The President addresses the Nation

by designs 257 Replies latest social current

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  Simon

  Simon- I'll tell you how stupid you can be as a teenager and your underdeveloped ability to hold your reactions in check. I slugged my High School Gym Teacher, he came up on me for something I was doing and I slugged him, oh man was that a mistake.

  Ha, I once had a fight during a lesson but avoided ever hitting the teacher - the kids hit the blackboard right next to where he was writing on it though.

  There was a brief period after that when all the "tough" kids would shout "Rocky Rocky" when I walked in, LOL
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  Simon

  Good luck and sincere best wishes for what you are doing. If you can influence just one to change his course it is worth it.

  Hear hear !
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  Glander

  Remember the theory of the Butterfly Effect ? You know, your car had a flat on the way to the airport and you missed the flight that crashed.

  Life is a huge pinball game in many ways, but individual choices are still vital if one is to have any control at all.

  How interesting to speculate on the policy that Trayvon's school adopted in cahoots with law enforcement. They ignored the obvious direction his life was going for their own individual interests. They swept his problem under the rug. If he had been involved in some sort of juvenile offender program for the burglary offense he may never had encountered GZ that night.
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  designs

  I hear you Glander, good points.
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  Simon

  You end up with alternate timelines that you cannot predict. Should you go back and kill hitler as a baby? Would things change for the better or worse? (other than you being locked up as a baby-murderer!). No one can ever know - each life has potential for good as well as potential for doing evil.

  My favourite was when Dr Who (Tom Baker) had the chance to destroy the Daleks and couldn't / wouldn't - he didn't know if history would be better or worse without them. Many planets united and faught them and who's to say they didn't stop something else worse from happening?

  While we can statistically make predictions based on larger groups quite accurately, no one can ever tell what any single person in that group can do. Everyone deserves a chance but also doesn't deserve to remove someone else's choice.
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  designs

  That's true Simon. I guess I get to wraped up in these things that affect young people. I almost lost one of my guys last week, the Court was hounding him and he relapsed, drank 3 bottles of Jack Daniels and spent 7 days in Hoag Hospital, nearly killed him. Back to square one.
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  Simon

  Ouch ... that's gonna be an epic hangover!

  BTW: I wanted to add that I appreciate people contributing to keeping this topic largely on track without it degenerating as some others have. It shows it is possible to have intense debate over important topics without falling out.
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  designs

  Chicago is considered ground zero for violence. As of July there have been 1020 shootings and 226 killed by gunfire, although this is down from last at this time that saw 1346 shootings and 299 deaths by gunfire it has finally pushed the elected leaders to address what Representative Robin Kelly called the 'everyday..mini massacres'. Neighborhoods have reported the drop in shootings and killings is not significant enough to make the community feel safe.

  First Lady Michelle Obama had hoped her attention to the killing of Hadiya Pendleton would have sparked a greater public dialogue when she called Hadiya 'I was her' but now an emergency summit has now been convened with the support of the President. The summit will focus on the 'multilevel' approaches that have worked and not worked in other cities along with urging Congress to pass universal background checks. The President and the First lady have traveled to Chicago for the summit.