to spread their propaganda just like those radical groups we all swear to hate. We say that it is important to stop the ruining of young minds with all the hate and racism rhetoric but we continue to listen to and report this same crap over every single  airwaves  that we can find.  Fox News will always seek the advice of a proven fabricator like Dick Cheney when it comes to foreign policy of this administration.  Now this is the same guy who had a hand in the ...

At first glance, this story reeks of an over-zealous Sheriff Deputy who clearly got far too excited with his authorization to use deadly force.  In the article titled “Deaf man killed by deputy: Deaf man shot 6 times 'failed to follow' cop's orders.”  as reported by Linsey Bald for News Examiner with assistance from the Huffington Post.  In the article it states “A deaf man was killed by a Florida deputy after an altercation at a towing yard went terribly wrong. Two deputies, undercover and in plain clothes, heard an argument occurring outside Fryer's Towing Company on Saturday afternoon in Daytona Beach. On approach, the deputies saw 52-year-old Edward P. Miller, deaf from birth, with a gun. When he failed to comply with the orders of the cops, they shot him dead.  Reports the Huffington Post: “Volusia County Sheriff Ben Johnson said Miller was ‘brandishing a firearm’ outside when Deputy Joel Hernandez and another unnamed deputy arrived. Hernandez, 35, fired his ser...

Not much surprises me these days but nothing makes me shake my head more than those whose job is to inform finding hit and miss messages to spread thinking that only controversy sells.  Much like advertisers think that a good product will never reach millions of consumers unless it is attached to barely clothed women or some handsome hunk without a shirt.  Contrary to Wall Street wisdom, sex does not sell, it only directs the mind toward sex and demises the product you are trying to sell but that’s just a layman’s view and apparently it doesn't count. Take for example the recent uproar presented to us by Ed Mazza of the Huffington Post who found it important to waste ink and print room on “President Obama Criticized for 'Latte Salute' While Stepping off Marine One”.  Personally I can think of a billions things that could have occupied this space and our time better than this but then I am not the one who chooses what is plastered on the pages of so-called news magazines....

A recent article in our local news about Rockford, IL reports that “Twenty-six Rockford businesses that operate with a liquor license received varying penalties for selling alcohol to minors.  The Illinois Liquor Control Commission Tuesday released the results of a hearing held Sept. 17 at the E.J. Zeke Giorgi Center.”  In this article is speaks of where these businesses were and the fines or penalties imposed whether pending or not.  After reading it, I was glad to hear that there were some enforcement but then another thought occurred to me. The main but missing ingredient to this was parental involvement. Now it should be made clear that you, as a parent, will never be able to protect your children but you can and always should educate them.  Education can come is several different ways, it is not necessarily and only schooling.  Education can come in the form of relaying your wishes of your children never drinking or what to do if they find themselves arou...

I have said several times and many times when no one seems to wish to wish or even care enough to consider, that PTSD is a factor but it is not the main cause of why so many who are treated for this or other mental issues flip out. The best evidence can be found in an article titled “White House intruder an Iraq war vet with "plenty of firepower" written for CBS News.  Notwithstanding, the title strictly worded to get more people to read it and so very misleading that it ignores the real problem.  The story should not be concerned with how much firepower Gonzalez has or the lack of security around the White House, it should have focused more on the drugs which are being handed out like candy by the legal drug dealers which make mental symptoms worse.  The evidence is there but the main topic of the piece is nowhere near it. The article reports that “The former stepson of a man accused of sneaking into the White House said the Iraq war veteran owns "plenty of fir...

For years, I have been advised not to speak on a subject that I have no knowledge in, no experience with or no idea of.  I heard these suggestions and for many things, they were right.  I would often find myself speaking about something that I did not educate myself about before opening that hole underneath my nose.  I've gotten much better at that now but this same truth should hold for those who are supposed to be much better informed that the public on these matters.  Should not this also apply to them and when they get it wrong, backwards or just plain flub the whole thing,  shouldn't  others correct that mistake? For you to make more sense about that to which I speak, I am talking about the constant armchair quarterbacking of the ISIL strategy.  Many are talking about what someone else is doing wrong but none of them pointing out the failing of the other person are making any effort to search for a solution themselves.  Th...

In an article written by Barnini Chakraborty titled “ Sick veterans who served at shuttered, toxic Army base turn to Congress, VA for help” for Foxnews.com you can find out things that many people do not want you to know or seem to care about at all.  Monsanto settled with the city and the civilian population on this subject but for some unknown reason all military personnel was left out.  No one knows and no one has the balls to step up and tell us why, maybe because we were seen as government property and therefore less than human.  Maybe we were still under some contractual agreement that we could not sue the government so that protected Monsanto and those local lawmakers from having to think much about us or maybe it was that those who were in charge was paid handsomely to omit the military.  Either way, you need to read this article and if you have any love for your military, you need to begin calling your member of congress and demanding that they find their ...

Conservative lawmakers and some sheriffs have been heard making noise about ISIL streaming through the border from Mexico or planning to come to America to kill us all.  How irresponsible is that but what makes even less sense is the lack of complaining that if what they claim is happening, why are these same people raising holy hell about congress taking another major break from their constitutional duty to help govern this nation and protect this country. I do not see nor hear any news outlet, local or national, questioning those in Washington as to what brain-less idiot decided to take another long vacation while we are under this so-called life  threatening  situation?  It’s as if their only concern is keeping their jobs which really do not make any sense because if ISIL is at our gates, their jobs would be lost anyway. I hear so many choose to target the president and his administration about leading from behind or being slow to the point but I hear no on...

When it comes to proving how vain, selfish and completely immature, human being are, nothing makes the case better than this story. It’s the story about school district police departments taking advantage of the free military gear that the U.S. Government is giving away.  So let me get this straight, educators have a very hard time coming together to find a solution to the problem of their failure to properly educate our kids but they can surely come together and gather military supplies for their school police departments.  Why do schools have their own police departments anyway?  It can’t be because it is so large that it needs one, this would be why the town or city that they locate in has one.  It can’t be because the rules at school differ that much from the ordinances and rules found in that very same town and city the school is located in, so why.  Must be because of the enormous amount of funding that district receives and since they do not wish to ...

For as long as I can remember people have been trying to convince us that there is a real difference in religion.  The Catholics wishes us to believe that they have the inside track to gaining access into heaven as well as the Baptist, Lutherans, Jehovah Witnesses, Seventh Day Evangelist and so on.  Each one presents a policy or guidelines that we may embrace and then a decision is made.  The same can now be said by those who follow the Islamic Religion or Muslim.  They all carry the same consistent theme but instead of celebrating this fact, each of them wants us to believe that the others are bad and only they can offer us that clear path.  They are all wrong and in this article I will attempt to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt, that there is only one God and there is only one true religion guaranteed to grant any of us access through that golden gate. Let’s begin by making one thing very clear using the old adage of “a rose by any other name, smells as ...

To hear those with the loudest claims of being a Christian, you hear them constantly telling you how you should live, what you are doing wrong and why you may never reach the promise of eternal life but what they do not tell you about is the missed opportunities to follow in the footsteps of Jesus every day.  They fail to help you understand that it does take a special person to create a special event and that special person is you.  Every day you can stand where Jesus stood and perform as many miracles as you wish.  You can help the blind to see, the deaf to hear and give the very souls of all those around you, a lift that only seems to come from heaven.  Sounds far-fetched don’t it?  Sounds like something that only God-like people can perform right?  Wrong and because you are wrong is why so many miss walking with Jesus each and every day.  For those who find it still so hard to believe that Jesus always walked with the common person and he walks wi...

It is always been a question as to where all these radical groups who truly hate America came from.  Now the homegrown ones, we know when, how and why they were created but the mystery about foreign haters always perplexed us that are until now. The extreme hatred of this nation can be traced back 31 years beginning with the  Beirut  Bombing when the Honorable Ronald Reagan was in the White House, George H.W. Bush was by his side and Richard (Dick) Cheney was in his ear.  Want proof of what I say, consider this. Prior to October 23 rd , 1983, President  Reagan  had Okayed shelling from the waters of Lebanon villages without discretion.  Killing women and children because he wanted to “teach them a lesson”.  The brains of the administration decided to give those angered by this shelling a target so they sent over Marines to act as peace keepers, tying their hands and making the Rules of Engagement policy so tight tha...

For some time now, people like John McCain and Lindsey Graham has been trying desperately to push this country into another long, drawn-out war in the Middle East.  A war, I must say, in which they will not have an active role in and have to dodge one bullet but will see the less that 1 percent having to re-engage if for no other reason than strictly political and try to make up for the lies that many helped spread to get us into Iraq in the first place. Some have avoided catering to their egos but still there are those who just can’t seem to help but seek their advice when it comes to things dealing with war as if their bad judgment of the past meant nothing.  The thousands of American lives lost do not seem to bother those who run straight to those cheerleaders.  Now Lindsey Graham is screaming like a little school girl who got her scarf caught in the car door as the vehicle was pulling off.  He’s saying that ISIL needs to be dealt with before they come over h...

The media is all ablaze with the Adrian Peterson story and the lessons are many but seldom does the media ever really get things right for fear of not getting high enough ratings that they often times sensationalize stories.  What should be happening right now is when something as critical as this takes place, lessons should be drawn, compared, contrasted and dissected in order to give those struggling parents another avenue than just corporal punishment.  I stand as guilty as many who never spared the rod for fear of spoiling the child but as Chris Carter so eloquently put it, “there are thousands of things that I have learned since then that my mom was wrong. You can't beat a kid to make him do what you want to do." What I discovered was never discipline a child when you are angry, it tends to grow and you make your own child of victim instead of teaching them a valuable lesson that will help them make better decisions later on in life.  I had to learn that the har...

I was blown away about a story written by Mike Miller for ijreveiw.com titled “News Anchor Makes Startling On-Air Announcement: He Only Has 4-6 Months To Live,” not because of any of the most thought of reasons like he was brave enough to share it with the audience or he may be seeking sympathy or increasing viewership.  I was blown away because it was only today that I was speaking to my own audience about the miracles average people perform every day. In the article Mr. Miller reports that “Champaign, IL, news anchor Dave Benton, 51, told viewers during a broadcast on Thursday that he has an inoperable brain tumor – and that doctors tell him he only has 4-6 months to live. The born-again Christian said he believes he is in God’s hands: “I am at peace and I know he’s going to take care of the days ahead and that the goal here is to have the best ones possible.” I was blown away because of what the article said toward the end “Stories like this one serve to remind...