Most every person in this country seems to be having trust issues these days. Whether it’s because our media is pushing their own agenda and/or ideals on us, or that people cannot understand what is credible information and what is not. If you think you are receiving 100% accurate information or news from the mainstream or popular media, then you are ignorant because there is a lot more, and more valid, news and information out there.
You also need to understand that you are ignorant if you don’t believe the internet might have information the mainstream media doesn’t want you to have. So, enough with being ignorant people. Today’s popular media outlets are making us dumber as a society. All it takes is what I like to call “Simple Social Math.” If people are telling me things I want to hear to keep me calm or appease me, it is my right and responsibility as a free American to question everything! Let me repeat… EVERYTHING! As the great quote from the movie Anchorman stated, “Television gives you the news and information you want to hear. Not the information you need to hear.” For democracy to be successful, the people need to be told the truth or at least closer to the truth then what they are being told today. If the voters are voting based off false or slanted information, inevitably that makes them voters with zero credibility. (Can you see the Social Math?). The saddest thing is that it isn’t even the voter’s fault. The voter just listened to what their country or their representatives told them was credible information. Which in my opinion, seems like a pretty rational decision for them to make. But it is not. Now, I am not saying everyone should believe everything they read on the internet. That would be an incredibly ridiculous thing to do. Because, believe me, there is some crazy shit out there. But what I am saying is that everyone needs to become more mindful and take the time to research and understand both sides of a given topic and really wade through all the opinions and editorializing to get to the “truth.” Check out new news sources such as the BBC or The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, C-Span (actually see and hear your politicians in action on the house and senate floors), and even SNOPES. There are many Freedom of information resources out there for everyone to view, but people can’t seem to break out of their popular media bubbles. So, I challenge you to try cracking your ignorant brain and go and free yourself from these information crutches you have imprisoned your mind in. Free yourself so you can at least trust yourself in the future as a credible source and credible voter.
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You want to know the God’s honest truth people? I would have loved to have called my blog/show “Here Comes the Love,” but this nation has made the word “Love” uncool and even too uncomfortably affiliated with religion. If you start to talk about love, people think your some sort of religious fanatic. How ridiculous is that? I am serious! The mofos out there even killed Barney for Christ sakes (It was a purple dinosaur you couldn’t miss in the 90’s)!!! People felt Barney, who represented unconditional love, did not do enough to show us the negative side of life….. unbelievable..
The evil we have been fed through the popular media is giving us more anger towards another, than love for each other. Like how hard is it for people to say, “I am going to live my life and be happy, and I don’t give a flying fuck what you do with yours!! Just be happy.” For some reason, people still don’t understand that the world is not going to nuke itself. Other than North Korea’s crazy ass and a few others, this world predominantly wants to see mankind prosper and care for each other with love (or that word people are so afraid of). Some of you out there might be like “WTF!? No!? Everyone still has it out for us! Fucking Terrorists Bro…..” Hello! It’s 2017. Stop letting this constant fear mongering media make you feel like we, as Americans, are powerless! With understanding of each other, we are never and will never be powerless! You don’t think by now there is a large percentage of Americans who have cyber and/or real friends who reside in what the popular media leads us to believe are so-called “Enemy Countries?” I went to college and I met people who lived all over the world! From Communist Countries to Capitalistic Countries to 3rd World Countries and most everyone happened to be super cool people. Now I personally prefer Capitalism because “Hell Yeah America”, Nuff Said…. But it didn’t mean I was walking around to every foreign exchange student calling them “Commies.” Come on now, I might be an ex-football player, but trust me I am not that dense in the head. It was getting the opportunity to meet these people, to understand how they grew up and how that molded their beliefs. That helped me to truly realize the power of love. Love is a major ingredient in understanding that your opinions are not the only right ones. We are all victims of our own upbringing and perspective. I might not agree with what some people believe in or practice, but it doesn’t mean I must separate someone or an entire community from my life. If I don’t like seeing two men kiss, that doesn’t make me a bad guy! And it for sure doesn’t mean I have a personal vendetta against the Gay community. Shit, I got some gay homies. People are different. The more you surround yourself with people different than yourself, the more you will learn to “love” and respect the differences. If you don’t take the opportunity to see and understand a side of a story that you are completely unfamiliar with, well then you are an ignorant schmuck…. Here is an interesting article from WIkiHow on understanding and admiring cultural differences Link. Anyway….. Yeah love is now a bad word….. I guess I will have to replace the word “Love” with “Moderation and Understanding.” Whatever, “Moderation is all you need”…
Sports is for entertainment. Although I am an ex-athlete… and many of my college and pro athlete friends would say that it is more of an occupation…. It is still primarily for entertainment…. I have started to transition from the player’s mentality into the spectators’ mentality. And now as a spectator, I must say that sports could be a lot more entertaining. I am not saying that what we have now isn’t entertaining, but it isn’t worth the money the people of this country are spending on it.
I chose to play football because it was the one sport where a group of individuals no matter how individually talented they are will not succeed just based on that individual talent. It takes the full team to achieve their goals. It is for this reason that I believe the NFL is dominating other sports in the means of popularity. Big money players, although can be very effective and helpful, cannot solely win championships. In individually driven team sports like basketball and baseball, money has been proven to buy championships! Spend incredible money on one or two players and you can win. If you don’t agree with me, that is fine! In my mind, I am just reflecting my personal honesty which this country has given me the beautiful right to do so. With these individually driven sports, I feel like money is screwing passionate city fans out of hope from ever having successful dynasties. The team that doesn't have the payroll to buy the superstar can't win. But fans still hope. And that simple hope of having a successful team gets millions of dedicated fans to continuously show up to games of terrible teams! I get it, football isn’t completely innocent, but I mean, come on now! You can’t disagree with me when you see NBA teams like the Hornets, in a tunnel with zero lights at the end of it! All I am saying is that we, as the American people, are paying for the entertainment! I wish the basketball or baseball seasons were entertaining enough for me to want to watch every game not knowing who was going to end up in the Finals or World Series. Just once seeing a team like the Jazz shock the world by having a chance to beat Golden State or the Cleveland Cavaliers. How much more interesting would the Playoffs have been if it wasn't 2 teams beating everyone else by 20 or more points. I'm just saying this year was incredibly hard to watch! Okay, look, I get it... I understand. In fact, I am a Laker fan!!! Money won our Lakers team many titles!! You think I am just gonna sit here and act like that didn’t happen? I just have started thinking about the real fans of this nation. The fans who have spent billions to watch teams that are, for lack of a better term, “Hard to Freaking Watch." Those people deserve just as much happiness, or at least the chance of obtaining the same happiness as fans of the Lakers, Warriors, Celtics.... Hell, especially Lebron and his Cavaliers. Check out the information at this link to see what teams are paying for their players. NBA 2017 CAP Tracker You will definitely see the teams that are shelling out the bigger bucks are the ones ending up on top. How freaking awesome would it be if every NBA team had a real superstar or even a true chance at a title?! How incredible would it be if you had no idea who was going to take the title? I bet you the ticket sales, the excitement, and unpredictability would increase dramatically. I would possibly watch the NBA for the entire season..... who knows..... probably not....... Yeah, I’m too busy living my life. Either way, remember, the definition of moderation is to avoid excesses and extremes. Well, I think that definitely applies in sports too. But before we use competition to bounce us into a world of moderation. We need to make sure the foundation of the competition is sacred and fair. With a foundation comprised of greed instead of fairness, sports can be continuously tainted by unbalanced leagues. It's too bad no one cares to ask the people their opinions of fairness among the competition. Why can't we figure out a way to give everyone a chance to compete fairly instead of ruling it as an impossibility? Oh Boy, wouldn't the world be so much better if we didn't run from these questions? I believe it would be if that goes for anything.
First, I need everyone to understand that our government consists of a bunch of people like you and I, who worked themselves into the position of power that they hold currently. Now that being said, once they get themselves into these positions of power, they not only do what they think is best for their society, but also what is best for them and the people who helped them get to these positions. And to be honest, if we were in their shoes, we don’t know what we would do… maybe the same thing. I understand that there are good and bad people in this world, and I also understand that there may be good and bad people in our government, but in order for us to move forward as a society, we have to work together as a society. We have to work with our representatives. Not just attack them. Even if we don't like our leaders, let's not just scream at them and hope things will get better with the next representative in 4 or so years. Instead, let's try to work together and COMPROMISE! It makes me sick when I hear that politicians from the different sides won't even try to work together. As noted in the article in this link, Where Have All the Centrists Gone, some of the biggest successes in politics have come from moderation and compromise. Today that seems to be gone. Whether it is because more people have become extreme, or because only the extremists are voting, something needs to change.
In my experience, politics has been a very difficult thing to talk about and to be honest, I don’t know why. We should all have very similar goals in mind given the fact that we are the people of the free world!…. The American Basic rule #1 is that we want to be free… basic rule #2 is that We all want a chance to be the best people we can be, financially, socially, whatever.…. but I don’t believe these values are necessarily free…. If you want overall freedom, you need to work for it, and that means you need to work as hard as you can to be a success given your individual skills and capabilities. Do people forget that Americans started this country by running away from oppression. People ran to America because they believed if they worked hard, they could achieve anything…. People ran to America because they wanted the freedom to choose how to raise their families… People ran to America because they didn’t believe they needed anyone to give them happiness... they believed they could go out and get it themselves. I do understand that there are people in this country that really do need help. There are obviously people who are incapable of providing for themselves. But if you are capable, I don’t feel bad for you… And neither does the rest of the world. So if you are sitting there lying in your own pity pool while the rest of us push this country forward, I am warning you, you will be left behind. I think the best exercise that every person needs to try and do at a minimum, is to argue in the favor of the opposition. When America can fully understand where everyone is coming from, that is when we, as a country, together, can move forward. We all need to think more broadly. We all need to learn to compromise. Try it, maybe you will understand the other side better and maybe it will help you to become more moderate in your beliefs.
What’s up America, I’m Jason Franklin….. and it’s time to Excuse My Moderation. Let me first tell you who I am… I am one of those upper, middle class kids who had it all growing up. I went to private schools, public schools, took great vacations, had two parents, lived in a great neighborhood in surbubia and got pretty much everything I wanted.. Basically, I have lived an incredible life.…. And, to top if off, I played Division 1 college football. My mom was Catholic and Republican and my dad was Jewish and a Democrat. I have learned a lot about the world around me and why people are the way they are through my experiences…. Division 1 football is like a mini example of the world…. You have men of all different ethnic, financial and social backgrounds…. You really get to understand how to put differences aside to achieve a common goal. You really start to understand why people think differently then yourself. I am also a Millennial. But for some reason, unlike most of us Millennials, I have a passion for working hard and making this world a better place. Of course, I am not sure if my definition of a better place is the same as yours, but at least I’m going to give it a shot.
Like many of you, my thoughts and opinions have been influenced by the popular national media…. and recently I have started to believe that everyone in the popular media has completely lost their minds. So, I decided to create this blog based off my own moderate opinions to demonstrate to all these seemingly ignorant men and women that they are starting to sound like children who have gone completely mad. I must also address everyone in this country with the “poor me” mentality…. Get over it! Everyone knows that things are not perfect in America! Whatever you have been doing by blaming others and not taking responsibility has obviously not been working. I bet you for every person blaming others for their own misfortune, I could find many who have been in an even worse situation and found a way to get their asses out of it. Bottom-line, Americans rise out of difficult situations themselves. It’s not everyone else’s fault, it yours. You are making the choices. The more you complain and bicker at others, you start to forget how YOU can do something to better YOUR own situation. Don’t come up to me and say, “it isn’t possible!” Because real Americans find possibility in everything! Real Americans can always succeed despite the obstacles around them. Real Americans treasure freedom over everything else! And, by God, if you try to take freedom away from people?! All I can say is that you better be ready. Because Jason Franklin is here to stay and I will be exposing you poor excuses for Americans. We have become a country of extremists. Fighting each other at every turn... Only thinking about ourselves.. Killing each other... We are displaying more hate for one another than love of each other… … it is about time for a change…. It is about time for Americans to start practicing what we preach… So, Welcome to “Excuse My Moderation”! I hope America is ready for a change. Okay, so like any training or education program, we are going to start with the basics of living a life of moderation. Some of you might be asking, “What does that mean?” It means, like your mother told you… don’t smoke TOO MUCH… Don’t drink too Much…… AND Don’t emotionally invest yourselves in the opinions of others TOO MUCH…. In other words, don’t be an extremist in any direction… And overall, just Don’t be “TOO MUCH!!”
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