Please Pardon the Inconvenience

The previous two posts did not have a comment section. Please leave your comments below; please.   You wouldn't believe how frail my ego is.

Dear HR Department, Get A Clue

In this past year of unemployment, I have been through the gauntlet of HR screenings by various and tawdry companies.  My least favorite of these tactics is what they call the survey or personality profile.  My distaste for this form of punishment stems from when I first came across it in the nineties when I was offered employment by Greyhound Bus Lines.  I had the job.  I just had to take their "personality profile".  I was told to answer the questions as honestly as possible.  After I was done and my answers were faxed to some psychologist somewhere, I was told that I did not fit in the "parameters" of their stupid test and, therefore, they could not hire me.  I tried to find out what it was that I answered wrong, but I was just given the "parameters" answer.  I have come across this thing often in the years since and I have never gotten a job from any company that has used this psychological trickery.  What annoyes me most is the questions on these things seem to try and deduce what your level of honesty and work ethic are.  I believe I am an honest person and I work hard for my paycheck, so what is it that a personality profile or survey or whatever you call it tells them about me?

Flash forward to the present.  I have just finished another one of these "character defect detecters" and I would be offended by the questions if they weren't so patently stupid.  The survey consists of 128 questions which ask me such probing things as whether I agree that it's okay to take some things from the office.  Let's think about this; I'm going to tell a prospective employer that I think it's okay to steal from him.  Hmm....Yeah, that's smart.  Question 32, 46, and 88 ask if I agree or disagree with the statement, worded in different ways, that you only work to the level that you think is adaquate for your pay and no harder.  Uh, what boss wouldn't want you if you answered to the affirmative.  The question that got to me was number 124.  Do you agree or dissagree that you read well enough to do the survey.  I might understand it if this was question 5 or 6 but question 124?  I dont get it.  Of course, I could not resist and answered that I disagreed.  Hey, it's not like I was going to be hired anyway.   

One hundred twenty-eight questions that could be boiled down to about ten that I can't imagine would trip up any individual into revealing anything they wouldn't want revealed.  I'm at a loss as to how these tests separate the chaff from the wheat and how is it that I am always the chaff.     

Oh No, Not Obama Again.

Yes.  Sorry.
I started this blog, in part, to go more in depth than just the personalities that are in the political arena, to explain and explore the reason and motivation behind politics and politicians.  It seems like I have done my fair share of criticising our President.  This is because he so perfectly represents the culmination of what scares me about extreme leftist policies.  Obama campaigned as a moderate and is now governing as a far left liberal (very nearly a radical).  If you don't believe me, just look at the people he is surrounded by.  Van Jones, Cass Sunstien, Reverend Wright and Bill Aryes are just a few examples of the extemists that have shaped and formed our President's values and beliefs.

What has amazed me is how Obama (a gifted campaigner and speaker) can get away with saying one thing in a speech and than say the opposite in the next sentence.  I realize that the choice for president this last election was not good ( basically it was between liberal and liberal light) and it is this problem that I would like to address.  I do not believe that 51 percent of the American electorate is desirous of the direction that our nation is headed.

 I believe that because of our busy and distracted  lives, we (myself included) have neglected our responsibility of being involved in the process of governance.  While it is true that we have a representative republic, it is still a nation "of the people for the people and by the people".  We, in the past, have complained about our representatives but have done little to change who represents us.  If we vote in general elections and our choices are the lesser of two evils, then it is we who are at fault.  As I write this, I chastise myself for not being more involved.  I now vow to change this.  This change means being involved in the party on the local level, taking part in shaping our candidates of the future.  Because who knows?  The dog catcher of today may very well be the presidential candidate of tomorrow.