I was a part of a scout troop as a young fellow. The Boy Scouts of America program is designed to teach young minds and train them to be good citizens, work hard, set and achieve goals, and in outdoor skills. Outdoor skills include things like "no trace camping", orienteering so you dont have to depend on a GPS and general respect for all life. Scouts are not the ones carving initials into tree trunks or leaving wrappers behind, rather they are the ones removing others garbage and leaving places better for those who follow. I learned so much about life and myself while a scout. I started to take responsibility for my own actions instead of taking the easier way out of a situation. I also learned that achieving the goals I set for myself helped improve my self image and serving others made my self esteem jump another notch. I worked hard and earned the Eagle Scout rank. Something that means a lot to me, more now than at the time. 

As an adult I have volunteered my time to give back to the organization that helped me. I have been a Scout Master and also as a Unit Comissioner. I have seen how the organization runs and is supposed to run. I must say that if more young people were scouts there would be less waste of natural resources, more care for the outdoors, more involvement in politics and more kind deeds done. 

One of the merit badges I earned was the required Citizenship in the Nation. I wrote a letter to one of my state's two senators. I also had to talk to merit badge counselor about the way our government works and the history of our nation. The merit badge counselor I went to see liked to study history, especially the history of the revolutionary war. We talked for a long time, he even showed me a flint lock, long rifle that had been used by one of his ancestors during the war. We talked about our consititution and what it means. This was a short experience for me and I learned some things. 

Last week, I had the oportunity to attend a speech by this same old merit badge counselor. He talked about the Articles of Confederation and how it led to our Constitution. The Articles of Confederation was our first attempt at self governance. Many of those who helped to write it feared a strong federal government with a potential heavy hand. They had experienced with the British parlimentary system and King George the burdensome and sometimes outlandish laws. They realized that sometimes the government can be so far removed from the people that it becomes simply a burden. So the articles were drafter and we formed a union. It was rather more like an agreement to be nice to each among the 13 former colonies. There was trouble with the monertary system and trade as well as putting forth a cohesive foreign policy. With the Articles of Confederation, as a nation, we learned that there must be some strength in the government. So in order to keep that power from getting out of control systems were developed that checks and balances out the powers of the federal government. That is why our Constitution starts out "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, ensure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

The first check the writers of our constitution put into place was that the idea of sovereignty. The constitution clearly states that all rights of governing belong to the people, not to the government. They then state that unless a power is specifically written in the constitution it can not belong to the federal government, it belongs to the people or to individual states. Note that our Constitution starts with the phrase "We the people..." not "We the government...." or some other statement of power. 

In the history of the world, this is a idea of the power of goverment coming from the people is singularly unique. The rights of government belong to the people. We cede some of that right to the government so that there can be peace and order. We hold the power not some body of beauracrats, WE.

I have a lot of respect for our law enforcement officers. They deal with people day in and out. This is hard enough even when dealing with good, law-abiding people. Instead, officers deal, in large, with the dregs of society, those who choose to flout the law. They are under paid and over worked. I can understand how difficult a job they have. I try my best to comply with the law and also to assist police officers to the best I can.

Today I felt embarrassed by the behavior of others. It was mid afternoon and I was driving on a mildy-busy, wide avenue. A police officer, with lights flashing and siren blaring, quickly approached me from behind. I pulled off of the road to the right to allow the officer to pass. I was aghast when other drivers did not. They kept going along their merry way. The officer was stuck behind traffic as either people did not see the lights, hear the siren or simply wanted to ignore it. Why did they make such a choice? Selfish reasons? or maye ignorance? 

I was on a flight the other day. As I boarded I followed an older gentleman who was being helped on board by the stewardess. I watched as she stowed his cane in the over head bin. I then took my seat next to him.

The conversation began as another passenger boarded, blabbing loudly on her phone. The two of us and the stewardess were very annoyed with impolite cellphone users. I asked the stewardess about people refusing to stop talking on phones when the cabin door closes. She admitted that it was often a problem. She then stopped her end of the conversation to give the obligatory, unwatched safety instructions. As she finished, she asked everyone to turn off all electronic devices. I thought I had done so but just then my cell phone rang. I silenced it and promptly turned it off. I admitted that while cellphones were practical, they are often simply annoying. I also admitted that I had not, until very recently, gotten my own phone. I had resisted the pull of peer and non-peer pressure so long that it had nice to be one of the few without a phone. However, it had become necessary for me, so I now have a phone. I confessed to often being considered "old school" and "cell-phone illiterate".

We laughed and kept discussing other issues.It turns out that this gentleman is 91 years old. He had been fishing with his son and was returning home to southern California. I was intrigued and asked what he had done for a living. He had built rockets for a now non-existant company. He talked about how there were so many rules and regulations to follow. He shared with me that he had need to do a test fire of a rocket but that the facility the company had was so close to housing that it was not allowed. This test needed done so he talked with someone he knew and arranged the whole thing, including putting all the electronic gear into a rented RV. He said in less than 10 days he had the whole thing organized, ready and tested. He and I were both of the opinion that this could not be pulled off today. I understand that there is a need to protect people, houses and the natural world around us. However, the current amount of red tape hinders new ideas and stifles innovation. There has to be a better way to protect the things we deem important. 

We talked about many things even about the current mortgage crisis. He of experiences he had some years ago about some of his friends that had bought homes around LA and then the value of those homes went way up. They took out second mortgages and treated their homes as ATM machines: buying, without second thought, many of life's pleasures. As time came to repay approached, some were not able to afford all the debt they had assumed and were forced to sell everything. There had been not such thing as a government bail-out or of judges reworking contracts, etc. These people lived, failed, hopefully learned and tried to make the best of it by starting over. 

I rather enjoyed his point of view on many things and I wish that many young people today would take the time to really look at things from the point of view of the older generation. We all could learn a lot by talking with those older than ourselves and hearing of their experiences.