New Airport Imaging Scanner to Enhace Appearance of Ugly Passengers

Previous Airport imaging scanners tended to show people in their worst light.  A revised scanner is being developed which will not only not blur out sensitive areas of the human body, but actually enhance them, thus placating self-appointed ''privacy advocates''

Washington DC - in response to complaints by the Airline Passengers Association, as well as self-appointed Privacy Advocates, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has announced today an upgrade to software for millimeter wave and scatter technology body scanners to enhance the appearance of passengers as they appear on the scanning devices.

In the past, images from such devices were anonymized, with facial features blurred out and genital areas blurred or shrunken.  Such images were viewed in a separate, darkened room, to hide the shame of passengers, whose bodies, without clothing, are hideously ugly, fat, old, or just plain ridiculous.

The TSA now recognizes that this former approach had the opposite effect of what was intended.   Passengers were even more embarrassed about their body shape and weight, as well as their personal attributes, as the shame of having their images viewed in a separate darkened room only served to highlight their negative body-image issues.

The new software corrects this problem by actually enhancing the images to show perkier and larger breasts, thinner waists and thighs, and a butt that doesn't sag so much.  Men will appreciate the "enhancements" applied via software to their genital images.  The enhanced images will no longer be viewed in a separate room, but displayed on an overhead High-Definition Television for all passengers to view and appreciate - and vote on - while waiting in line, using an app in their smartphones.

For interested passengers, the resultant images will be available in a package of 8" x 10" glossys, as well as wallet and other sizes, and a JPEG image can also be automatically e-mailed to the passenger's address, uploaded to their mobile phone, or set as their default image on their Facebook page.

While waiting in line to be screened, passengers can select from one of a number of body enhancement options for their security screening images, including such packages as the "Pamela Anderson", the "John Holmes", or the "Arnold Schwarzenegger (bodybuilder version)".

During a pilot program at the Washington Reagan International Airport (the only airport, incidentally, named for two U.S. Presidents), participants were enthusiastic.  "I always felt my butt looked big", said Anisha Wiles, "but with this new scanner image, I'm proud to show off my body.  Damn! I'm hot!"

Others were enthusiastic about the souvenir photo feature of the new invention.  "Finally, I have a decent photo to upload to all my sex site pages," said Darrel Henderson, a Congressional Aide, "Not that I do that sort of thing, of course."

TSA workers also praised the system.  "Do you know what it is like, looking at all these ugly-assed people all day long in a darkened room?" gate screening agent Tyrell Williams noted, "It wears on your nerves!  Damn! People need to lay off the buffet!  If you know what I mean.  After a shift of watching this parade of ugly, I get home and the last thing I'm thinking about is sex, let me tell you!  But with this new system, well, everyone is hot!"

TSA expects to roll out the new scanners across the country within the next month or so.  Sales from souvenir photos are expected to offset the initial cost of upgrading existing scanners or installation of the new devices and may actually generate a positive revenue stream for TSA in years to come.

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Criminal Activities

Having a criminal record is no bed of roses.

I met a young man the other day.  He has a criminal record and he finds it hard to get a job.  He was not a bad kid, really, just your typical middle-class kid, caught up in the suburban nightmare of booze and drugs and poor normative cues from his social peers, combined with the soul-sapping experience of high school.

The problem is, his criminal career went from spray-painting bad white-boy graffiti on the back of the school, to minor break-ins at the local church.  At first, the law was lenient with him - as a Youthful Offender, he was sent off to Family Court, given a slap on the wrist, and told his record would be wiped clean after age 18. 

Of course, his parents were furious with him, and he thought they were "assholes" for "making a big deal out of it".  But of course, the crimes they charged him with were only the ones he was caught for and he had committed many petty acts of vandalism, thievery, and general mayhem over the years.

Of course, some parents don't get furious.   They defend the actions of their criminal child and assume the police and the people complaining about thefts and vandalism are just lying.  One mother, where I lived near DC, when her son was caught breaking into cars, explained the 200 car stereos found in her garage as her 15-year-old son's ''car radio business''.  Most were damaged to the point of not working.  He merely wrecked people's dashboards for no real purpose - and his Mother saw no harm in it.

Getting back to our story, at age 18, he and a friend were trying to shoplift at Wal-Mart, which is a really poor choice for shoplifting, as the Wal-Mart company has more combined experience with shoplifters than you ever will.  They saw some lady leave her purse in her cart, and swiped her wallet.  They took out the credit cards and went nuts, trying to charge hundreds of dollars of electronic devices, including a game boy and an MP3 player, on the credit card.

And of course, they got caught, and were on camera.   It was a crime of stupidity, not a crime of desperation or passion.    They were bored middle-class kids with "nothing to do" - or so they thought.  And off to jail they went - real adult jail this time.  You see, credit card theft is a Felony, and that is some serious business compared to the various misdemeanors they were charged with - and the Family Court they were previously tried in.  They were now in the big leagues.   Not even out of high school they had really screwed the pooch big time.

The boy's parents didn't have a lot of money for a lawyer, so a public defender was appointed.   He negotiated a plea deal.   The boy would serve 30 days in jail - on weekends - and have a felony conviction on his record.  Weekend jail was, to say the least, frightening for a young man, even a minimum-security jail.   And his parents were heartbroken.

But the worst part was not the 30 weeks it took to serve the sentence, but the Felony conviction on his record.  He went off to college and did OK in school (smoking more pot and drinking, of course) and in the summers, he would come home and bum around the house.    While his friends got summer jobs and bought cars and clothes and stereos, he sat at home, watched TeeVee and smoked more dope.

You see, one of the first questions on the job application form was "Have You Ever Been Convicted of a Felony?"  He tried lying on the form once, and got a job with a chain store.   That lasted a week, until his background check came back and they fired him.

He graduated from college and bummed around with low-paying jobs in the restaurant field.   Even getting these was hard to do, as no one wanted to trust him with a cash register or any serious amounts of money.  Eventually, after a decade or so, the impact of it started to wear off, as more people were willing to write it off to "youthful indiscretion."  But he never worked in his chosen career, but instead worked in various low-skill or no-skill jobs in the service industry.

And that's where we left him, last I knew.  And that is a pretty sad start to a career in life - at the bottom rung with no hope of success.  And yet, it all started out very young, and could have been avoided if only he took different paths in life.

And yes, a lot of kids do stupid things as kids - they spray paint a wall or shoplift candy.  And the law recognizes that kids can be wildly irresponsible, particularly when influenced by other kids - which is why we have Juvenile Offender status and a Family Court.  But you only get one pass in Family Court - maybe two at most.   And once you graduate to adult court, well, all bets are off.

And what is tragic is that a lot of young men and women fall into this trap - young men and women of middle-class backgrounds with good educations and great opportunities.  And yet they will tell you that they were "bored" when you ask them why they slashed the tires on 50 cars.  Bored?  And breaking things is interesting and fun?   Only to an idiot.

Usually drugs are involved, usually pot.  And no, potheads never like to admit to this, but it is true.   And this is why most potheads have legal rap sheets that have little or nothing to do with marijuana use itself.  And a big part of it, too, is the kids you hang out with.   You hang out with potheads, derelicts, and under-achievers, well, chances are, your path in life is going to be like the young man I profiled above.

But it is a choice, not a destiny.  And you have to consciously choose to vandalize the school or break into a church or steal a credit card.   No one forces you to do so by circumstance.  Not middle-class kids, anyway.

I doubt any such kids would read this.   After all, there are more interesting things to do, like setting fire to the neighbor's cat.   But you'll have to pardon me if I do not weep profusely for people - even young people - who consciously make poor choice after poor choice.  One mistake in life is understandable, even acceptable.   But when you make it clear that you intend to always choose poorly, well, you will reap what you have sown - and often that is a lifetime of woe.

Tenant 101

Want to have less hassles with your landlord?  Try seeing things from his perspective for a change.

Many kids tend to view landlords as "assholes" who "just want all their money" - and yet they don't notice that the landlord isn't exactly the richest dude in the world.  And they wonder why, just because they have 20 people over at their house for a kegger.  Or a couple of windows got broken, and he gets upset. Why is that?  Must be an asshole, right?

But the reality of it is, most landlords are pretty thinly financed.   The income from your rent pays a whole host of expenses - the mortgage, the property taxes, the insurance, the utilities, and the like.  And if you stop paying rent - or damage the property - the landlord goes from making a small profit to having a huge loss.

Why is this the case?  Well, in most markets, Real Estate is pretty competitive.  If one landlord is making a boatload of money in rents, others will jump into the market and buy up housing and convert it to rental properties, or build rental properties to rent.  And this process continues until the profit margins are no longer that attractive.  And this, by the way, happens in most businesses, which is why free enterprise and capitalism work so well - compared to the alternatives!

And yes, there is a lot of Real Estate available - more than you think.  For example, at Syracuse University, where I went to school, there is a lot of run-down, abandoned, or underutilized real estate near the university.  If landlords who rented to students were making such a killing, someone would jump into that market, buying up the cheap Real Estate there and renting it.  But they don't - because the market is pretty saturated as it is.

So your typical landlord is not making a lot of dough.  Sure, over many many years, he may collect on the property if he sells it.  But he is gambling on the market going up - and as we have seen, markets can go down.   Even in good times in "hot" Real Estate markets, some neighborhoods, cities, or areas may actually depress in price.  If a neighborhood goes ghetto, prices drop.  And so much for big profits and hello huge losses.

So in most cases the rent you pay barely covers operating expenses - and the landlord is risking money, time, and his credit rating (as well as bankruptcy) on the property appreciating in value.  And what can depreciate a property in value?  Crummy tenants.

Living on your own is a chance to live as an adult.   And as an adult, we all have to grow up.   Unfortunately, in this country, "kids" of 25 or even 30 are treated as children - and act accordingly.   So you see a "kid" of 25 wearing kiddie clothes and holding a skateboard and talking in teenage slang, "Wassup dude!  Let's smoke some 420 and have a kegger at the pad!   S'cool!"

Or whatever.  It is freaking embarrassing.

Not so long ago in this country, a person that age would be married, have children, and have a well-paying job, wear a suit and tie, drive a car to work (not one with a coffee can muffler, either) and probably be buying their second house.   But today?  Kids remain pre-teens until well after college - if they ever move out of their parents' basements.

Not so long before that, a "kid" of 20 would be piloting a 4-engine bomber over Europe - with the lives of 10 men resting in his hands.  People had a lot more responsibility in those days and took it seriously.

And not so long before then, a "kid" of 16 might be married and headed West with his new bride, in a covered wagon, ready to homestead a raw patch of land.

And kids today?  At age 30 they are hardly more mature than the 12-year-olds of Mark Twain's day.

And yet, social responsibility remains important, not only for our society at large, but on a personal level.  Today, computers track all aspects of our lives - and we often willingly give up this information to the online world.  6 million college students closed their Facebook accounts last May.   Why?  Because in a job market where 1 in 10 get a job interview and of those, 1 in 10 get hired, it doesn't pay to have the image of "party boy" stamped on your resume.

And in this day and age, when hiring and firing someone is a big deal - you want to make sure they won't sue you, that they might actually work, and that they won't bring their gun to work - employers do background checks on people - they ask you to pee in a cup, and they search your name online and on Facebook - or hire investigators to do this for them.

Sounds unfair?  Probably is.   But as a young naive liberal college student, you probably thought putting onerous work rules onto employers (those evil big corporations you are now begging for a job from) was a super-keen peachy idea.   After all, why should they be allowed to fire someone just because they never show up for work and steal from the company?   And if they do fire them, they can't even give out a bad recommendation, either.

So, you asked for this sort of employment environment - this is what you get.   Employers who are paranoid about hiring anyone at all because it costs so darn much and the risks are so great.   The chickens have come home to roost, my friend, and if you want to blame someone for your job going overseas or no one hiring, take a good look in the mirror and then slap yourself (hard) for all the silly-assed shit you said in college.

But getting back to being a good tenant.  Yes, employers also check your credit ratings these days.  If you are in debt to your eyeballs and show unpaid or late rent - or an eviction - on your record, they ain't gonna hire you.  You've telegraphed what a worthless and unreliable scumbag you are - so don't act all surprised if they don't hire you.

And yes, all that stuff is available on a computer.   And yes, they may ask for references, including that from a landlord.   And if the landlord says you were a noisy S.O.B. who annoyed the tenants and paid the rent late, well, they probably have a reasonable expectation that you will be equally as annoying in the workplace.

As a tenant, you have the right to quiet enjoyment of the property, nothing more.   And other other tenants in adjacent apartments (or buildings) have similar rights.   So cranking your stereo to full volume just isn't in the bag.   Parking on the lawn isn't funny.  Letting your friends park in someone Else's parking space and then screaming at them that they are "Nazi Assholes" when they ask you to move the car, just isn't cool.   And no, chances are the lady downstairs is not a "Nazi Asshole" but a single Mom who came home tired from work and doesn't want to park her car around the block, instead of her assigned space, just so your friends could come over and smoke bong hits (and your friends live three blocks away, what's up with that?  They can't walk?).

But, all of what I am saying is in vain.  Most college-age kids, particularly males, have an incredible sense of entitlement these days, and the first thing they feel entitled to is one big continuous party.  And many of these kids - often middle-class and upper-middle-class kids - get their normative cues from their peers and act out these college fantasies, with predictable results.

College can be a great opportunity - and given what it costs, it should be viewed as one.  Each hour of class time is costing you and/or your parents well over $100.  Don't squander it.  And College is a good place to build up your credit rating - not buy getting a credit card and running it up to the max at the Aeropostal store, but by not spending money but rather learning on how to live on less.   Every dollar in student loans you take out is a mortgage on your career.

Today, more than ever, you have to view these four years of college as a pipeline to a job.  You don't have to do everything perfectly, but you just have to avoid making really stupid mistakes.  Getting shitfaced all day long and getting C's and D's is a stupid mistake.   Putting up pictures of you puking on your Facebook page is a similar mistake.   Running up credit card debt and having a credit report that shows delinquent payments and a legal history that shows evictions, arrests, and the like, is basically going to make you unemployable.  There are far too many other kids out there who don't have these handicaps.

Unfair?  Perhaps.   When I was in school, youthful indiscretions were overlooked.  Criminal records and financial records were rarely checked, if ever.  Whether you were a party boy or not usually didn't matter with regards to whether you got hired.  Often, just being from the same fraternity as your boss got you in.   Today, that sort of thing is a lot harder to do.  Companies have to hire based on performance.   There is less room, if any, for slackers.

So, being a good tenant is something that is in your best interests as well.  Few, if any, landlords are "assholes" as is often alleged by tenants.  Usually, if you scratch the surface of such stories, you find a history of late rent payments, various parking violations, damage to the rental unit, complaints by other tenants, police visits, vandalism, etc.  The asshole is the tenant, not the landlord.

And if you don't like a landlord - move out.  Most leases are for a year or less, so if you don't like a location, find another.  Ahhh.... but there's the rub.   Once you've decided to become a problem tenant, no other landlord will have you - and this applies to older people who are out of college as well.

Looking back on my years as a renter, I got along with my landlords fairly well.  The only times I had any troubles with the landlord, they were usually troubles of my own making - playing music too loudly, or my friends parking in a neighbor's designated space - that sort of thing.  Very rarely did a landlord instigate trouble merely for the heck of it.   Vacancy kills, and an unrented unit is a unit not generating income.   You want good tenants to be happy - the key words here being good tenants - and a smart landlord doesn't start things with a tenant without reason.

Bad tenants, on the other hand, are a nightmare.  They damage the property, they never pay their rent on time - if at all - and they annoy the other neighbors.  The best solution to avoid tenant problems, from a landlord perspective, is not to take them on at all.   And when a prospective tenant comes to you telling you what an "asshole" the previous landlord was, well, he knows the score on that.

The Healing Power of Massage

Back Pains?  Neck Pains?  Aches in Muscles and Joints?  Massage can be more effective, cheaper and better for you than pills or surgery - but ask your Doctor first.

Massage is very under-rated and under-utilized in the United States.  Part of the problem lies in our Puritan roots, where we cannot even talk about things like massage, or nude bathing, for that matter, without collapsing into a fit of giggles.  Our friends overseas seem to have less of a problem with that.  Perhaps they are more mature and grown-up, whereas our country is populated with mostly adult children.

So, go ahead, get it out of the way.  Tell all your jokes about oriental massage girls and "happy endings."  Just let me know when you're done.  I'll wait.  Done yet?  No?  Now?  OK, feel better now?  Let's get serious.  You see, despite what you read about on those billboards that say "Truckers Welcome", massage therapy is a very serious business and one that can really help you as you get older and more infirm.

And unfortunately the second bad stereotype about massages is that it is part of a "spa treatment" for ladies, who have cucumber slices put in their eyes and mud packs on their faces.   Hot stones on their spines and a relaxing afternoon with girl talk.  Tee-Hee.

So, in the United States, Massage has this reputation as either a covert sexual thing for men, or some sort of girly activity for women.  But in neither case are the healing powers of massage emphasized.  And this is sad, as it can be such a powerful means of healing.

As I noted in 50-Something Growing Pains, by the time you hit the mid-century mark, your body will have more than a few miles on it, and some parts may start to wear out, if not in fact, fall off.  And things like compressed discs and whatnot are the norm, not the exception.

And you should go see a doctor, to be sure.   And they will do a $1500 MRI or whatever, which your insurance won't cover (or will partially cover, or your rates will skyrocket, or both) and tell you that you have a compressed disc or something and they really can't do much about it, unless the problem is really serious.

If you have a crappy doctor, he might recommend surgery anyway, and I've seen this backfire in a big way.  The words "botched surgery" come to mind.  Before you go under the knife, make sure you have explored all alternatives.

If your doctor is crappy but not a surgeon, he might recommend pain killers, and you'll find yourself on a one-way trip to the Rush Limbaugh Center for Pain-Killer Re-Hab.  But along the way, you can sell some of your Oxycontin on the street for a tidy profit.

Pill Doctors write scrips.   Knife Doctors say to cut.  When the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem tends to look like a nail.

Now, I am not down on doctors - there are good ones and bad ones.   But they are not Gods, and the only tools they really have in their black bag are a knife and a bottle of pills - at least when it comes to things like a pinched nerve or disc.  See a doctor - but be skeptical and get a second opinion, if necessary (you do that with your car, right? why not your doctor?) and ask about alternative treatment options.

A good Doctor might make some other recommendations - if they are appropriate for your condition.   For example, if you are carrying around a 60 lb. bag of concrete, known as a "belly", you might want to look into losing that.   It is amazing, but when you aren't carrying that around, your spine is in a lot less pain!   And they might recommend that you investigate massage therapy.

Mark has a compressed disc in his back.   They tried to inject something into his spine and that went horribly wrong (migraine headaches, as his spinal fluid leaked out.  A "blood patch" cured the problem, others are not so lucky).  Surgery was not in the cards - not after our neighbor's experience (excruciating pain for a lifetime, with drug addiction throw in).  And we turned down the kind Doctor's offer for a scrip for Codine or Oxycontin (which seemed to be a big chunk of his practice).

A different doctor recommended a deep muscle massage.  And it has made all the difference in the world.  I have a compressed vertebra in my neck, and since I've been getting regular massages, I feel much better and never have "stiff neck" attacks anymore.

Now, I am not a big fan of "touchy feely" kind of crap, and was very skeptical about massage as a means of healing.   But it does work, and when you get one, you realize how contorted and stiff your body is (and gets) and how the muscles get all hard and out of whack.  A good massage leaves you feeling a bit like you've been in a car wreck the next day.   But the day after that, well, your body feels rejuvenated.

Finding a good massage therapist can be problematic.   As I noted before, "massage parlors" have the reputation as places for sexual encounters, while "day spas" have the reputation as merely places for personal indulgence.  A really good, vigorous, deep muscle massage is not what you will get at either place.

We were fortunate to find a good massage therapist in New York, who gives a massage that is intense and deep.   Unfortunately, the further South you go, the harder it is to find serious massage therapists, as in the deep South, massage is still viewed as either the slap-and-tickle or as girly time.  But if you are having muscle or joint pains, it pays to at least try a massage therapist.

Look for one with extensive training, who is willing to listen to your problems and understand what you are looking for.   I would avoid spas and health clubs, unless you are traveling, as most have a retinue of therapists of varying levels of expertise and you may never have the same person twice.  Many better massage therapists will travel, and thus you have have a massage in the convenience of your own home - often for less than what is charged at a health club or spa.

We talk a lot about the "health care crises" in America.  But a big part of this crises is the mentality of patients these days.   Everyone wants to go to the doctor and get a quick fix - in the form of a pill or surgery.  Few are willing to admit that many of their problems may be self-inflicted and the answer doesn't necessarily lie in a pill bottle or at the end of a knife.

And no, in most cases, your insurance won't cover the cost of massage therapy - but it never hurts to ask.  Of course, if they do cover it, expect your rates to go up - nothing in life is free.

But to me, freedom from pain is well worth a few dollars for a massage every other week or so.

Patient, heal thyself!

Bootstrapping Beliefs

Up, Up With Jesus!

Belief is a powerful tool. And as I have noted before, any tool or invention has its dark side.  Money is a powerful invention and tool - and an idea, really.   It has the capability to do great good or great harm.  It all depends on how you use it.

And beliefs can be harmful to you, whether it is believing in a Real Estate market that will always go up, up, up! or believing that the price of gold will never fall.  Both are beliefs not founded in any sort of reality, other than listening to the opinions of others, and not processing raw data yourself.

But often, beliefs not founded in reality can be bootstrapped by contrary data, not invalidated.   People find reasons to show that the data that undermines their belief system, actually supports it.  They take a "No" and turn it into a "Yes".

This was driven home to me by a tragic story about a young boy who jumped off a building and killed himself.  He came from a strict religious family and was Gay.  All of his siblings rebelled against their strict parents in one form or another.   A sister eloped with a boy of another religion and left the State, never to return.   Another got into drugs and alcohol abuse.  And this youngest sibling, rejected by his parents and feeling unloved, took the dramatic (and stupid) step of killing himself.

Now, as a parent, one might start to wonder, if all of your kids end up troubled whether maybe, just maybe, your parenting skills are perhaps not up to par.   What is it that you did wrong that made your kids rebel and leave you - or kill themselves?  Perhaps by depriving your children of unconditional love you created the problem?  Perhaps the strict and unforgiving religious teachings they forced on their children were to blame?  Most normal people might think that - at least as a possibility.

But no, the religious parents thought just the opposite.  "The Devil," they said, "is out to get us!  Since we are strictly devout Christians, he has targeted us for special abuse!"  So the reason their son was Gay was not that he was Gay, but that the Devil wanted payback.   The reason their daughter married a man from another religion wasn't that she might love him - or wanted to get out of the dysfunctional household and latched on to the first ticket out  - no, no, it was the Devil.  And the reason their other son lapsed into drug and alcohol abuse wasn't because he was trying to anesthetize himself from the post-traumatic stress of growing up in a house where beatings were regular and love was scarce.  No, it was Satan, in all his glory, exacting revenge on a True Christian Family!

So rather than call into question their beliefs, this contrary data actually bootstrapped them and made them even stronger.   The answer was not to try to love and understand their children for who they were, but to cut them off and abandon them as the spawn of Satan, and to spend even more time and money on their fundamentalist church.

And this is sad - and a common occurrence these days.  And what is doubly sad is that the parents inflicting this sort of upbringing on their children are not themselves the children of strict religious backgrounds, but rather later converts to such extreme religions later in life.  And the fallout from such families, I think, will be extensive in the years to come.

What triggered this posting was a trip to Atlanta, where I stayed at the hotel where the young boy jumped to his death (a  messy and impolite thing to do, and utterly wasteful).  Just a suggestion, but if you really want to "get even" with your Baptist Parents, go out and be happy in life - that will really, really piss them off.    If you kill yourself, it just gives them permission to say that you were crazy and that they were "right".

At the same time I was there and heard this horrific story (from many years back) a large number of youth groups with Up With Jesus invaded the hotel for the weekend, to drink Mountain Dew, eat candy, and sing really, really bad Christian Rock (You can always tell a Christian Rock song, as it sucks.   You can't have Sex, Drugs, and Rock 'n Roll without the Sex and Drugs, apparently - the songs of rebellion don't work for conformity).

What amazed me about these kids was not that they were polite Christian children - as one might expect - but rather they were arrogant, rude, abusive, and rather wild.  They ran around the hotel saying rude things to other guests, snickering, riding the elevators and setting off the alarm bells, and playing their electric guitars in their rooms, at full volume, at 6 in the morning.    What would Jesus do?  Kick some Christian Youth Butt, I think, particularly if he was trying to sleep.

It was a bit shocking at first, but perhaps being told that you are "special" as a Christian all your life gives one carte blanche to think you are better than everyone else.  And perhaps their rude behavior was just a manifestation of suppressed rebellion.  I do not know.  But to some extent, they were only sort of like a slightly friendlier version of Hitler Youth.

And no doubt, for many of them, down the road, the realities of life will clash with the indoctrination of their upbringing (an indoctrination that likely their parents did not go through) and the results will be, well, unpleasant, to say the least.

But then again, it is possible they may bootstrap these contrary experiences into strengthening their beliefs, thus perpetuating a cycle that eventually, like an undamped electrical oscillator, will swing wildly out of control - and another Republican Senator will give a tear-filled press conference and then resign to spend more time with his family.

So what does this have to do with personal finances?  Well a lot:

1.  Religion and faith is a fine thing, but don't let it dominate your life to the exclusion of all else.  Giving all your money to a church and viewing your whole life through the prism of religion is never a good idea.  Extreme and hateful religions, whether they are the Taliban or the Born Again, are a lousy idea.

2.  When analyzing raw data, analyze the data with an open mind, rather than coming to a conclusion and then fitting the data to the conclusion.  We saw this in the Iraq war (where data was collected to support the premise, rather than vice-versa) and we see it in people's personal lives - such as the self-justification people use to rationalize leasing or other raw financial deals.

3.  If you are trapped in a situation like the one described above - with unloving parents, an oppressive religion, or an abusive spouse - the best thing to do is escape and form your own life.   Killing yourself just vindicates your enemies.  Destroying your life with drugs and alcohol may make you feel less pain (but likely just the opposite) but it will surely give your opponents the ammunition to say "I told you so - he would never amount to anything!"  Leave abusive relationships, and never look back.  Take care of yourself!  I give you permission.

And if you are ever staying in a downtown hotel and 30 church buses pull up with the "Up With Jesus" singers aboard - check out right away.