Politics as Usual

I’ve never been big into politics, which is something I’ve been scolded for by my elders and even my peers for most of my life. My parents have pretty much been labeled “independents” throughout their extremely weak political careers. Politics has hardly been a staple of conversation at the dinner table growing up, so perhaps that is why my interest has never been there to begin with.

I’m not sorry I don’t care too much – well, that’s the wrong way to put it. I do care about the well being of the country and the people that populate it and the policies that run it. I want to see things end up successful. But I just can’t trust the politicians of this world because from what I’ve gathered, they have not given me much to trust in.

Everyone, from the politician to the president to the cable networks has a personal agenda to make their side more appealing than the other. Instead of working together as a “united” country the politicians continue to bash one party while praising their own decisions.

For the last eight years George Bush has been classified as the devil. Some of the criticism has been warranted while some of it has been a bit over the top. Overall the guy was just a terrible speaker with the ability to convey an idea to the general audience with the smoothness and accuracy of a six year old learning the ABC’s for the first time. The general impression given by Bush was a hard one to ignore. Add to that the fact that he seemed to act on “hunches” rather than with logic reason and it’s no wonder so many people questioned the way he ran office.

Of course, the Republicans are going to hail him as perfect and the Democrats want him banished from earth to rot in the depths of hell.

And then you have Obama.

Obama is attempting to bring life back to the economy with stimulus after stimulus. The last four months the stock market has been booming – I’ve even seen a 17 percent gain on my investments. The Democrats are going wild, feeling as though the light has been shined by the messiah and life will return to normal.

The Republics hang on to the idea that Obama is bankrupting America or the fact that while the market is improving, job losses continue to pile up in record numbers.

And then the Democrats fire back insisting that the market’s collapse was brought on the Bush Administration.

Or – does anyone remember the so-called “Weapons of Mass Destruction?”
And then the Republicans will criticize Obama’s reformed healthcare plan. They will preach socialism.

And the Democrats will come back … and so forth.

It’s all a sick game of he said-she said. It’s all about greed and influence and manipulation. Nobody cares about the issues – especially the youth vote. Many of those who voted for Obama didn’t give two hoots about his policy. They simply listened to what they were told – McCain is old, Palin is stupid, and Republicans like George Bush ruined the country.

Obama was marketed as the Black Jesus – the BLACK vote was finally going to count. Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King’s contributions were even put on par with the possibility of a BLACK president taking office. It was an issue of race and culture and people listened. Obama was the popular vote. Just ask any number of celebrities that endorsed his every move. The press was full of praise. Up until his election CNN constantly brought the death toll of Iraq soldiers’ to the lime light of the program. As soon as he was elected that has since been muffled.

Coincidence?

Back when Bush was running for office in 2000 the Republicans were doing the same thing the Democrats did. They were criticizing Clinton and his NAFTA agreement. They were lambasting Al Gore and his “green thumb.” They spoke about Bush’s family values and his father’s experience, yadee, yadee, yah.

The interesting thing I’ve noticed is that once the opposite party gets elected the opposing team spends every ounce of energy destroying every decision that is made by the new administration.
Is this democracy? What exactly is America fighting for?

I don’t know the answer and I recon I won’t get the answer with Obama, Bush, or John Doe.
I’ve only come to one conclusion when it comes to politics.

Democrats got it all wrong.

Republicans got it all wrong.

The wool has been pulled over the sheep’s eyes.

We will continue to do our jobs, and ‘baaaah’ with the pride of USA.

Hooray.

The Boshoven Experience

I started working out with a personal trainer – Lynne Boshoven – at the end of the first week of July. I was referred to her by my uncle, who has been sending my cousin there since the end of June. This place doesn’t look like a gym from the outside – it’s a simple, concrete structured building with limited windows and a small parking area. But once inside your eyes are greeted to a gym built from the heavens.

There are two sections to the building. The first provides all the cable machines you could imagine as well as the machine oriented squat platforms and some treadmills for cardio work. The back of the building is built more along the lines of power lifting. There are five to six heavy manual squat racks, two normal dead lift bars and one axle bar and a rack of free weights.

A little information on Lynne … she’s one of the top power lifters in the nation, including both men and women. She’s a monster, point blank. She doesn’t’ look overly intimidating from a physical stand point, but when she gets behind a squat wrack or stands in front of a dead lift bar, you’d better be prepared to do some heavy lifting. She has 26 years experience as a personal trainer and still, in her 50’s, does her best to compete in competitions whenever possible.
The best thing about the gym is the flexibility. She’s pretty much open for service from 7am until anywhere past midnight. This is excellent because it doesn’t provide people the excuse of time when it comes to getting to the gym to work out while balancing the daily grind of life. Whether its 7am or 11pm, working out is no problem.

I’ve been working out and eating a lot of protein in hopes to gain some weight and muscle. I’m ball parking for July 8th, 2010 as the big day of results. I’ve learned more in 3 ½ weeks than I ever thought imaginable. The price, $30 a week for unlimited usage is something that you will be hard pressed to beat.

Just look around if you need proof. I wouldn’t lie to ya.

The workouts consist of the three main core muscle groups: legs, back, chest, with some variation on other types of exercises as the weeks go by. Regardless of what you do, you’ll never leave feeling as though you didn’t put a good 2 hours of work.

All the business is pretty much word of mouth, as she hasn’t been a public gym in decades. I think that works out best. The people there have more of a community feel to them, rather than a bunch of big jug heads romping around on the mat looking for a head to smash. So far in the little time I’ve been there I’ve seen some pretty impressive results. The first week there (and no experience, mind you) I dead lifted 185lbs, which is pretty pathetic, even for me. The second week I dead lifted 250lbs at 3 reps. I’m not sure about my squat weight, but I do know that within 2 weeks I had gained 50lbs of strength.

Hopefully as the results pour in I will try to get some pictures up to show my advancement.
Take it easy.