I read several blogs and find a number of them filled with doom and gloom ,yet each has something of value to say and share. I hope mine does, too.

I live a quiet life and I guess I may be classified as one of the sheeple the other blogers write about. Sometimes we have limited choices in life when it comes to finances, homes , jobs, location, famlilies and lots of trivia. I would like to be a "prepper," but S.S benifits limit what I can buy and accumulate in the way stocking up and/or being ready. I know Treesong does well on a limited income, but remember that old saying: "Two can live cheaper than one?" It does ring true.

I have worked for a non-profit nursing home for a long time. You don't make big bucks in a non- profit institution, but I have done OK. What aggrivates me is that I have paid into the S.S. for 40 yrs. and note that I am not getting much bang for my bucks. If I had been on welfare I would have had nearly free housing, nearly free medical care, help with heating and utilities and food stamps. However, in spite of poor health I stayed off the gove. dole and am happy that I could do so. I take pride in it.

What makes me mad is what butt-smart critics who refer to people recieving "entitements" as a strain and drain on the govenment treasury. I worked and payed into a corrupt system that has "borrowed" social security funds to shore up a govenment that never has had to budget because they have access to OUR money.

Well, things are gonna change and it will be the poor and near poor and middle class that will pay for changes that will remain the same.

Welfare should not be for people who will not work, but for people in true need. Down the street from me is govenment housing. The kids have cell phones, Ipods, roam the streets smoking and who knows what. They have cable and nice cars. Young grils that look like they should be in grade school trape up and down the center of the street with street with strollers and babies. Someone forgot to tell them not to screw around, get pregnant and live off the sytem.

My views date me. I am from a generation that is fading into oblivian, but I am like Old Glory, fading with pride and integrity. meb