Fact Check Before Believing

I know another political post, what can I say, I live in New Hampshire and it is in our blood.  

The above image is going around on Facebook and after a bit of research I have found it to be 100% false. Lincoln was never elected for President as a member of a third party. In 1860 Lincoln was a member of the Republican party which held a collation majority in the House.

Below they have added a vote for Lincoln is a vote for Douglas. Lincoln was the only Northern and Republican candidate running for office, while the South split their vote between three candidates: The Democrat party split into two groups, John Breckenridge (Southern Democrat), Stephen Douglas (Democratic), with John Bell being a true third party candidate (the Constitutional Union Party). The election was won by Lincoln only because the North had more electoral votes than the South and Lincoln won all the Northern States. So the added statement is even a bigger falsehood.

Now without the added notation on the bottom you could take this to mean because the South split their vote three ways they lost the election and if they hadn't wasted their vote on someone other than Stephen Douglas, the South would have won the election and we would not have gotten Lincoln. This is still false since Lincoln won enough electoral votes in the North to win the election.

Lesson is don't believe anything on Facebook, unless you spend the time to check it out. All to often something looks good so we share it and only add to the problem. Same goes for the media cause they mislead you as well and have their own agenda. It use to be the media could tell no falsehood, now it is they can say anything as long as they do not KNOW it is false. That is a big difference, they no longer feel they have the obligation to fact check themselves first.

And above all be respectful of the other candidates and especially be respectful of whom ever becomes President no matter what you think of them. We need to teach our children how to be respectful and it doesn't work if we aren't respectful to those in authority over us.

Should we only vote for a moral president?

I can't take it any longer and I must speak out.  I don't want my blog over run by politics, but I must speak out on several issues.  So here goes the first of several post on the current state of our election process and the grumbling I hear all to often.  I'll try and keep it neutral. 

I will never select my president because they love to hike, no more than I would hire my plumber, carpenter or investment broker on the fact that they have hiked the Appalachian Trail from beginning to end. Now when I am choosing among equally qualified individuals, I will than and only than use other criteria to help me narrow down the choice. If they are a fellow hiker they get bonus points. But I will not chose someone just because they share my love for hiking.

There once was a murderer and adulterer and thief whom God was very pleased with and was willing enough to endorse him and call him a man after his own heart. HIs name was King David. You may try and argue the facts, but it will remain that King David was a horrible sinner, worthy of the death sentence by the rules of his own land. Jesus also called Matthew a tax collector and hot head and liar named Peter. And Peter was going to be the head pastor of his new Church. Yikes!

I'm not saying that we should not ignore the sins of those on our list of candidates, but rather focus more on the issues at hand. If two people running for office are almost equal on the issue, that are important to you, then you can take out the morality issues to help you make a final selection. On the other hand if one candidate was perfect and had no moral faults yet wanted to pass laws that would ban anyone over the age of 45 from hiking they probably would not get my vote, but I might let them do my plumbing if they were licensed.

Dirt Sidewalks

I see it has been a while since I last posted, so I felt an update was due.  If you have been following my blog you can see that my summer was full.  At the end of summer we had to shift gears and start getting ready for school.  New school supplies and clothes had to be purchased.  The new schedule for my oldest daughter, now in middle school, has me getting up an hour earlier and it is taking me way too long to adjust to my new schedule.  I think she is doing better than me.

I'm still barefooting it as much as possible.  A little funny if you were a fly on the wall.  I walk everywhere barefoot, but when I shop locally I put on my vivobarefoot sandals to enter the store.  It really feels a little backwards.  Usually one takes off shoes when you enter your home and here I am putting something on.

I am attending church Sunday nights barefoot and the other day the Pastor's wife laughed when she saw I was barefoot.  Not a bad laugh, but more from amusement that I was still barefoot.  Perhaps, since summer is now over.  Not sure what funny bone I hit, but at least I made someone smile.

Today I walked to and from work barefoot and the temperatures were below 50ºF on the way in and 57ºF on the way home.  I'm wondering how low I can go, so it should be an interesting fall.  On the way home I had the opportunity to walk on a section of sidewalk that had been torn up.  As I walked on the dirt I never knew what my feet were going to encounter underneath the top layer of sand.  It was also interesting to  note, that most of the shoed people seemed to be avoiding the now sand sidewalk and using the street.



There is one problem.  I am still developing a blister of sorts between my big toe and its neighboring toe.  I've seen a coach and he informs me I need to learn to activate different muscles and gave me some exercises to help me work towards this goal.  Of course being 50+ I have a lot of muscles that are no longer being used like they should, so hopefully this will help me out in the future as well.  But today I think my posture might be the biggest culprit.

My coach had discussed with me that I needed to activate my glutes more, which I never realized I don't really do while walking.  How's that possible, I'm not sure.  I had started walking differently and did notice a difference, but all of a sudden the blister comes back bigger than ever.  I realized that I had stopped walking in the way my coach suggested.  Today I tried his method again and I think it will help the blister problem.