ONE CENTIMETER

  One centimeter. Evidently this made a huge difference to a young couple and their just about ready to be born new baby, a second child for the mom. Women know their bodies, but men keep insisting they know better; thus, have instituted contrary rules, placing mother and child in danger. A four-centimeter dilated woman in obvious severe pain, the pain of the latter part of birth, refused entry. Why? She needed one more centimeter dilation, a measurement that can change, turn on a dime, but out she went - to give birth soon after in the car. One centimeter and active labor. Manifest pain, but men decided, for the sake of money, to place a ridiculous rule in place. Tiny minds evidenced in ridiculous tiny measurements and unthinkable possible results.

Apparently, this pandemic of tiny minds, unthinking, non-workable minds has hit the offices of the politicians running the country, and indeed the world. Rigid thinking. Antiquated laws and beliefs returning to life, zombie clones that suck the blood out of society. Measurements that make no sense at all, forcing decisions onto society that simply do not stand up to the light of day. All will be so judged by historians of the future.

 That is if there is a viable future for us, a future with a working society, a co-operative family of nations who finally realize and accept the truth: all nations are more alike than different. That a government owes certain manifest obligations to its citizens. Security. Access to food, shelter, education, medical care, and a progressive penal system which finally, can actually enact the reformation aspect of incarceration along with punishment for offenses. And why not, for a decent and fair society can cut the rate of the incarcerated population by double digits.

Sigh... yet another aspect of society that tiny minds cannot understand. When a misbehaving child in school is given another path to expressing needs, a positive one, rather than threats and punishment, the child can make a positive turn. Improvement of society begins at early levels, but tiny minds cannot seem to get it.  But the difference it would make!! Sigh...

Tiny minds obsessed about money, not understanding that a penny spent at an earlier level can save dollars at a higher, more fraught with consequences level. Deny abortions but deny also the funds necessary to raise that child, to aid the mother in providing for this unwanted or unable to be provided for child. Denying the resources at a younger level, equates to much higher spending later on and more damage to society and its members. Do not pay for a safety bar in a bathroom, but then spend thousands for repair of the fractured hip and other bones as a result of the inevitable fall. Makes no sense at all yet tiny minds rule the day. Petty, tiny minds, and looming results.

A country is invaded by a giant who has no qualms about shoveling people, his and those of the 'enemy' into a never-ending assembly line of death, pain, blood, and injustices that echo through the centuries. A centimeter again. When a democratic nation is threatened, it is incumbent upon other democratic nations to be both and properly proactive and reactive and aid the embattled country. It is not enough to watch them go down to the last man and woman, to the last pulverized remnant of a life that was. It is not okay for over 10 million people to be displaced, lose their lives they had been living, to wake up overnight to a crazed, fractured world of shelling, of children's deaths and maiming, of frantic, confused elderly, a world gone mad. 

What makes the difference? Apparently, tiny minds have struck again. It is just fine to stand by and watch a country get shelled and bombed into smithereens, pay for the refugees, for how many years to come, and why? Because of that centimeter, for should a Russian boot cross the border into a NATO country, aha! Now that centimeter comes into play. Even as these nations live in oblivious foggy thinking, for think not, and know, deep inside the marrow of your bones, that a predator is predatory, always hungry, always seeking new food sources, never ever done. That centimeter of ground makes no - never mind at the end of it all. Too little too late leaves one coming from behind, a bad situation. But....tiny minds who cannot see beyond that centimeter.   Sigh ...

That tiny centimeter is as prevalent as in the tiny minds of certain American politicians - along, unfortunately, with some unthinking, non-working brains of others who cannot see the truth behind the smoke. Graham, who has broken so many rules of discourse, of loyalty, of plain decency - now states that he holds Jackson to a different standard. Say what? Huh!! What standard? That of Trump? Limbo politics - how low can you go? Epitomized by this Southern gentleman who is most manifestly not! But that is for another day, another posting. I have many centimeters to go today, hopefully all in the proper, correct, beneficial direction. I will do my best.