Is Trump Normalizing the GOP?

Romney and McCain look like heroes today, instead of villains, thanks to Donald Trump.

A funny thing has happened in the last two years.   Many on the Left are starting to find a new appreciation of their former foes on the Right, such as Mitt Romney, John McCain, and John Kasich.  These Republicans, once thought as far-right extremists, are now seen as moderate, and applauded for standing up to Donald Trump.

Was this all by design?  Or were we just being fooled before?   In the previous elections, I found myself drawn into this sort of mindless hate of opponents of what at the time were my political beliefs - or what I thought they were, anyway.   Both parties offer up scarecrow images of their opponents - caricatures of their policy positions and personal beliefs.   We are told not to just vote for the candidate of our party, but to despise and hate the candidate from the other party.

This is not constructive - and it is what lead us to Donald Trump.   We all like to blame Trump for his particular brand of nasty - mocking John McCain, an actual military hero, as he lays dying of cancer.  But if you connect the dots, this really is what both parties have been pushing for decades now, and it continues today with Trump's antics and the "resist" movement of the Democrats.   Both parties want to tap into visceral hate, not just policy points.  Policy points don't get voters out to the polls.

In that regard, Hillary's campaign was doomed from the get-go.  The GOP has been pushing Hillary-hate for decades.   Although behind closed doors, these politicians are cordial and often actually even good friends, in the public eye, it is more like professional wrestling, where outlandish things are said and each candidate is reduced to a cartoon character.  The actual wrestling match is secondary - the chair throwing and trash-talk before the match is what people came to see.

Donald Trump, who has actually appeared on professional wrestling, took this political theater to a whole new level.  And suddenly, Mitt Romney doesn't seem like such a bad guy - even if his Bain Capital is a bit of a vulture capitalist operation.   John McCain looks like an absolute saint these days - why did we not vote for him?   Oh, right, Sarah Palin.

Palin bears mention in that she is part of this Trumpian political theater.   She was very good at throwing out the clever quip or the fast insult.   But when it came down to policy and politics, she showed herself to be out of her element.  Nevertheless, McCain can't complain too much about the Donald's methods - he took the viper to his breast when he picked Palin as his running mate.

Sadly, we all get caught up in this nonsense from time to time.  I look back as some things I've written here in the past and cringe.   McCain and Romney were not the devil themselves, and Barack Obama, well, turned out to be a lot less than we thought he would be.  His legacy, sadly, is that what little he got accomplished was so quickly unwound.

Ordinary politicians are often boring and uninspiring.  And ordinary politicians often have a harder time getting out the vote.  Odds are, you can't even name your own Senators for your State, or the Congressman for your district.  And without looking at your driver's license, can you name your governor?  Of course not - or you are excused of that is the case.  These are not the larger-than-life cartoon figures that dominate politics today.

Of course, this cartoon politics plays both ways.  If your opponent is a boring policy-wonk like Hillary Clinton, the secret to success is to paint her as a "villain" character, much like in professional wrestling.  Give her a catchy name ("Crooked Hillary") and a back story (the e-mails!) and let the fans fill in the rest.  In retrospect, it was a bad idea to nominate her (and Sanders an even worse idea) as she was so easy to caricature and cartoon as the Wicked Witch of the West.

But then again, maybe some good will come of all of this.  Maybe - just maybe - people will tire of professional wrestling politics and go back to normalcy again.   And there may be some evidence of this, as some "moderate" candidates are beating out their more radical brethren in the primaries.

And maybe we, as voters, will stop being drawn into these reality-show scenarios, where there are "good guy" characters and "bad guys" and instead of rooting for one side or the other, we can instead think carefully about their policies and political beliefs - and their ability to compromise and get things done - and vote accordingly.

Maybe!

Blue Wave or Blue Puddle?

When you start selling socialism as the solution to our "problems" you can count me out.

The Democrats are claiming that this fall, we will see a "blue wave" as they take over Congress.  But even Democrats admit that at best, they may have a majority of seats in the House but not the Senate.  And they are promising - get this - to bring back Nancy Pelosi as speaker of the House, even though her politics are well past their sell-by date.

The problem the Democrats have is the same one faced by Republicans over the last decade.   The extremists take over the party and form a bloc of intransigent legislators who do little more than block any effort to get anything done - unless it is 100% on their terms.   So we have a Democratic party embracing ideas like "free college" which would be a nightmare as I discussed before.  It would be like Obamacare, only worse - just charge whatever you want and send the government the bill!  What could possibly go wrong with that?

Decades after communism and socialism have been proven to be ineffective forms of government, the far-left still posits that not only are these great ideas, but that the majority of Americans will go along with them.  And that's where I think we are headed for trouble.  You see, when you talk about "redistributing the wealth" and "taking money away from the wealthy and giving it to the poor" I get awfully nervous.  Because what ends up happening in these sort of deals is that the very wealthy skip out on the whole thing by setting up tax shelters and hiring accountants and lawyers, leaving the middle-class and upper-middle-class to pay the bill.

When you talk about "redistributing the wealth" you are talking about my bank account.

I spent 14 years working my way through college, 40 years working at various jobs, including delivering pizzas and scrubbing toilets.  I managed to pull myself up and put money aside and learn to live without and build a good life for myself.  And I did this without exploiting anyone or anybody.  And you tell me you want me to vote for you so you can take this all away from me and then force me to beg the government to get a pittance back? 

Sorry, but no sale.   Fly over America some time and look down at all those endless suburbs that surround every city.  Every one of those houses on those tiny lots has a family in it - a family scrimping and saving to get by, pay the mortgage, and save for their kids' college.   You go ahead and tell them you want to jack their taxes so some crackhead doesn't have to work.   Go ahead, see how well that sells in middle America.   And bear in mind, these are the folks who are middle America - the liberal Republicans and conservative Democrats who call themselves "independents" because frankly they are sick of the extremes of both parties.

They will vote Democratic out of conscience.  But when you promise to take away their money - well, they will hold their nose and vote Republican - yes, even for Donald Trump.

And therein lies the problem.  You take away the tweets and his boorish behavior and allegations of "collusion" (which I suspect will never be clearly proven - if there was any collusion, it was by 330 million Americans who listen to stupid conspiracy theories on the Internet or believe in polarizing politics - all of which were aided and abetted by you-know-who in the Kremlin) and all you are left with are actual policies.

Yes, I know, the Post and the Times have gone ballistic with frightening articles about how Melania wants a divorce or how morale in the West Wing is at an all-time low.  They are basically fulfilling Trump's promise of "fake news" by falling into his reality show trap.   Think about it - this Omorosa lady played what part in his reality series?  Yup, the villain.  And now she continues to play the part and distract people from what is actually going on in America.   So chat it up at the water cooler about "secret tapes" that reveal nothing.  Keep your head down and eat your media kibble.  Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

But people to pay attention to record-low unemployment, even if such things usually precede a major market crash.   They will see only the 4% growth rate and a stock market that has risen dramatically (never mind the chronic instability since the beginning of this year - another "tell" of a future recession).  So long as the economy doesn't tank just yet, all is going well for the GOP.

And I think the Democrats know this, which is why they are selling snake oil socialism this time around - that and blind Trump-hate.   Hey, I despite him as much as the next guy.  He comes across to me as stupid, infantile, and just, well, gross.   I mean, imaging him naked and you will see what I mean.  Eeeeeeew!   Middle-aged fat guys with tiny dicks hands hidden under folds of fat.  But again, what matters is policy, not whether the President (who is so quick to rate women on a scale of 1 to 10) is only a 1.5 himself, and only if he managed to lose at least 50 pounds.

We have a guy here on the island who put a sign on the back of his truck using mailbox letters, saying "ReSist 45!"   It is kind of creepy - the sort of thing you see on vehicles parked in a "compound" out in the desert.  The Democrats are pushing this "resist" mentality - but what does it actually mean?  How are we suppose to "resist" our own government?  And isn't this what we condemned the far-right for doing over the last decade?  You know, taking over federal parks at gunpoint and claiming to be "sovereign citizens" and all that crap.  You can't fight crazy with more crazy.  And yes, I am looking right at you, Maxine Waters.

So what does "resist" really mean?  That you shame government officials at their homes or when they eat out at a restaurant?   What exactly does that accomplish?  Or do we dress up in costumes and pretend to be street hooligans and call ourselves "antifa" and end up making fascists look normal?  Ask the Communist "street fighters" from the Wiemar era how that worked out for them.

The problem with dramatic politics is that the majority of us don't see the world as quite coming to an end.  I was in the grocery store here in Homer, Alaska, and in the magazine rack was a copy of "Prepper" magazine - a magazine apparently aimed at end-times people who are building cabins in the mountains for the Apocalypse (and yea, there is a lot of that here in Alaska, and apparently in California as well!).  The headline on the cover was, Are you prepared?  Yea, I am - prepared to preserve Democracy, our society, and our country, which despite what you may have heard is not in any danger of falling apart, unless, of course, we start to believe in this end-times nonsense or the conspiracy theory propaganda fueled by the Russian Internet Research Agency.

What we need in our government and our society in general is less craziness and more normality.  Maybe we should revive old Calvin Coolidge's campaign slogan, "A return to normalcy" which sold well after the chaos of World War I.   People were tired of upheaval and wanted not radical change, but stability and predictability in our society, our government, and our economy.

I get e-mails from the Democratic party all the time, asking me for money for various campaigns.   And since I donated to some Democrats in the past, my name is sold to other candidates who also make pitches for money.   But at least in Georgia, throwing money at Democratic campaigns is sort of throwing money away.  And no, despite that the Times and the Post say, losing in a close race is not "winning" - it is still losing.  The fact that your opponent did not win by as wide a margin as last time around is not indicative of anything.  You have to win to win, nothing else matters.

But the Democrats will hear none of that.  Rather than organizing and realizing that their message simply isn't selling with a lot of people, they argue the election was "stolen" due to Russian influence or collusion or stolen e-mails or whatever.  Hillary won the popular vote!   But winning the popular votes doesn't win elections - and the Democrats know that.  No one wants to admit that maybe Hillary was a flawed candidate who ran a flawed campaign, and that Putin's little puppet - Bernie Sanders - basically destroyed her campaign before it even started.  To appease these leftniks, Hillary had to move further to the Left in her campaign speeches, which was enough to turn off voters, or turn them to the GOP.

Will there be a "blue wave" this November?   Well, the Democrats will take the House, that's for sure.  But not the Senate - who confirms judicial nominees, including Supreme Court nominees.  They may take a few governorships as well.   But in order to sell their message to the masses, they need to distance themselves from the radicals in the party - something that they will be loathe to do, as our primary system favors radical interests.  When Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is the poster-child for the Democratic party, you've lost me.   Not only do her political posters look like propaganda from Castro's Cuba, her politics sound about the same as well.

Sorry, but no sale!

Just Crazy About Jesus!

Are religious people more crazy than non-religious people?  Hard to tell...

In the news, one of those connect-the-dots things that makes you wonder.  A guy steals an airplane and crashes it to the ground.   His relatives say that "Jesus is holding our family together" and that the man was a "good Christian."

Meanwhile, in California, the unhinged individual, who lived as a hermit in a cabin and started the largest wildfire in California history (apparently to get even with his neighbor over a long-standing feud) is described by some as "a good Christian."

It seems that whenever someone goes off the deep end, they turn out to be fundamentalist Christians.

Or does it just seem that way?  In a country where the majority religion is Christianity, the majority of crazy people are likely to be Christians.  So maybe it is just that.  Or maybe it is just religious people in general - folks who put belief ahead of rational thinking - who are crazy.   It seems that half the problems in the world today are being caused by religious extremists.  Take for example, the Middle East...

But does that mean, by default, that non-religious people are more sane?   I doubt it.  Or at least, it is hard to prove.  The problem is, of course, that you have non-religious people making a religion out of non-religion.  Many atheists make atheism a central part of their life, just as Christians make Jesus the central part of theirs.  Consider Matty O'Hair and her particular brand of crazy.

So maybe the answer is, the world is full of crazy people.  In fact, probably the crazies outnumber rational thinkers by 2:1 - at least.   Act rationally in an irrational world.  It is all you need to do to get ahead, I think.

Biodiversity and Market Diversity

When ecosystems move toward a single species, they become more unstable and subject to disruption.   When markets move to only a single player or a few players, similar instability can occur.

Alaska is an interesting place - sort of stuck in the 1990's.   For example, it is the last bastion of Blockbuster video rental stores - which went out of business in the lower 48 during the Bush era.   We drove by a mall in Anchorage, and not only was it not abandoned, but it was being remodeled.   They were remodeling the Sears store, if you can believe that!

While they have a lot of chain stores and restaurants up here, there are far more small mom-and-pop businesses run by locals.    If you want a slice of pizza, you don't look for a Poppa John's (racism in every slice!) or a Pizza Hut, but some local shop that you find on the advice of a local or a fellow traveler.

Believe it or not, much of the marketplace in America was this way at one time.   In the small town I grew up in, we had no chain restaurants, department stores, or indeed, even a chain grocery store (unless IGA counts as a chain - it does stand for Independent Grocer's Association).  Today, that same small town has a McDonald's - and the local diner is out of business.   The IGA is gone, but now they have a Wegman's.

Just as dominant species evolve over time and force out weaker life forms, dominant businesses evolve over time and force out competitors.   In any business, you see this.   The car industry once had hundreds, if not thousands, of name plates.   Today, there are maybe a few dozen brands of cars in the world, and most of those are made by a handful of companies.

To some extent, this is a good thing.   Small companies that have established niche ecosystems can be wiped out by more successful species that supplants them.   You may think you have a nice little business building Hupmobiles, but then Ford comes along with a cheap car that takes over your habitat, and you become extinct nearly overnight.   The strong survive and the weak fail - it is true in the marketplace as it is in nature.

But what happens when our marketplace devolves into a monoculture?   Many scientists are arguing that the same is happening to our ecosystem, as we humans take over more and more of the available habitat, forcing out other species, particularly those who occupy narrow and fragile niches.  And some argue that biodiversity is a good thing for our ecology and that monoculture could be an unstable system - as the dominant species could be wiped out, once it consumes all the available habitat.

It is an interesting argument, with regard to the environment.   Over the millennia, there have been a few mass-extinction events in the history of our planet - and some argue that one is going on right now, as we take over more and more of the habitat portion of the planet.  When the Earth's axis tilts, or the comet strikes, huge swaths of species are wiped out, and it may take millions of years for new species to evolve from the few survivors of the apocalypse.

The problem for a monoculture, or an ecosystem with few species, is that if the cataclysmic event destroys the ecosystem of that monoculture, all life is wiped out and nothing will survive and evolve.  Without biodiversity, the system becomes more unstable and vulnerable, even as it seems more and more robust.

The markets today are seeing disruptions and cataclysms of their own - and not just in terms of market crashes or recessions.   The way we spend and behave has changed over time, and the big dinosaurs of industry and retail are dropping dead, one by one.  The smaller and more agile competitors - in this case, online retailers - are able to adapt and grow and take over the habitat once occupied by lumbering brick-and-mortar dinosaurs.

I think the analogy is apt - in business it is adapt or die, and many a strong company has gone under doing "business as usual" and not bothering to change things.   Why rock the boat when big SUVs are selling so well?   Then a comet strikes in 2008, and two of the most venerable car companies - including the largest one on the planet - go bankrupt.   That is why today, GM and Ford are plowing money into self-driving cars and whatnot.  Not because they will sell today, but perhaps tomorrow or the next day.   It is also why people love to hate Elon Musk.   He may be an evolutionary dead-end, but he may spawn more diversity that in the end is a threat to the existing monoculture.

Of course, the ultimate monoculture in business and industry are the regulated utilities, and how they operate illustrates how monoculture in business can be vulnerable.   The utility business has largely remained unchanged since, well, its inception.   Other than the introduction of nuclear reactors in the 1950's, the means of power generation and distribution and metering has remained largely the same since Westinghouse's time.

The companies make money - by law - and the shareholders are happy.  The unions are happy and the workers are happy.    And so long as rates are "reasonable" the customers are happy, too.   No need to update to a "smart grid" or even a national grid - things are fine the way they are.   There is little incentive for innovation or change.  And the few companies that do innovate often find themselves bankrupted by taking risks in a business that ultimately is risk-free, if you keep your head down and don't make any waves.

Then along comes Elon Musk and his solar shingles and energy storage pods.   In theory, you could set up such an installation and then cut the cables to the utility company for good.   The solar panels could generate more than enough electricity for your home - and store the excess in Lithium-Ion battery packs for use at night or on cloudy days.   It is only the horrific cost of installing all this technology that has prevented it from becoming mainstream.

The evolution of such disruptors may, however, be brief.   Donald Trump believes in business-as-usual, and is willing to use tariffs and regulation changes to squelch innovation.   High tariffs on solar panels will make solar shingles a stillborn dream.   Abolishing tax incentives will be the nail in the coffin - for solar, as well as for electric cars.   Easing CAFE and emissions requirements for cars and trucks will mean it will be more profitable to stamp them out of good old rust-prone mild steel, instead of esoteric materials like aluminum and high-strength steel, as Ford and GM are presently doing with their trucks and SUVs.

On a personal level, I think that diversity in the marketplace is usually beneficial to the consumer.  When we have a market devolve into a monopoly or a duopoly, innovation in products languishes and prices ratchet upwards.   I can go to the local family-run Mexican taco joint in my home town and have food that is not quite like any other store.   Or, I can go to Taco Bell and have a fake taco that is exactly like the ones served at a Taco Bell on the other side of the planet.  Oh, and the small, family-run taco place is cheaper, too. And they serve beer.

Chain restaurants and chain stores are successful because a lot of people like things to be certain.   And large chains can afford saturation advertisements on television - prompting the great unwashed to show up.   The rise and fall of all the major chains and franchises is usually linked to advertising campaigns.   Arby's made news a few years back when franchisees went into revolt.  They argued that the corporate parent wasn't keeping up their end of the deal, specifically in terms of nationwide advertising and promotion.   And some argued that this was no accident, but rather an attempt to weed out weaker franchisees and acquire their franchises as corporate stores (Domino's went through a similar weeding-out, early in its history).

The local Mom-and-Pop store can't afford to advertise on a national scale.  So they have to find a market niche - such as a college town environment or tourist-town environment - where they can thrive in a protected preserve.   Either that, or be swallowed up.   In Central New York, there was a chain called Carrol's which was pretty much like McDonald's or Burger King.  They sort of invented the Happy Meal even before Micky-D's did.   But they could not compete as a local chain because they couldn't afford to advertise like McDonald's could.    So they did the smart thing - sold out to Burger King in exchange for a number of franchises.  And today, Carrol's has like 800 B-K franchises worldwide.

Success in business has a lot to do with advertising, more than anything else.   And that is yet another reason not to watch television.   What you think is your idea to "deserve a break today" is actually an advertising jingle bouncing around in your head, after you've heard it 1,000 times on the television and radio.

But I digress.

I am not sure what the point of all of this is, other than I prefer to nurture those businesses in niche ecosystems, rather than patronize the dominate species.   McDonald's doesn't need my money, and the food there has the texture and taste of poop.   No, really, it is designed to be eaten without any teeth whatsoever.  But I digress again.

This is not to say I patronize businesses that should rightfully become extinct.   Paying more for shoddy service or products is just not a smart move.   Rather, I think you can seek out and find bargains with some niche players who have more incentive to compete in order to survive.  Whether it is a restaurant meal or a new car, odds are the best bargains are not going to be where the herd has stampeded.

The Sad Tale of Billy Brown - The Company You Keep

Decisions you make in life, particularly decisions made early in life, can have profound affect on the rest of your life.  One key decision is who you choose as your friends.

I had mentioned or alluded to Billy Brown in earlier postings, but never, I do not think, did an exclusive posting on his sad life story.   Don't feel too sorry for Billy - it turns out he did some pretty horrific things.   But what is "sad" is that he had so many opportunities in life, but squandered them all in a fit of drug and alcohol abuse and self-pity.

I met Billy when he moved to our small town in Central New York.  Billy was from Virginia - what today they call "Northern Virginia" - Fairfax County and its environs.   It was hardly "the country" or rural Alabama, but to kids from Central New York, three-feet-deep in snow, it seemed like an exotic, far-off location.   At the time, Southern things were coming into vogue.  The whole "Southern Rock" thing got started, with Lynyrd Skynyrd and all.  The "Dukes of Hazzard" was playing on the television (and no, there is no Hazzard County here in Georgia - I checked).

But to us frozen Northerners, Billy was as exotic as a Pacific Islander would have been.  We pestered him with questions about living in "The South" even though his experiences in the suburbs of Washington, DC were about the same as ours in New York.   And he relished the attention.  Pretty soon, he started affecting a Southern accent, wearing big-buckle belts, cowboy boots, and even a cowboy hat.   And the girls loved it.   The more attention he got from this, the more "southern" he became.

It might have all been harmless fun at that point, but things took a turn for the worse.   There was some talk that he had some difficulties with his parents.   And maybe there were difficulties in adjusting to a new school and a new town.   But the main problem was that he started hanging out with the wrong people.   At first, I used to hang out with him.  Back then, we were all smoking pot and drinking beer.   Not good for your psyche or your grade average, but it wasn't about to kill anyone.   But pretty soon, he gravitated to harder drugs and harder folks, and I sort of lost track of him at that point.

A friend told me he was arrested for breaking into the town's pharmacy and stealing prescription drugs.   At that point, I walked away.  He was headed down the wrong path and headed for self-destruction.   His parents, being somewhat wealthy, were able to extricate him from legal trouble.  Since he was only 17, he was adjudicated as a minor and sent back out on the streets.   Our legal system assumes that until you're 18, you don't know what the fuck you are doing (which is largely true) and that there should be no legal consequences as a result (which is a very bad idea).

Like I said, we drifted apart after he started doing shit like that, and the next year I went away to college and General Motors.  When I came back to my home town on occasion, I would meet some of my old friends, and we would talk about what everyone was up to.  And Billy was up to no good. After graduating from High School (or being asked to leave, I am not sure which) he decided to hang out around town, work odd jobs, and live with his parents.   He hung out in bars (the drinking age being 18 back then) and also hung out with high school kids who looked up to him because he was older, had a secondhand Camaro, and would buy beer for them.

Even though adolescence for him was a nightmare, he chose to continue living it for years to come.  And this is the part I don't understand - people who live with their parents and at the same time say they detest their parents.   If you don't like hanging out with them, why not leave?  But maybe there is some sort of crippling emotional tie going on here.  They stay at home, living in the basement until age 30 and beyond, hoping for a parental bond or love that is never forthcoming.   Perhaps, like the addict, they are entrapped by smaller and smaller doses of reward, the longer they continue the game.

Whatever the reason, things went from bad to worse, to horrific in short order.   Billy lost his car to a DUI wreck, and lost his license as well.   To get around (to the big city to buy drugs or get drunk) he would "borrow" cars from the local gas station.  Our town was like Mayberry, RFD.  People would leave their car at the gas station, put the key under the floor mat, and leave a note on the dashboard saying what work they wanted done on it.   It was a small town, and a trusting place.

Billy would pick a car and drive it to the city and then bring it back before sunrise.  He did this a number of times and never got caught, as the car was always right back where it was supposed to be, before anyone noticed.  He had graduated from breaking and entering to grand theft auto.

But one night, he decided to "borrow" a Cadillac from the gas station and go into the city to visit some bars and buy some drugs.  Early the next morning, drunk as a skunk and wired on who-knows-what, he sped back to town, weaving all over the road.  Coming in the other direction was a bride-to-be, returning from a "girls night out" on the night before her wedding.  Billy hit her head-on, crushing her Datsun into a ball of tin-foil.

She might have survived, if help had been summoned quickly, or first-aid administered.  But Billy, worried for his own safety from the law, ran away.  The young lady bled to death before help could be summoned.

Strangely enough, Billy's strategy worked.  Since no one could tie him to the scene of the crime, and since he wasn't around to take a breathalyzer test, it was nearly impossible for the State to build a case against him - not even for stealing the car, much less DUI, manslaughter, or second-degree murder.   So they plea-bargained it out and Billy went to jail for an alarmingly short period of time and was back out on the streets again in no time, hanging out with, and buying beer for, high school students.

Now, one would have thought that after killing someone like that, you would not have returned to your home town. But apparently the well of low-self-esteem is bottomless.   That was the last I heard about Billy - third-hand as it was.

I am not sure what the point of all this is, other than my Mother used to have a saying, "chose your friends wisely" which I never understood entirely.  After all, you don't choose your friends, do you?   Isn't it some sort of mutual thing?  You can't force friendship on other people (although I've seen it tried!) so you don't really have a "choice" of who to be friends with - right?

I think what she meant was, you do have a choice who not to be friends with, and when you start hanging out with sketchy people, well, you will end up doing sketchy things.  The normative cues provided by crackheads will eventually persuade you to start smoking crack.

One reason I ran away from Billy and his new friends is that I saw him doing horrific things and didn't want to be drawn into that.  If I had continued to hang out with him, I would end up doing harder drugs and start to think that maybe breaking into stores and living with Mom and Dad weren't such bad deals after all.

I had another friend - a relative, actually - who started to go down the same path.  He started to hang out with noxious friends - sketchy people from the other side of the tracks who had checkered histories.  One had been dishonorably discharged from the Army and - surprise, surprise - lived with his Mother in a trailer.  He encouraged my relative to do stupid and reckless things.  And through this one friend, he met another, and pretty soon, they were hanging out, smoking pot, doing LSD, and driving drunk.   He was fortunate that he got caught early on, as I think even he realized his friends were taking him nowhere fast.

A similar thing - on a lesser scale - happened to me, and it is one of those "there but for the grace of God" kind of deals.  When I dropped out of college (again, poor choice of friends, plus drugs and beer) I moved back to my home town and got a job in the nearby city.  And I started to hang out with some of my old friends - and new ones - who liked to smoke pot and drink beer.   At least I wasn't living at home.   But the nexus of it was, I was going nowhere fast, and neither were my new "friends" who were getting into harder and harder drugs - smoking opium (no, really) and doing this crazy new thing of the 1980's called "rock cocaine" - you smoked it!

I noped out of that.  Maybe after seeing what happened to my relative and to Billy Brown, I realized I wasn't much different than them, but just luckier.  If I had kept going down the same path, I would have ended up like Billy Brown - in a world of woe with no way out.

Older people like to say stupid things to young people, such as "these are the best years of your life!" and other nonsense.   A better adage is "youth is wasted on the young" - and if you see some of these YouTube videos where teen-somethings dare each other to jump off the roof of their parents' house, you can see what is meant by that.   What seems like ten seconds of thrills to a youngster, looks more like a lifetime of aches and pains to an older person, who still feels the pain from that knee injury incurred at a tender age, decades ago.  Again, decisions you make while young have profound impact later on in life.