OBOF SS & MORE PART CL4 - 2

WELCOME TO OPINIONS  BASED  ON FACTS (OBOF)

Name	Published
OVERVIEW	Dec. 28, 2010
SOCIAL SECURITY PART 1	Dec. 30, 2010
SOCIAL SECURITY PART 2	Jan. 10, 2011
SOCIAL SECURITY PART 3	Jan. 17, 2011
SOCIAL SECURITY PART 4	Jan. 24, 2011
SOCIAL SECURITY PART 5	Jan. 31, 2011
SOCIAL SECURITY PART 6	Feb. 07, 2011
SOCIAL SECURITY PART 7	Feb. 14, 2011
SPECIAL ISSUE	Feb. 18, 2011
SOCIAL SECURITY PART 8	Feb. 21, 2011
SOCIAL SECURITY PART 9	Mar. 01, 2011
SOCIAL SECURITY PART 10	Mar. 07, 2011
SS & MORE PART 1	Mar. 14, 2011
SS & MORE PART 1A	Mar. 21, 2011
SS & MORE PART 2	Mar. 25, 2011
SS & MORE PART 3	Mar. 29, 2011
SS & MORE PART 4	Apr. 04, 2011
SS & MORE PART 5	Apr. 11, 2011
SS & MORE PART 6	Apr. 18, 2011
SS & MORE PART 7	Apr. 25, 2011
SS & MORE PART 7A	Apr. 29, 2011
SS & MORE PART 8	May 02, 2011
SS & MORE PART 9	May 09, 2011
SS & MORE PART 10	May 16, 2011
SS & MORE PART 11	May 24, 2011
SS & MORE PART 12	Jun. 06, 2011
SS & MORE PART 13	Jun. 20, 2011
SS & MORE PART 14	July  05, 2011
SS & MORE PART 14A	July  18, 2011
SS & MORE PART 15	July  19, 2011
SS & MORE PART 16	Aug. 03, 2011
SS & MORE PART 17	Aug. 15, 2011
SS & MORE PART 18	Aug. 29, 2011
SS & MORE PART 19	Sept. 12, 2011
SS & MORE PART 20	Sept. 26, 2011
SS & MORE PART 21	Oct.   10, 2011
SS & MORE PART 22	Oct.   24, 2011
SS & MORE PART 22 EXTRA	Nov.  04, 2011
SS & MORE PART 23	Nov.  07, 2011
SS & MORE PART 24	Nov.  21, 2011
SS & MORE PART 25	Dec.  05, 2011
SS & MORE PART 26	Dec.  19, 2011
SS & MORE PART 27	JAN.  03, 2012
SS & MORE PART 27A	JAN.  05, 2012
SS & MORE PART 28	JAN.  17, 2012
SS & MORE PART 29	JAN.  31, 2012
SS & MORE PART 30	Feb.  14, 2012
SS & MORE PART CL1	Feb.  21, 2012
SS & MORE PART 30 EXTRA	Feb.  23, 2012
SS & MORE PART 31	Feb.  28, 2012
SS & MORE PART CL2 - 59	Mar.  06, 2012
SS & MORE PART 31 EXTRA	Mar.  07, 2012
SS & MORE PART 32	Mar.  13, 2012
SS & MORE PART CL3 - 1	Mar.  20, 2012
SS & MORE PART 32 EXTRA	Mar.  24, 2012
SS & MORE PART 33	Apr.  10, 2012
SS & MORE PART CL 4 - 2	Apr.  17, 2012

IN  THIS  ISSUE

1.  The Constitution - Do you know?

2.  "Contemplating Life."

3.  Ending note.  

~~~

THE  CONSTITUTION -  DO  YOU  KNOW?

 1.  Do you know how many articles there are in the Constitution?

2. Do you know how many States there were that signed the Constitution?

3.  Do you know what States had representatives to sign the Constitution?

4.  Do you know how many signers there were to the Constitution?

5.  Do you know how many Amendments there are to the Constitution?

6.  Do you know the titles of the Amendments?

ANSWERS

1.  Seven.

2.  Twelve.

3.  Virginia, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia.

4.  Thirty eight.

5.  Twenty seven.

6.  Amendment I - Freedom of religion, speech, and the press; rights of assembly and petition.

    Amendment II - Right to be arms.

    Amendment III - Housing of soldiers.

    Amendment IV - Search and Arrest Warrants.

    Amendment V - Rights in criminal cases.

    Amendment VI - Right to fair trial.

    Amendment VII - Rights in civil cases.

    Amendment VIII - Bails, fines, and punishments.

    Amendment IX - Rights retained by the people.

    Amendment X - Powers retained by the states and the people.

    Amendment XI - Lawsuits against states.

    Amendment XII - Election of the President and Vice President.

   

    Amendment XIII - Abolition of slavery.

    Amendment XIV - Civil rights.

    Amendment XV - Black suffrage.

    Amendment XVI - Income tax.

    Amendment XVII - Direct election o Senators.

    Amendment XVIII- Prohibition of liquor.

    Amendment XIX - Women's suffrage.

    Amendment XX - Terms of the President and Congress.

    Amendment XXI - Repeal of Prohibition.

    Amendment XXII - Limitation of Presidents to two terms.

    Amendment XXIII - Suffrage in the District of Columbia.

  

    Amendment XXIV - Poll taxes.

    Amendment XXV - Presidential disability and succession.

    Amendment XXVI - Suffrage for eighteen - year - olds.

    Amendment XXVII - Congressional Salaries.

~~~

"CONTEMPLATING  LIFE"

This is the third of a series of essays that I told you about sometime ago.  By way of clarification, I will open with the first paragraphs of the last CL posting, which will lead us right into this essay.  

I want to tell you about an incredible man.  He was born in the poorest of the poor.  Despite unbelievable odds in his early years, he managed to get through early school years and went on to obtain a Ph. D. in economics.  It just isn't possible to imagine the obstacles he faced and conquered to get to that point. 

He was a Professor of Economics Emeritus, Eastern Illinois University.  After retiring, he spent 11 years trying to educate the public about the great Social Security fraud by Congresses stealing $2.6 trillion from the SS Trust Fund.  He has written 7 books on both Social Security and Economics.

Also, for the past 17 years he has been writing weekly essays "Contemplating Life," that are published in five newspapers in Arizona, Florida, Tennessee, Illinois, and Virginia.  He has compiled 77 of these essays into a book and it is from these 77 that I am going to post some of the essays.   

The reason for telling you this is that the Tuesday between the Tuesdays that I post the "Opinions Based On Facts," I am going to post one of the essays from the book, "Contemplating Life." 

The man that I have been talking about is Allen W. Smith Ph. D. and I have the greatest respect and admiration for him.  I have found these essays to be very enlightening and comforting.  I hope you will also.

~~~

AN  ESSAY  FROM  THE  BOOK

"CONTEMPLATING  LIFE"

BY

 Allen W. Smith Ph.D.

“Nothing can bring you happiness but yourself.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

          We all want to be happy, but many of us have a mistaken notion about what happiness is or how to attain it.  Happiness is not wealth, fame, or fortune.  Happiness is not a possession to be prized.  It is not a problem-free life, or a certain set of circumstances.  Happiness is a state of mind, a way of thinking..

 

          Dale Carnegie, author of How to Stop Worrying and Start Living, defines happiness this way.  “It isn’t what you have, or who you are, or where you are, or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy.  It is what you think about.”  If Carnegie is right, then there is nothing anybody but yourself can do to make you happy.  Other people may be able to bring about changes in your life, either positive or negative, but nobody else can determine your thinking.  Thinking is like breathing.  We all have to do it for ourselves. 

          Thinking is a very private thing.  There is no way that any one of us can tell for sure what another person is thinking, and we certainly cannot change what they are thinking.  If they are ob­sessed with negative thoughts or thoughts of hate, we cannot change that.  Only they can change their thinking.  We can say and do things in an effort to influence the thinking of others, but we have control over only our own thinking. 

          The power that thinking has over our behavior and our mood has been recognized for centu­ries.  William Shakespeare wrote, “It is neither good nor bad, but thinking makes it so.”  Buddha said, “What we think, we become.”  And Mahatma Gandhi, the great pacifist who led India to its independence, wrote, “A man is but the product of his thoughts.  What he thinks, he becomes.”

 

          Thinking is not the sole product of the mind.  It begins with the heart where one’s feelings lie.  Once the heart has dictated the conclusion, it commands the mind to provide the reasoning that will defend that conclusion.  What passes for thinking in some people involves nothing more than simply rearranging their prejudices.  I don’t believe that such people can be happy until and unless they relinquish their prejudices and replace them with feelings of love.  Once love becomes a part of their lives, they will find that their own happiness depends on the happiness of others.

          Most of us have active minds and all sorts of thoughts come to us.  We have no control over the thoughts that enter our minds, but we do have control over the thoughts that dwell there.  Thoughts that are useful to us and others should be encouraged, but negative thoughts should be banished.  When it comes to thinking about the past, we need to frequently weed our memory gar­dens.  We should cling to those memories that make us happy.  But memories that hurt us or others should be relegated to the deepest areas of our subconscious minds.  We should try to learn from the words of Marcus Aurelius, a Roman philosopher who lived eighteen hundred years ago.  He said, “When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive—to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.”

~~~

CLOSING  THOUGHT

If the good Lord is willing and the creek don't rise, I'll talk with you again next Tuesday April 24th with an edition of OBOF. 

God bless you all

&

God bless the United States of American.

Floyd