EPIC RANT: O!ministration is greatest impediment to businesses creating jobs
Delivered by hotelier Steve Wynn, CEO of Wynn Resorts, in an earnings report conference call conducted this week. During the call, where the questions varied from inside-baseball share price and profit matter to the overall outlook for the market's his company has properties in, Mr. Wynn called out the Obama administration for being, "The Greatest Wet Blanket To Business And Job Creation In My Lifetime". Here's a taste from the transcript:
I believe in Las Vegas, I think its best days are ahead of it, but I'm afraid to do anything in the current political environment in the United States. You watch television and see what's going on on this this debt ceiling issue. And what I consider to be a total lack of leadership from the President, and nothing will get fixed until the President himself steps up and wrangles both parties in Congress. But everybody is so political, so focused on holding their job for the next year, that the discussion in Washington is nauseating.
And I'm saying it bluntly that this administration is the greatest wet blanket to business and progress and job creation in my lifetime. And I can prove it and I could spend the next three hours giving you examples of all of us in this marketplace that are frightened to death about all the new regulations, our health care costs escalate. Regulations coming from left and right. A President that seems, you know -- that keeps using that word redistribution.
Well, my customers and the companies that provide the vitality for the hospitality and restaurant industry, in the United States of America, they're frightened of this administration. And it makes you slow down and not invest your money. Everybody complains about how much money is on the side in America. You bet. And until we change the tempo and the conversation from Washington, it's not going to change.
And those of us who have business opportunities and the capital to do it, are going to sit in fear of the President. And you know, a lot of people don't want to say that. They say oh, God, don't be attacking Obama. Well, this is Obama's deal. And it's Obama that's responsible for this fear in America.
The guy keeps making speeches about redistribution, and maybe's ought to do something to businesses that don't invest, they're holding too much money. You know, we haven't heard that kind of money except from pure socialists.
Everybody is afraid of the government. And there's no need -- there's no need, you know, soft pedaling it. It's the truth. It is the truth. And that's true of Democratic businessmen, and Republican businessmen, and I am a Democratic businessman and I support Harry Reid, I support Democrats and Republicans, and I'm telling you that the business community in this country is frightened to death of the weird political philosophy of the President of the United States. And until he's gone, everybody is going to be sitting on their thumbs.
[emphasis-ed]
Wow...Pretty brutal stuff, eh? Brutally honest, that is... The full transcript is posted at Seeking Alpha. And RCP has audio of the rant posted as well, if you'd prefer to get the full flavor that his tone of voice imparts to the verbiage.
Oh, and as an aside, when Wynn compares the administration to straight up socialists he's speaking from experience; in the call he mentions that it's his companies 5th year operating a casino in Macau; the property with the greatest growth prospects in his organization right now. For the geographically challenged among us, Macau is located in Communist China.
Although a long outspoken critic of the administration's regulatory policies and general business unfriendliness, it's nothing new. Other prominent businessmen such as Mort Zuckerman, no wingnut by any stretch of the imagination, has made many similar points, albeit couched in less strident language, for some time. Indeed, Mr. Obama's class warfare schtick seems to be wearing a bit thin on even his old pal Warren Buffet.
It's painfully clear to all but the most partisan kool-aid drinkers that this administration's economic initiatives have failed miserably, as many knew they would being mere re-runs of past failed progressive policy prescriptions. And the breadth and magnitude of this failure really calls into question whether the President want the economy to recover, or would prefer the crisis environment, such being more conducive to implementing his radical transformative agenda under the guise of it being urgently necessary for the good of our nation. Given that he's clearly pursuing such a strategy in the current debt talks, it's getting increasingly more difficult to extend him the benefit of the doubt, and assume he has nothing but good intent, with respect to his larger social and economic agenda.
[Cross posted at The Conservatory]
You want a detailed debt reduction plan? Tom Coburn has one.
Senator Coburn tellin' it like it is; can you dig it?
Which he revealed today. A 9 Trillion dollar one; which, you know, is some serious money even in Washington DC...
One of the Senate's staunchest budget-cutters unveiled Monday a massive plan to cut the nation's deficit by $9 trillion over the coming decade, including $1 trillion in tax increases opposed by most of his fellow Republicans.
The plan by Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., is laced with politically perilous proposals like raising to 70 the age at which people can claim their full Social Security benefits. It would cut farm subsidies, Medicare, student aid, housing subsidies for the poor, and funding for community development grants.
Coburn would also eliminate $1 trillion in tax breaks over the coming decade, earning him an immediate rebuke from Americans for Tax Reform, an anti-tax organization with which Coburn has had a running feud. He would block taxpayers from claiming the mortgage interest deduction on second homes and limit it to homes worth $500,000. He would also ease taxpayers into higher tax brackets more quickly by using a smaller measure of inflation to adjust the brackets.
Coburn would cut $1 trillion from the Pentagon budget over a decade. He would block military retirees from the Tricare Prime health care plan, the option with the lowest out-of-pocket cost, saving $115 billion, and he would raise the prescription drug copayment under the program, as well as require higher out-of-pocket fees. He also would reduce the fleet of aircraft carriers from 11 to 10 and Navy air wings from 10 to nine.
As you can imagine, I'm no fan of that last provision to be sure, but that's one of the reasons I loves me some Tom Coburn; he's a fair man, and I can guarantee that there will be something in this plan for everyone to hate :)
But overall it's an impressive work. Essentially, in a nutshell, over the next 10 years he achieves $3trillion in discretionary cuts, $3trillion in entitlement cuts, $1 trillion from defense cuts, $1 trillion reduction from tax code reforms, and $1trillion savings from a reduction of interests costs paid over that same time period.
As a member of the President's deficit reduction panel Senator Coburn is well acquainted with the intricacies of this issue, and he's never been afraid of putting it out there-so to speak. Here's a list of where he's getting the 9 trillion dollar figure from:
Now I'm sure in the coming days there will be mountains of analysis, comment, and explanation of this program. As Joy did with CC&B, I strongly urge you to get the facts straight from the source at Senator Coburn's site. You can view the plan there in pieces, or download a PDF of the entire proposal.
Tell us what you think of Senator Coburn's plan kind reader, we truly value your opinions here at The Conservatory.
Today’s Truth: Obama never really banned lobbyists from working in White House
Click to enlarge
So says Presidential spokes-tool Jay Carney, who, as an aside, is every bit as condescending and smug as Robert Gibbs, but who just isn't remotely funny in any way; so, no real redeeming qualities, no? From RCP:
White House press secretary Jay Carney is asked about President Obama's meeting with Microsoft's top lobbyist:
REPORTER: "One of the participants in the President's education roundtable with business leaders was Fred Humphries, whose Microsoft's top lobbyist. Why isn't that a violation of the President's pledge to eliminate access and influence?"
Carney says there were "numerous participants" in the meeting, including a former Bush cabinet secretary. Carney then clarifies Obama's so-called pledge: "The president's promise was not to eliminate or prohibit lobbyists from entering the property [White House], but to not give them special access."
[Emphasis-ed.]
Got it? Well, let's go to the record, and not some wing-nutty one, but one with absolute moral authority who's reportage can be believed with a kind of metaphysical certitude; let's check MSNBC:
"President-elect Barack Obama has pledged to change the way Washington works and curb the influence of lobbyists," said Podesta in the transition team statement.
"During the campaign, federal lobbyists could not contribute to or raise money for the campaign...the president-elect is taking those commitments even further by announcing the strictest, and most far reaching ethics rules of any transition team in history."
In an off-camera briefing Tuesday, Podesta was asked whether potential staff expertise may be lost as the team adheres to these new rules.
He replied, "So be it," reiterating Obama's commitment have the "toughest" rules to "stop the revolving door" in Washington politics.
The.Most.Ethical.Administration.EVAR! Lobbyist will not "run his White House"...The "toughest rules"...But today?
Carney did not explain the difference between "special access" and participating in a meeting with the President.
Will wonders never cease...It just goes to show that Jim Geraghty was indeed prescient back in 2008 when he said that all Obama's promises come with an expiration date. In case you're interested, here's a list of those he had violated through March 2010, more than 1 year ago. Maybe we should start referring to him as Pinnochi-O!
Pinnochi-O!
What do you think of Mr. Obama's honesty, or lack thereof, kind reader?
[Cross posted at The Conservatory]
Too bad to check: Feds fund study of gay men’s penis size
From The Daily Caller we find out about this important study that was meant to get, er, straight to the bottom of things:
The research, titled “The Association between Penis Size and Sexual Health among Men Who Have Sex with Men,” began in 2006 and surveyed 1,065 gay men. Among its key findings: Those gay men who felt they had small or inadequate penis sizes were more likely to become “bottoms,” or anal receptive, while gay men with larger penises were more likely to identify themselves as “tops,” or anal insertive.
Another discovery from the research: men with smaller penises were more likely to be psychologically troubled than those with larger genitalia. The goal of the study was to understand the “real individual-level consequences of living in a penis-centered society.”
Wait...A penis centered society? Which society would be that? I thought we'd been told that American men are fixated on women's breats! This must be a whole other circle of folks than the one I'm running in...
And the research was conducted at Hunter college in NYC, will wonders never cease.
Call me a h8ter, and I'm sure some will, but in my humble opinion this is a boondoggle all the way, regardless of how fabulously it's dressed . A private charity, or foundation, should have been sponsoring this niche study; and considering that a higher-than-average percentage of homosexual males are affluent and influential I don't think that's too much to ask. Heck, I think that the residents of the DuPont circle area and the West Village together could have underwritten this study on their own.
Fact is stranger than fiction. What do you think kind reader?
[Cross posted at The Conservatory]
Allen West Rips President Petulant for his Friday Tantrum
The Real Deal versus The Poser
Via The Right Scoop, Colonel West exhibits the quality of actual candor, real "straight talk", one of the many personality traits that have endeared him with Tea-Partiers and others:
The President’s concern is about getting reelected. The President’s concern is that he is an intransigent, liberal, progressive socialist who is also Marxist because of the class warfare rhetoric that he espouses.And I think that when you heard him on Friday and the more he comes out and talks, the more truly out of touch and incompetent he seems.
Dude! That is rip-tastic! TRS goes on to illustrate the point West used as a central exhibit of the President's class warfare argument; that while Obama claimed that 80% of the public wanted tax increases as part of any budget deal, that he neglected to mention that 47% of the public paid no federal income taxes. Mr. West wondered aloud whether the President had knew of, or considered this, at all.
But it gets even better. West goes on to light up Sheila Jackson-Lee for her raced base remarks on Friday:
Attacking this President is not attacking his skin color. It’s attacking his failures. He has a vision for this country that is anathema to the vision of the founding fathers, in our belief in individual responsibility and accountability and our free markets and free enterprise system.
Gee I love that kind of talk. Now if only we could have that kind of refreshing directness come from the White House on a regular basis. Hey, wait a minute, I think I have an idea how to make that happen...
Chock full of Awesomeness!
What do you think kind reader?
[Cross posted at The Conservatory]
Are 70% tax rates on the way back in?
We're Broke!
Like in the bad old days before Ronnie Reagan reformed the tax code? Writing at WSJ, Michael Boskin seems to think it a matter or "when" and not "if":
Many Democrats demand no changes to Social Security and Medicare spending. But these programs are projected to run ever-growing deficits totaling tens of trillions of dollars in coming decades, primarily from rising real benefits per beneficiary. To cover these projected deficits would require continually higher income and payroll taxes for Social Security and Medicare on all taxpayers that would drive the combined marginal tax rate on labor income to more than 70% by 2035 and 80% by 2050. And that's before accounting for the Laffer effect, likely future interest costs, state deficits and the rising ratio of voters receiving government payments to those paying income taxes.
It would be a huge mistake to imagine that the cumulative, cascading burden of many tax rates on the same income will leave the middle class untouched. Take a teacher in California earning $60,000. A current federal rate of 25%, a 9.5% California rate, and 15.3% payroll tax yield a combined income tax rate of 45%. The income tax increases to cover the CBO's projected federal deficit in 2016 raises that to 52%. Covering future Social Security and Medicare deficits brings the combined marginal tax rate on that middle-income taxpayer to an astounding 71%. That teacher working a summer job would keep just 29% of her wages. At the margin, virtually everyone would be working primarily for the government, reduced to a minority partner in their own labor.
Nobody—rich, middle-income or poor—can afford to have the economy so burdened. Higher tax rates are the major reason why European per-capita income, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, is about 30% lower than in the United States—a permanent difference many times the temporary decline in the recent recession and anemic recovery.
Some argue the U.S. economy can easily bear higher pre-Reagan tax rates. They point to the 1930s-1950s, when top marginal rates were between 79% and 94%, or the Carter-era 1970s, when the top rate was about 70%. But those rates applied to a much smaller fraction of taxpayers and kicked in at much higher income levels relative to today.
There were also greater opportunities for sheltering income from the income tax. The lower marginal tax rates in the 1980s led to the best quarter-century of economic performance in American history. Large increases in tax rates are a recipe for economic stagnation, socioeconomic ossification, and the loss of American global competitiveness and leadership.
Amen to that last line. As perhaps one of the elders here, I can vividly recall what our economy was like before and after the tax code revisions in 1981. Prior to that, wealthy Americans were less inclined to invest in businesses, whether their own or as a venture capitalists, than to make sure that a percentage of their wealth equal to the amount their accountants specified they needed to keep their net income below the rapacious higher bracket levels was invested in instruments known as "tax-shelters"; typically revenue neutral or money losing propositions, such as dilapidated real-estate or other run-down or underwater assets, instead of dynamic, growing concerns. Which is at the heart of why the tax code changes really resulted in the ensuing economic boom.
As a nation, we can't afford to go back to the tax rates and the concomitant paradigm that existed before 1981. Indeed, the only reason we had been able to stand it, as a nation, between the rise of the welfare state under FDR until Reagan was because of the pre-eminent role that America enjoyed in the global economy; dominating all facets of global industry-smokestack, creative, and financial.
Due to many factors, such as globalization and the aggressive mercantilistic economic posture of China, in particular, not only can't we afford to placate big labor's extortionist-like hold on the public and private sector, but neither can we sustain our welfare state in it's current form or the tax burden to support it. It's a luxury we can no longer afford...
I've long thought that Mr. Obama's plan was to run up budgets and deficits so high that pragmatism and responsibility would force us to enact large tax increases. He's made great strides in his first two-and-one-half years in office, and believes himself to be nearing the goal of his threat today to veto any bill containing balanced budget amendment language in it is any indication. He's determined to drag us to a Euro-style welfare state model by hook or by crook; and lately it looks more like the latter...
So I'd urge all to call or write their Representatives and Senators, the telephone numbers and e-mail contact info can be found at the House's and Senate's websites, and let them know where you stand on the matter; it's especially important to do so if you live in a deep-blue state like I do, just so they get the message.
[Cross posted at The Conservatory]
Good News: Misery Index now at 28 year high!
Or should I say, Welcome Back, Carter ...
Brought to you by Recovery Summer part Deux!11!1!, courtesy of Barack "L"etat c'est moi!" Obama, Sheriff Joe Biden, and the Democratic party. It seems to be a recurring theme with them...
Just wait until the bond vigilantes go to work.
Oh, and on a related note:
Notice how it says, "watch this index", along the top border? Well, I'd advise against it for the meantime, at least if you've got a weak stomach.
[Headline image courtesy of MoneypennyDD, and cross posted at The Conservatory]
Public Pensions Problem: Paying for time not actually served
Bill Zettler at Champion News looks at one of the little-known issues with public pensions -- the service time used to calculate the benefit is not the time actually worked.
As he notes, there are two ways this happens in the Illinois Teachers plan:
Why is that? Well teachers get pensions paid on “Service Credit” not actually on the years worked in Illinois. “Service Credit” is a concept that boosts pensionable years worked in IL with giveaways that have been added over the years to increase teachers’ pensions for no reason other than they are teachers.
I know of no private sector system where the workers receive pensions based upon more years than they have actually worked.
Service Credit scam 1: pensions paid on 75,000 years of sick leave never worked.
The major way to get Service Credit is via sick days. Every teachers’ contract contains an allowance for “sick days” averaging about 12 days per year. If the teacher doesn’t take the days off as sick leave (most of the suburban schools have 2-3 personal days on top of sick days so they can use those for real sick days) they can accrue them for up to 2 years Service Credit when they retire.
....
Service Credit scam 2: “Optional Service Purchase”: Pay $63,000 get $1.2 million.Teachers may also “purchase” Service Credit, at an extreme discount, for teaching previously in other states.
Retirees have paid nominal amounts for 82,700 out-of-state work that by definition is not Illinois work. If it’s not Illinois work why do Illinois taxpayers have to pay pensions for it?
....
Why do Illinois taxpayers have to pay pensions for work not done at all or done in another state?
Very good questions.
These features are not necessarily restricted to Illinois. "Air time" (buying "Service Time" in a new job based on a job worked elsewhere) is something all over the place, and it can be abused in a big way. The amount "charged" for air time is usually well below what it will actually cost (esp. given the low retirement ages).
With regards to sick time being accrued for pension benefits, in many private companies there is a maximum number of sick days allowed to be rolled over from one year to next...and if you don't use them, they're gone.
Zettler also has some more questions related to the TRS plan.
With benefits like is, even with generous assumptions and smoothing to dampen effects, is it any wonder the funding ratio is below 50%?
Congress is making it difficult to raise debt limit because they’re racists
Oh no, she di'int...Oh yes, she did; she's playing the Race Card™ :
"I do not understand what I think is the maligning and maliciousness [toward] this president,” said Jackson Lee, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus. “Why is he different? And in my community, that is the question that we raise. In the minority community that is question that is being raised. Why is this president being treated so disrespectfully? Why has the debt limit been raised 60 times? Why did the leader of the Senate continually talk about his job is to bring the president down to make sure he is unelected?”
"I am particularly sensitive to the fact that only this president — only this one, only this one — has received the kind of attacks and disagreement and inability to work, only this one," said Jackson Lee from the House floor.
Really Ms. Jackson-Lee? What planet were you living on between 2001 and 2008?
Why is Obama different? Let me try to answer in terms a progressive would understand. To begin I'd ask her to recall the heady days following the 2008 election, when President-elect Obama promised the American people he'd enact real entitlement reform. In fact, as our old pal Karl reminds us, at the 2009 "Fiscal Responsibility Summit" Obama said:
Contrary to the prevailing wisdom in Washington these past few years, we cannot simply spend as we please and defer the consequences to the next budget, the next administration or the next generation.
We are paying the price for these deficits right now. In 2008 alone, we paid $250 billion in interest on our debt: One in every 10 taxpayer dollars. That is more than three times what we spend on education that year; more than seven times what we spent on V.A. health care.
So if we confront this crisis without also confronting the deficits that helped cause it, we risk sinking into another crisis down the road. As our interest payments rise, our obligations come due, confidence in our economy erodes and our children and our grandchildren are unable to pursue their dreams because their saddled with our debts.
That’s why today, I’m pledging to cut the deficit we inherited by half by the end of my first term in office. Now, this will not be easy. It will require us to make difficult decisions and face challenges we’ve long neglected. But I refuse to leave our children with a debt that they cannot repay, and that means taken responsibility right now, in this administration, for getting our spending under control.
So get that? Obama promised to be a red-ink-eradicating, Deficit Hawk!; It was just one of the many hats our BRILLIANT!, POLYMATH! PRESIDENT with SUPERIOR TEMPERMENT! pledged to wear so that we could all be the ones we were waiting for. I mean, really, that wasn't the only time he was morally offended by the notion of raising the debt ceiling. So you see Ms. Jackson-Lee, it's fundamentally because of the HYPOCRISY !
But no, the Congresswoman would have us believe that there has never been seditious speech in the manner of McConnell's comment about his job being to make sure Mr. Obama was not re-elected; NEVER! Because truthful, open, talk about political intent is much, much worse than the Democrat's, and Obama himself as he postured for his upcoming Presidential run, attempts to undermine our troops in the field during the surge in Iraq by continually proclaiming before any MBM outlet that had a camera running that "THE WAR IS LOST!" and "THE SURGE HAS FAILED!"; even though, in reality, "The Surge" had barely gotten underway. Sure Sheila, it's far worse to hope your political opponent, and his agenda, is defeated than for national level politicians to make reckless assertions that bolster the very enemies our warriors were engaging in the field by signaling that one US political party was willing to engineer losing a war in order to win an election.
Sure, they're only doing it because Obama's a black man...In fact they made the decision to do so, and hatched their eeeeeevolllll plan at a KKK meeting 2 weeks ago...Including the black Republicans...At that same Klan meeting...
It doesn't have a thing to do with our national debt within 10 points of current GDP? Or the voters overwhelmingly desiring a significant reduction of spending, as reflected in both polls and last November's elections. Nope, nothing to do with reality, Ms. Lee, but everything to do with the "reality based" narrative folks like you choose to read into any political opposition you face...
Krauthammer was right when he said that the Race Card™ is the last refuge of a liberal scoundrel...
[Cross posted at The Conservative Commune]
Paganism – a Blind Man’s Bluff
Truly:
Then they sent some of the Pharisees and Herodians to Him in order to trap Him in a statement. They came and said to Him, “Teacher, we know that You are truthful and defer to no one; for You are not partial to any, but teach the way of God in truth. Is it lawful to pay a poll-tax to Caesar, or not? “Shall we pay or shall we not pay?” But He, knowing their hypocrisy, said to them, “Why are you testing Me? Bring Me a denarius to look at.” They brought one. And He said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” And they said to Him, “Caesar’s.” And Jesus said to them, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” And they were amazed at Him.
I tell you that this lesson is a great one. As with all of the Lord's Teachings, each time one reads it, one walks away with deeper understanding. And, per usual, what appears obvious is of tertiary importance. There is a lesson here about our responsibility to our earthly rulers - that is, civic obligations. But, and call me dense if this is obvious to you, an epiphany occurred to this Pilgrim a couple years back upon a casual reading of this passage (which i had read numerous times previously).
Turning it upside-down like this is also interesting…
Recognizing their craftiness he said to them, “Show me [your soul]; whose image and [likeness] does it bear?” They replied, “God’s.”
So he said to them, “Then repay to [God] what belongs to [God] and to [Ceasar] what belongs to [Ceasar].”
What we glimpse here is an invitation to proper orientation of one's heart, mind, and soul. It is as if the Christ is telling us we will travel from pocket to pocket without rest until we are returned to the Treasury of our Creator.
One may say that today's pagans are throwbacks to a time before the Good News. But I say they are not. Pagans of yesteryear were necessarily blind. But they were not devoid of desire to seek and find. The Platonists, as St. Augustine attests, employing Reason and deduction alone, came to the conclusion that a Creator-God exists. A Single, Omniscient God. This previous to the Word becoming flesh. Previous to the Word. Previous to the New Covenant.
But today's Pagans (in the West) persist in spite of Logos... I often get the sense they do so precisely out of contempt.
Which begs several questions...
Why the contempt? To this I say that it is my experience that today's consumer - today's alt-lifestyler - is more appreciative of those things that appear "exotic" and abnormal to things they deem "mainstream". As a teenager I was also attracted to this Punk Rock sentimentality. And even to this day I have such tendencies. This rebelliousness is a human condition it seems. However, over time I have learned that Punk Rock culture has nothing of value (on its surface) to to offer those seeking a deeper connection with God. Punk Rock died with the popularization of the Sex Pistols in the United States. Sure, there was a hearty Punk Rock Scene in the States through the tail end of the Eighties. I know this because I was there and saw it with my own eyes. But it was already dying by that time and to a degree that one could sense it.
There is good reason for this. Punk Rock did not translate well outside of its specific conditions from whence it sprang. It could only exist for so long outside of its original context. Without its stimulus, without its purpose, it simply had no food... no reason for being.
The theme of teenage angst is ubiquitous. Through all ages and in all cultures. Punk Rock was simply an interesting twist on an old theme. But it had all of the right aspects of an easily consumable commodity. All of the sex appeal to make a marketer's wet dream come true. That is, I get why it became commercialized - and when it did Punk Rock stopped being Punk Rock and instead became punk rock - a wisp of its former self. Nevertheless, it is revisited (some say re-discovered) from time-to-time in forms that critics seem to love but those of us who experience it one-generation out from the early days here in the States cannot recognize at all.
What's the point? The point is that paganism of today smacks of the Punk Rock/punk rock phenom. Especially in the West, where New Agers and all manner of tribalism is enjoying great success - thanks to people like Oprah Winfrey and James Arthur Ray. The appeal of rebellion is ubiquitous to the teenager and to be expected as he/she "discovers him/herself". But this sort of cheap rebellion is unattractive among the middle-aged... at best, it is unattractive... at worst it is juvenile.
The Pagans of the past were living in comparative darkness. Unless they bumped into someone like a wandering Jew named Enoch Root for example and had some long and very involved conversation with him. The Stoics and Platonists came out from the darkness by adhering to the only Light that existed - that of Reason - that inherent Likeness and Knowledge instilled in each of us.
Find me a Stoic. Find me a Platonist.
But pagans are everywhere today. Intrigued by the rebellion and angst - which again I can appreciate very well - the pagans of today even have the audacity to claim "newness" - New Age. As if there are any heresies that have not been conceived of, argued over, combated, and in the end dismissed since the time of the Christ.
Paganism is now paganism. An interesting little, exotic temper tantrum. For a Juvenile to be expected... in an adult perplexing and unbecoming. Exotic is relative to Era. As I have said before: if it is mysticism you are after... or something truly exotic and foreign... one must study and comprehend. One must open the Third Eye and petition for deep understanding. The Word is Radical. The Word is Punk Rock. The Word is Rebellion. The Word is the New Age. Despite who lays claim to it, professes it, loves it, hates it, denies it.
It just Is.
Ascending the bluff is simple. Ascending the Mountain: now there is a real, worthwhile challenge.
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