Jay Ross's Blog, page 12

Ten Things You Should Know About ISIS

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
-Edmund Burke

The Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is an al Qaeda offshoot with about 35,000 folks who now control tens of thousands of square miles and who want to create an Islamic state there and everywhere else, if possible.  They are a group of thugs and terrorists who have murdered lots of people publicly and grotesquely, like thugs and terrorists have done repeatedly throughout history.  They are the most well-funded terrorist organization in history and their slick social media posts and YouTube videos have gotten them thousands of recruits from around the globe.  But here are some things worth noting:

1.       They ignore international borders and rule by Sharia Law.

2.       They are led by a man who was released from one of my detention camps five years ago (where he said, “I’ll see you guys in New York.”)

3.       The UN reports that ISIS has forced as many as 1,500 Yazidis and Christians into sex slavery.

4.       ISIS split from al Qaeda in February because al Qaeda wasn’t brutal enough.

5.       ISIS made a couple billion stealing oil and over $430 million robbing banks.

6.       It is estimated that they have brainwashed thousands of Westerners and over 100 Americans have joined ISIS. Many of them have come home and are being watched by the FBI...

7.       ISIS has called on members to kill all Western disbelievers.  Even civilians.

8.       Unlike other armed conflicts, I am not in this alone.  ISIS is so backwards, even Russia is thinking of helping the coalition.

9.       I started air strikes against them on September 23rd…but I’m not at war with them.

10.   I am spending between $7 and $10 million per day to fight these guys.  And I need more.  (For comparative purposes, it costs a little over $2 mil per year for every troop I have in Afghanistan.)

Do I know what the answer to this is?  Of course not.  But I do know that you have to recognize evil, stop it, and love everybody.  Sometimes it’s just awfully hard to do all three of these at the same time…

Comments or questions?  Contact me at DiaryOfAmerica@gmail.com.

Ten Interesting Things About Apples and Johnny Appleseed

"An apple a day keeps the doctor away."

Happy Johnny Appleseed birthday!  I know.  Kind of a random topic for ten interesting facts, but what can I say?  I love me some apples.

1.       The first apple trees were in Central Asia and China grows the most of ‘em.  (I’m number two.)

2.       My first apple trees were planted by Pilgrims in 1620.  (The only apple native to North America is the crab apple!)

3.       There are about 7,500 different kinds of apples, and I grow more than 2,500 of ‘em.  

4.       Apples are grown in all 50 states and commercially grown in 36 of ‘em.  (My top five are 1.  Washington, 2.  New York, 3.  Michigan, 4.  Pennsylvania, 5. California.)

5.        My five most popular apples are:  1. Red Delicious, 2. Gala, 3. Golden Delicious, 4. Granny Smith, and 5. Fuji.

6.       Apples are harvested in late summer and early fall, but we can get ‘em all year at grocery stores because they can be kept fresh for 12 months in Controlled Atmosphere Storage (which regulates the temperature and oxygen and stuff).

7.       The average person eats 65 apples per year (almost 16 pounds of 'em).  They are my second most popular fruit behind bananas.

8.       Johnny Appleseed (aka John Chapman) was an orchardist and nurseryman who did not just randomly plant apple trees.  He planted them and then came back years later and sold the orchards.  (Interestingly, most of the apples he planted couldn’t be eaten but were made into hard cider.)

9.       Johnny traveled alone and barefoot for 50 years—mainly in the Midwest--and carried a Bible with him every place he went.   He was a friend to kids, a news bringer to adults, an ally to Indians and animals, and a preacher to everyone.  (He died of pneumonia at age 71,)

10.   Johnny planted over 100,000 square miles of apple orchards in Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.  Mmm…one hundred thousand square miles…

Questions or comments?  Contact me at DiaryOfAmerica@gmail.com.  Thanks.

Ten Things You Should Know About Child Abuse in America

“It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.”
-Frederick Douglass

 
 It’s not a pretty topic, but with it dominating the news and sports radio this past week, let’s talk about ten things you should know about child abuse.


1.        There are four types of child abuse:  physical abuse, neglect, sexual abuse, and emotional maltreatment.

2.       About five American kids die per day because of abuse or neglect.  That’s about 1,600 per year.  (70% are younger than 3.)

3.       About 3.5 million cases of child abuse are report every year.  That’s about one every ten seconds.  And 2 out of 3 incidents go unreported!

4.       Nearly 80% of child abuse cases are neglect.

5.       Nearly half of reported victims are girls and half are boys.  But 44% are White, 22% are Hispanic, 21% are African-American, and less than 1% are Asian.

6.       I am ranked 26th out of 29 developed countries based on measures of child welfare and 25th out 27 based on rate of child deaths because of abuse or neglect.

7.       Victims of child abuse are 11 times more likely to engage in criminal behavior…and I spend 17.3 times more per prisoner as I do public school student.

8.       Substance abuse is a contributing factor in up to two-thirds of maltreated kids, and the rate of abuse in single parent households is nearly twice that of two parent households.

9.       Child abuse has become big business…especially for the government, which was already spending over $100 billion a year on it way back in 2007.

10.   There are ten easy things that we all can do to stop child abuse, and almost all of them are free.

 

Questions or comments?  Contact me at DiaryOfAmerica.org.  Thanks!

Ten Interesting Things About My Constitution

“Don't interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties.”
-Abraham Lincoln (born 22 years after it was written)


Happy Constitution Day!  In the summer of 1887, the Constitutional Convention secretly met for over 100 days at the Pennsylvania State House.  They met and debated from 10 to 3, six days a week!  Originally meeting to strengthen my Articles of Confederation, the new 4,400 word Constitution that they ultimately created—the oldest and shortest of any major country—set the gold standard for the rest of the world.  Check it out.

1.      The fifty-five delegates represented a large number of professions—physicians, ministers, merchants, teachers.  But 34 of them were lawyers.  And half of them fought in the Revolutionary War.

2.      The median age of my citizenry in 1887 was 16.  The median age of the 55 delegates was 42.  (The oldest of the 39 signers was 81 year-old Ben Franklin.  The youngest was 26 year-old Jonathan Dayton.) 

3.      Rhode Island didn’t attend at all because they were afraid of a strong national government.  (Ultimately, they were the last state to ratify my Constitution…three years later.)

4.      My Constitution is littered with misspelled words.

5.      Thomas Jefferson was in France and didn’t sign.  John Adams was in England and didn’t sign.  (And dudes like Samuel Adams, John Hancock, and Patrick Henry refused to attend.)  James Madison (“the father of the Constitution”) and George Washington (the president of the convention) were my only two presidents to sign.

6.      The word “democracy” is never mentioned in the Constitution.  I'm a republic.

7.      More than 11,000 amendments have been proposed (including getting rid of the Senate in 1876, getting rid of the Army in 1893, and making divorce illegal in 1914).  Thirty-three have gone to the states.  And only 27 have been approved and added to the Constitution.  (The most recent was in 1992.)

8.      Thomas Jefferson thought my constitution should be rewritten every nineteen years so that each generation could live by their own rules.

9.      At one point, my Constitution served as the basis for nearly 95% all other country’s constitutions and in many ways has been my “most important export.”

10.  Most dissent against my Constitution was because it lacked a Bill of Rights at first, and three guys refused to sign.

According to a Digital History survey, barely half of all Americans even know what my Constitution is for, and a full 70% don’t know it’s the supreme law of the land.  How much do YOU know? 

This Constitution Day, take a minute to brush up on this brilliant document and be thankful for a great 227 years!  I need as many informed citizens as I can get!

Questions or comments?  Please contact me at DiaryOfAmerica@gmail.com.

Ten Things To Remember About 9-11

“What separates us from the animals, what separates us from the chaos, is our ability to mourn people we’ve never met.” - David Levithan

On September 11, 2001, 19 al Qaeda terrorists hijacked four of my planes as part of their plan to “create a global order under Islamic authority.”  They crashed two of them into the World Trade Center in Manhattan, one of them into the Pentagon, and one of them into an empty Pennsylvania field (after the passengers and crew of that flight fought back).  It was the worst terrorist attack in my history, killing 2,977 people (from 115 different nations).  To fully grasp what happened, here’s a few numbers worth remembering…

1.    There were 3,051 children who lost a parent on 9/11, and 17 more would later be born to widows.

2.    There were 343 NYC firefighters, 23 NYC cops, and 37 officers at the Port Authority who died that day.  (An additional 300 firefighters were on leave for respiratory problems a year later.)

3.    It took nine months (3.1 million hours of labor) and $750 million to clean up the 1.8 million tons of wreckage.

4.    Three times as many men were killed as women.  And the greatest number of deaths were to people between 35 and 39.

5.    Only 291 bodies were found “intact,” and only eighteen people were rescued alive from the WTC rubble. 

6.    From the first attack to the towers collapsing took 102 minutes.

7.    It is estimated that the 9/11 attacks cost the terrorists about a half a million dollars.  Three years ago, The New York Times estimated the cost to me at $3.3 trillion. 

8.    In the weeks after 9/11, church and synagogue attendance increased by 25 percent…but then went back to previous levels just two months later.

9.    Congress created a $7 billion Victim Compensation Fund (paying the average family of a victim $2,083,000).  I also started bombing al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan 26 days later and got me the Patriot Act and the Department of Homeland Security.

10.  Americans donated $2.8 billion to 9/11 charities, and googling “9/11 heroes” gives you 102,000,000 results, including this pretty cool tribute video.

So, this Patriot Day—as the war on terror seems crazier and more complicated than ever--take a moment to reflect.  What does 9/11 mean to YOU, and how can we use it to make us and the world a better place?  



Questions or comments?  Contact me at DiaryOfAmerica@gmail.com

Ten Interesting Things About the NFL

"Winning isn't everything; it's the only thing."
-Vince Lombardi

This week kicks off the 95th season the NFL—the most profitable sports league in the world.  Founded in 1920 in Canton, Ohio, this gazillion dollar organization is my pride and joy.  Here’s some interesting numbers to chew on as we sit back and enjoy.

1.      The average NFL salary is $1.9 million per year.  Aaron Rodgers tops the list at $22M/yr, and the top 10 are all quarterbacks.

2.     The average NFL player’s career is only 3.3 years. (Kickers and punters have the longest careers at 4.87 years.  Running backs have the shortest at only 2.57 years.)

3.     A whopping 78% of NFL players are broke two years after they leave the league.

4.     NFL mascots get paid between $23,000 to $65,000 per year.  NFL cheerleaders get about $70 a game.

5.     The average NFL game only has 11 minutes of actual action.

6.     About 3,000 cows per year are used to make NFL footballs.

7.     The NFL is considered a not-for-profit organization and does not pay any taxes

8.     Notre Dame has produced more NFL players than any other school…by a lot. (Click on the link to see the current kings of the mountain.)

9.     Da Bears hold the NFL record for most wins (730) AND highest winning percentage (.575).

10.  It is estimated that fantasy football cost employers $6.5 billion in lost productivity.

So…good luck to you and yours!  Gonna be another good one!


Questions or comments?  Contact me at DiaryOfAmerica@gmail.com.

Ten Interesting Things About Labor Day

"Nothing will work unless you do."
-Maya Angelou

Labor Day has always seemed like my strangest holiday.  Think about it.  On Veterans’ Day, all the non-vets thank veterans for their service and cheer for them in parades.  On Mothers’ Day, all the guys thank the moms for all they do and take ‘em out for a meal.  But on Labor Day?  Rarely do non-workers thank workers for their labor.  And many of my hardest workers still work that day.  It’s like everyone just decided we need a day where people barbecue and stop wearing white.  Let’s call it Labor Day!

So what is the deal with the holiday that most people just associate with the start of football season and school?  Let’s take a look…

1.       Labor Day began in Toronto in 1872 as a demonstration for workers’ rights.

2.      In the late 1800's, the average American worked 12 hour days, seven days a week just to put a roof over his head.  (Even kids as young as five worked dangerous jobs!)  Now, the average worker puts in 8.8 hours a day, five days a week.  (And the Fair Labor Standards Acts keeps everyone under 12 from working and everyone under 18 from working dangerous jobs.)

3.       In 1882, 10,000 union workers in NYC took to the streets for my first Labor Day parade.

4.      In response to growing unions and worker protests (and protester deaths by my soldiers and police), Congress made Labor Day a holiday in 1894 (to be observed on the first Monday of September).

5.      The 1916 Adamson Act established the 8-hour workday.

6.      Just over 56% of Americans have a job.  (That’s over 156,000,000 folks.)

7.      According to a survey by LinkedIn, only 1 in 11 people are working their childhood dream job.  (According to  The Washington Post , the five most common childhood dream jobs for men were 1. Pro athlete, 2. Pilot, 3. Scientist, 4. Lawyer, 5. Astronaut.  For women they were 1. Teacher, 2. Veterinarian, 3. Writer, 4. Doctor/Nurse, 5. Singer.)

8.     The average commute time is just over 25 minutes, and 77% of workers drive to work alone.

9.      Since only 3% of workers in my largest occupation, retail, belong to a union, many workers in that industry actually have to work more hours on Labor Day because sales make it the second most profitable day of the year (other than Black Friday).

10.  Despite all the talk that my economy is in the pooper, the OECD says my workers still earn more than anyone else in the world (not to mention that nearly half the planet—over 3 billion people—live on less than $2.50 per day).  

So…thank you, workers, for all you do.  Enjoy the day.  Appreciate all that you have and the sacrifices that have been made.  And think about what you want to do to make us both great.  Then roll up your sleeves and get back at it.  With all my baby boomers retiring, I have tens of trillions in unfunded liabilities.  I need ya!

Questions or comments?  Contact me at DiaryOfAmerica@gmail.com

Ten Interesting Things About School in America

“An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.”
Benjamin Franklin

1.      The first public school in America didn’t appear until the Boston Latin School opened in 1635.  And this school encouraged dissent and free thought.  In fact, five of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence attended it.

2.     Elementary school was typically only available to America’s rich kids until 1840.

3.     It wasn’t until 1918 that every child in America was required to attend at least elementary school.

4.     High school was devised during the Great Depression, and it didn’t necessarily want to make children more educated.  It wanted to keep kids (and their cheap labor) from taking jobs from grown-ups.  (Daddy has to eat!)  Then, once the economy recovered, high school just stuck around.

5.     There are now over 79 million students enrolled in American schools from kindergarten through college. 

6.     Each day, approximately 25 million children board one of over 480,000 yellow school buses to go to one of the 115,000 elementary or secondary schools. 

7.     Each year more than 3 million students drop out of school in America.  That’s the equivalent of nearly 250,000 NBA teams annually and nearly 8,300 dropouts a day. 

8.     Two-thirds of all the jobs held by high school dropouts under the age of 26 last less than a year.

9.   Thomas Edison's teachers said he was too stupid to learn anything.  (He later invented 1,093 things including the electric light bulb, the phonograph, and the motion picture camera.)

10.  Even though the human brain weighs only three pounds, it contains over 14 billion cells and 100 billion neurons.  According to some doctors, the human brain is powerful enough to hold all of the knowledge in the history of human existence. 

So…Happy learning (or teaching)!  America needs you!


Any question?  Contact me at DiaryOfAmerica@gmail.com.  Thanks!

Ten Interesting Things About Ben Franklin

Ben Franklin was quite the character.  Known as "the first American," he was the epitome of the self-made man.  Did you know these ten fun facts? Ben stopped eating meat when he was sixteen so he would have more money to buy books. Ben taught himself to read five other languages:  Latin, French, Spanish, German, and Italian.Ben has been inducted into 14 Halls of Fame. Ben crossed the Atlantic 8 times and spent 27 years living abroad. Ben never patented any of his inventions because he just wanted them to be for the good of society. Ben would sit naked in the tub, open a window, and take air baths to get fresh air and get rid of germs. Ben created and published my first ever political cartoon. Ben dropped out of school after two years at age nine, but later received honorary degrees from Harvard, Yale, St. Andrews, and other fancy pants universities. After Ben turned 70, he started celebrating his birthdays backwards. Ben proposed an alphabet that would get rid of what he thought were redundant letters—C, J, Q, W, X, Y

Ten Interesting Things About Abraham Lincoln

In a recent survey, Abraham Lincoln was voted as the greatest American of all time.  Did you know these things about my sixteenth president?
Abe was my first president born outside of the 13 original states.Abe was a beast of a wrestler (going nearly 300-1) and is enshrined in the Wrestling Hall of Fame.
As a lawyer, Abe would sometimes carry important papers in his hat. There are no direct descendants of Abraham Lincoln.  (Of Abe’s four sons—Edward, William, Thomas, and Robert, only Robert lived to be an adult.) Abe was granted a patent for an invention that lifts boats.  (He is my only president to ever have a patent.) Abe read the Bible all the time, but he never belonged to a church. Abe didn’t like being called Abe.  He preferred Lincoln. Abe didn’t smoke or drink. Abe established Thanksgiving in 1863. Abe created the Secret Service (mainly to catch counterfeiters) just a few hours before he was assassinated.