Who Isn't or Isn't a Well Paid "Herlo?:

America’s two biggest groups of scammers have got to be police officers and firefighters, whose union reps routinely tell Americans that their members put their lives on the line every day simply by slipping into their uniforms. They really use that terminology as they lobby for "donning and doffing" rules that give them extra pay for the time they spend slipping into their government-supplied garments.

But the latest data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics once again show that these groups of government employees work in relatively safe professions, with firefighters having a lower death rate than the average American worker and barely edging out cashiers in terms of putting their lives on the line. Most cashiers are killed on the job because of homicides, whereas a quarter of firefighter deaths are from truck accidents – and the numbers have declined, apparently, after concerted efforts to convince these heroes to buckle their seatbelts.

Fishermen, loggers, pilots and farmers/ranchers have the most dangerous jobs in America. Police officers and sheriffs fall below farmers, but above construction workers. About half of their deaths are because of car accidents, often the fault of their own driving habits.

This list looks at the data over a longer period and reinforces the same point. None of the top 10 dangerous jobs are in the government "public safety" area and only one category (trash collectors) is dominated by government employees.

I’ve known people who work in a number of the most-dangerous professions – taxi drivers, truck drivers, trash collectors, electrical line workers, loggers, fishermen, pilots, roofers, coal miners, farmers – and I cannot ever recall any of them insisting to me personally or publicly that they are "heroes" who "put their lives on the line."

 Once in a while, I’ll hear a farmer insist that it’s thanks to his kind that we have food on our table, but even that’s a rarity and it's usually part of a political campaign to keep the environmental crazies from restricting his water or property use.

I can’t recall ever telling people that, by writing this article, I am a hero of the First Amendment. As annoying as my profession may be, I don’t know any journalists who would argue such an absurdity.
By contrast, police officers and paid government firefighters – as opposed to the largely noble group of volunteers, who provide this service to the public for free, despite the harassment they receive from firefighter unions who try to put them out of business – always insist that they are heroes. 

They do so in their public pronouncements and especially during union negotiations. They love to have press conferences and hand out heroism awards to fellow union members. They often tell me that it's thanks to them that I am safe to enjoy my life.

During negotiations, firefighters and police routinely invoke the memory of 9/11 for their own personal gain. I remember when Laguna Beach, Calif., firefighters – who have a cushy gig on the Southern California coast – plastered photos of 9/11 all over a fire truck as they lobbied for higher pay during their dispute with the city manager.

In the California Legislature this year, Democratic leaders quietly pushed ahead legislation that would have declared that any retired cop or firefighter, no matter how old, would be presumed to have died of a work-related injury if he or she died from some common ailments such as blood disorders, heart disease or cancer. The purpose was to give huge payouts to their survivors. The bill was softened then vetoed, but it shows the lengths to which the unions will go to play the hero card for self enrichment.

A few years ago, I wrote about a bill that would have exempted firefighters from criminal negligence for on-the-job behavior. It, too, died, but there’s no special protection that these heroes won’t seek. Police unions lobby to assure that even the most abusive among them don’t have to suffer any penalties, even in instances where they shoot unarmed members of the public in the back.

Heroes are people who display great courage and selflessness to protect others. Here, we see people who are extremely well paid for services that entail only modest risk, and then rig the legal system so there is no accountability if they misbehave. They increasingly follow bureaucratic rules designed to protect "officer safety," assuring in essence that they are forced to endure virtually zero risk during their work day. Is that heroism?

In 2011, Alameda, Calif., firefighters stood around and let a man drown to death. They said they couldn’t go into the 60-degree San Francisco Bay water because they didn’t have the proper cold-water training.

 Many believe they were selfishly withholding "services" as a way to make a point about proposed budget cutbacks. When asked by a local TV station whether he would go into the water and save a drowning child, division chief Ricci Zombeck said:

 "Well, if I was off duty I would know what I would do, but I think you’re asking me my on-duty response and I would have to stay within our policies and procedures because that’s what’s required by our department to do." 

Is this the answer of a hero or a bureaucrat? My first LewRockwell article was about a similar event in Philadelphia, where police and firefighters stood around eating and joking as a suicidal man jumped into the water. Despite the assembled minions of well-paid uniformed government workers, it took some unpaid bystanders to risk their lives and try to save the jumper.

Unfortunately, the public seems to buy this nonsense. When I was on the Stossel show discussing such issues, a California union spokesman, Dave Low, argued that cops and firefighters receive big pensions because they die soon after retirement. But fortunately I had already done the research. 

According to the union-controlled California Public Employees Retirement System, police are the longest-living public employee category followed closely by firefighters. They live well into their 80s, enjoying those millionaires’ pensions that their unions have secured for them.

Enough is enough. Police and firefighters work in professions that are not particularly dangerous and they live longer lives than most people. Most of this work can be replaced by the private sector. There are no categories of hero. Individuals in all professions and all walks of life engage in heroic acts. The truth will set us free – and might just lighten our tax burden also.

18 Things You Can Do Now To Be More Positive, Kind & Loving

We live in denial of our inherent negativity for the most part, and often wonder why the world around is so mean and reckless. Unlike dogs we may not be born eternal optimists, but positivity is something that can be imbibed even if a tad forcibly; such as by trying to tweak our sense of humour, the way we react to a given situation, by being more pleasant and believing others too have a mind, and by smiling each time somebody says ‘thank you’.

 While positivity is a state of mind, the answer lies in our perspective. Here are 18 things you can do right now to becoming a more loving and positive person.

It’s one thing to wax eloquent on positivity, but quite another to be a positive person at heart. Despite believing to have a positive outlook, we invariably weigh the cons first. What’s more, we prefer needless sarcasm for humour, manage a wry smile when something is genuinely funny, and believe deep down that the glass is actually half empty.

18 Things To You Can Do To Change Your Outlook:

1. Have the desire: To become a positive person one must have a strong desire to be positive. And the desire will come only if you are convinced that becoming a positive person will enhance the quality of life. Positivity is like an aura, and you know you are a positive person when people start trusting you, random people become polite with you, colleagues at work respect your positive outlook and you start building rapport easily.

2. Believe in all possibilities: About what you can or cannot do. About what is possible or impossible. Don’t allow your limiting beliefs to keep you stuck in the wrong place. Spread your wings and fly! Once you realize all is possible, the doors of limitation that were closed in your mind will open be connected to all those aspects of consciousness.

3. Be realistic: Do not try to become a saint. Becoming a positive person does not mean you can never have any negative emotion or encounter any negative situation. It is the overall attitude that matters and your reaction to every experience. Don’t get bogged down by failure, and disappointed when your expectations are not met. Understand that everything is of service to you. All experiences are neutral and our perception is what creates our positive or negative outlook.

4. Experience empowerment rather than criticism: Give up your constant need to complain and criticize about those things — people, situations, events that make you unhappy, sad and depressed. Nobody can make you unhappy, no situation can make you sad or miserable unless you allow it to. When you criticize, you are passing self-judgement for something lacking in your life that you refuse to let go of. Never underestimate the power of positive thinking. For every opportunity you feel the inclination to criticize, try to think about how that specific situation is serving or benefiting others.

5. Experiment: Be a keen observer. Use everyday life incidents to see how you can manage them in a more positive manner. These will serve as perfect instances to turn your outlook more positive. For starters, contemplate how you could have better handled a situation by being less hostile and more indulgent. Come up with five ways that could have saved the day, and learn to take things at face value sometimes. Remember, your ability to trust the other person also reflects your genuineness.

6. Accept responsibility: Guilt is a trick of the mind. Accept responsibility for yourself, your life and your actions. You are response-able. You are an adult. You are account-able, meaning, with every action you take, you account for it. You chose to do it; you must accept the consequences of it and you did it all for a reason…to learn. If you continue to feel guilty, you stop learning.

7. Speech and body language: Try and make positive words a part of your daily lingo, and work on your body language in way that you come across as friendly and approachable. Look amused when something is amusing, laugh when something is funny, congratulate when credit is due, and give others a chance to narrate their side of the story. Never think you are the only interesting, knowing one around.

8. Be yourself: You are unique. Enjoy your uniqueness. Nobody in the world is just like you. Stop trying so hard to be something that you’re not just to make others like you. The moment you take off all your masks, the moment you accept and embrace the real you, you will find people will be drawn to you, effortlessly.

9. Company: One way to becoming positive is to seek positive company as both positivity and negativity are infectious. If the people you spend most of your time with are grumpy or have a pessimistic standpoint, you’ll find yourself inadvertently mirroring the same emotions with others. In order to inculcate positivity it is imperative that your friend circle is a positive, energetic, and a happy bunch. You’ll find yourself carrying the same positivity everywhere you go.


10. Think here and now: The past and future often set us on a path of emotional turmoil. We often assume the past looked so much better than the present and the future looks so frightening, but you have to take into consideration the fact that the present moment is all you have and all you will ever have. The past you are now longing for — the past that you are now dreaming about — was ignored by you when it was present. Stop deluding yourself. Be present in everything you do and enjoy life. After all life is a journey not a destination. Have a clear vision for the future, prepare yourself, but always be present in the now.

11. Activities: Do not remain idle and brood. Take up positive activities with others or in isolation. Share a joke, narrate a pleasant incident, take part in sporting activities, go for a run in the evening after work, have healthy sex, and you’ll find yourself bubbling with positive energy.

12. Take it easy: Everyday life is bound to give you shocks. Be prepared to minimise impact and shrug it off. For instance, you may get too hassled everyday while driving to work or trying to park your car. When you accept the fact that certain things cannot be changed, you’ll be more at ease with yourself and those around too.

13. Drop your expectations: Let go of any expectations of yourself that will limit your growth. If you hold high expectations for how others should behave, you will often be disappointed if they do not represent themselves in the manner you expected. It is only your expectations of people that cause you to judge them which ultimately is a judgement of yourself. Far too many people are living a life that is not theirs to live. They live their lives according to what others think is best for them, they live their lives according to what their parents think is best for them, to what their friends, their enemies and their teachers, their government and the media think is best for them. They ignore their inner voice, that inner calling. They often forget what makes them happy, what they want, what they need. You have one life — this one right now — you must live it, own it, and especially don’t let other people’s opinions distract you from your path.
14. Maintain a diary: Instead of recounting all events of the day, filter out only the positive ones and make a note of them. It could be anything trivial from your bus arriving on time, your mom cooking a delicious breakfast, to remembering to pay the bills on time. When we look for positivity in the little things that make our lives worthwhile, we leave no room for negativity. Try consciously practising this for 10 days, and at the end of day ten when you read your diary back you’ll only have memories of all the good things that happened to you.

15. Meditate: Not only does it secrete happy hormones but also creates a sense of awareness within you. You will learn to control your breathing, and by way of it, control your mind from wandering. Every time you meditate, you feel a surge of positive energy through your body that calms your nerves, soothes your mind, elevates your mood, and not to mention enhances your level of tolerance.

16. Embrace change: Change is good. Change will help you move from A to B. Change will help you make improvements in your life and also the lives of those around you. Follow your bliss, embrace change — don’t resist it.

17. Re-invent your need to be right: There are so many of us who can’t stand the idea of being wrong — wanting to always be right — even at the risk of ending great relationships or causing a great deal of stress and pain, for us and for others. We love to right-fight. It’s just not worth it because the state of being right is all subjective with so many layers and perspectives of truth. Whenever you feel the ‘urgent’ need to jump into a fight over who is right and who is wrong, ask yourself this question:“Would I rather be right, or would I rather be kind?” ~ Wayne Dyer.

18. Say ‘thank you’: Thank god, thank your parents, friends, and thank yourself for all the hard work you did, for everything you achieved. Saying thank you frequently makes you humble, and a humble person is seldom cynical.

Cesar Tells Of Pongo Fund, A Food Bank For Pets

When Larry Chusid discovered in 2009 that no resource existed to provide dog and cat food to Portland, Oregon area pet owners in need, he made it his mission to become that resource.
The Pongo Fund, named after Chusid’s late four-legged best friend who thrived on homemade food, exists to distribute healthy, high-quality diets to anyone with hungry pets. To date, the nonprofit organization has provided more than 3,731,013 healthy meals to dogs and cats in need.

“A healthy pet leads to a healthy family,” says Chusid, The Pongo Fund’s executive director. “Our belief is that if the family cannot afford pet food, they’re facing a lot of struggles, and giving them low-quality food is only going to exacerbate the situation. Let’s make sure that we take care of the soul of the family: the animal.”

Caring for a Community

Though traditional food-bank networks throughout the Pacific Northwest provide food to people in need, they only focused on the two-legged family members, Chusid says. “I wanted to make sure hungry animals had access to great food, but I was shocked to learn there was no resource. I just thought, this can’t continue.”

So he used his own resources to purchase high-quality pet food and began giving it out twice a day, every day, to families with pets living under bridges or on the streets. He was making a difference, but he felt it wasn’t enough. He wanted to reach everyone in need – including those behind four walls.

“The people who are living outdoors with pets were the easiest people to access because they were out there,” he said. “But what about all the people who are living behind four walls? Suffering in silence?”

Three years ago, Chusid began to formulate a plan — a plan that came to fruition thanks to a chance encounter with Canidae Pet Food CEO Scott Whipple. When Chusid shared his vision, Whipple wanted to help.

“I told him that I wanted to open a pet food bank that would exceed the expectations that anyone ever had when it came to opening any food bank,” Chusid recalls. “I wanted to reach out and care for a community that was in such dire need, that could not afford to feed their pets. But I wanted to do it in a way that was filled with courtesy and dignity, something beyond what anyone even imagined possible.

When Chusid said he needed $125,000 worth of food, Whipple didn’t even blink.
“[Whipple] said, ‘You can count on that donation. When do you want it?’ I couldn’t believe it,” Chusid says. “Canidae has allowed The Pongo Fund to develop an organization with a mission statement of providing quality pet food for the family pets of anyone in honest need.”

In 2010, after just one year in operation, The Pongo Fund had served more than 1 million meals — all made possible by Canidae, pet food maker Dogswell, and the countless volunteers who distribute the food every month.

“When we opened our doors on November 8, 2009, we had forty people that came that day and received literally life-saving respite in terms of the food for who they consider to be the most valuable members of their family: their pets,” Chusid said. “One year later, November 14, 2010, we celebrated our one-year anniversary. On that day, we gave out our one millionth meal. Instead of forty people in line, there were now almost two hundred.”

Since then, The Pongo Fund has provided nearly four million meals to hungry pets. “And we have also facilitated some thousand spay/neuter surgeries, a strategic formula working in unison to reduce overcrowded shelter populations,” Chusid says.

Reaching Beyond Portland

The Pongo Fund not only gives out free Canidae and Dogswell meals twice a month via its distribution center, but it also disperses food throughout Oregon and southwest Washington via allied nonprofits.

“We built this mission into a fully operational endeavor that does not only open the door and give food to the public,” Chusid said. “We have developed, integrated and managed a pet food distribution network that now supplies pet food to more than fifty different nonprofit organizations throughout Oregon and southwest Washington. That is, as far as I can tell, the largest pet food distribution network in America.”

During the month of September, The Pongo Fund will be closing its doors for the first time — but only for six weeks. Plagued with roof leaks in its existing facility, the organization has been forced to relocate to a new space in Southeast Portland.  In anticipation of the move, the group made sure its distribution network was fully stocked, Chusid says.

“The Pongo Fund has donated an extra 50,000 pounds of kibble to many of our community partners, including Snowcap Charities, Salvation Army, Neighborhood House, Potluck in the Park and Clackamas Service Center,” he says. “We also donated food to establish pet food pantries at West Columbia Gorge Humane Society and Multnomah County Animal Services. These extra food supplies will provide struggling families with increased options during this brief service interruption.”

Unfortunately, this also means The Pongo Fund’s depleted pantry will need to be restocked. Chusid says he welcomes donations from concerned supporters. “Because The Pongo Fund purchases pet food at huge discounts, monetary donations go the farthest to help feed hungry animals around the state,” he says.

“If we can continue building on what we’ve done, I remain optimistic that we can make a bigger difference than we already have,” Chusid says.

50,000 Honey Bee Relocation

On July 7 a photojournalist discovered approximately 50,000 bees living in the walls of his Los Angeles home, and he wasn’t even scared.

Spending little time at home because of work, Larry Chen, 27, initially didn’t notice the bees. According to the hired beekeeper, the hive was an estimated six to eights months old.

However, one month ago, Chen began noticing bees buzzing in and out of his window, and he decided to investigate. According to Chen, the bees only came out during a 30-minute window in the day.

“I’m not really terrified of the bees… I just remained calm, and I figured they wouldn’t bother me too much… I got stung once, but I was more curious about how big the hive actually was. I figured it was just a small clump of 1,000 or so,” Chen said.

After his initial investigation, he spent a month on the road, traveling for work. When he returned, Chen found time to call a professional to assess the situation. He explained that he recently saw a documentary about the endangerment of bees, so he wanted to save—not exterminate—them.

He found a man on Craigslist, who goes by the name Mike Bee, who would safely remove the bees. He is a member of the rescue organization Backwards Beekeepers, a group that works with HoneyLove.org in order to educate the public about bees.

“My policy is to relocate, not exterminate,” the beekeeper explained.

It took Mike Bee and his wife five hours to remove the bees from the wall. While Chen was not stung during the removal process, Mike Bee was stung four times.

The bees entered through a ventilation pipe that airs out the attic and an area near a window, according to Mike Bee. Although the pipes were lined with a wire mesh, the squares were big enough for bees to fit through. Since the area was a dark, protective shelter and featured a convenient entry point, the space was very accommodating to a beehive.

First, the beekeeper located the bees and cut the drywall. Then he burned pine needles, creating a smoke that would calm the bees. Afterwards, he began vacuuming the bees in a custom-made device, so that the comb could be visible. Subsequently, he removed the queen and cut out the comb, placing it in a box with the bees.

After removing the bees, he scraped off any remnants of wax from the honeycombs and cleaned the area of the hive. He then stapled screening mesh over the ventilated pipes in order to deter a new swarm from finding the same spot.

The bees filled two boxes that fit 20,000 bees each, but there were still many strays. The beekeeper explained that the bees would be returned to the city after he completes a process called an orientation flight.

“It’s good we caught it at this time because it could have been a lot bigger,” Chen said.

Thanks To Venezuela's Generosity Millions Of Americans Will Receive Heating Fuel

Many poor Americans in colder climes will doubtless be dismayed to hear that shortly after ringing in the New Year, Congress and the president have decided to cut 25% from the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, (LIHEAP) showing once again their preference to default on the needy and vulnerable rather than asking the most powerful and wealthy to make even the smallest sacrifices.

Far more welcome news came from Citgo Petroleum Corporation, a subsidiary of Venezuela’s state-owned oil company, which announced that it would be continuing its six-year-old program of providing heating oil to poor Americans free of charge. The contrast between the values displayed by the American and Venezuelan governments – the “good guys” and “bad guys,” respectively, of the American political consensus – could not be more striking.

$1.2 billion will be cut from LIHEAP, reducing its budget to $3.47 billion. Thankfully the initial requests of the Obama administration to cut the program’s funding to $2.5 billion were not carried out. In 2011, 8.3 million people were helped by LIHEAP, although there were more people eligible than the program was able to assist. According to the National Energy Assistance Director’s Association (NEADA) 90% of families participating in the program contain at least one “vulnerable” member, defined as the elderly, children, and the disabled.

The cuts come at a time when the cost of heating oil has reached $3.93 a gallon, up 57 cents from last year. This is a 22-year high, according to the Energy Information Administration. The escalating price of heat is especially threatening to people living on a fixed income, including the retired.

Citgo expects to help more than 400,000 Americans this year with a 100-gallon donation of heating oil and said that in addition to providing assistance to private citizens, Citgo would also provide assistance to 250 homeless shelters.

Venezuela’s generosity towards its northern neighbor began in 2005, after Hurricane Katrina had ravaged the Gulf Coast, when Citgo donated $1 million to disaster relief and President Hugo Chavez offered to send food, water, fuel, and other humanitarian assistance. Chavez was not taken up on his offer by the U.S. administration.

That same year, in response to a call by 12 U.S. Senators for oil companies and oil producing nations to donate heating oil to help ease the pain of high prices caused by hurricanes Katrina and Rita, Venezuela rose to the occasion once again. Despite criticism from the American government, the program has continued each winter since.

Heating oil is not the only humanitarian assistance promoted by the Chavez government. Over the last decade, Venezuelan doctors, many of them trained in Cuba, have provided free medical care, including surgeries all around Latin America. In New York's South Bronx, Citgo has donated millions to support community building organizations, including natural food co-ops, environmentally sound recyling programs, and youth groups.

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