More Vs Enough vs Abundance (Reprise) Part III

"Who is rich, he who is satisfied with his lot" also translated as "Who is rich? The one who is appreciates what he has…"

(Talmud—Avot 4:1)

Daat – in Kabbalah meaning ‘connection’ also ‘knowledge’ which exchanges  between creation and development (in the former) or attaches between wisdom and understanding in the latter

Tzavta – connection. Tzavta is the Aramaic origin of 'mitzvah' (which did not mean 'good deed'). Mitzvah is a changing from the origin Tzavta to mean 'commandment' as in Bar Mitzvah - son of the commandment.

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Let us not confuse 'abundance' (in the biblical sense) with more. More rarely if at all relieves anxiety - there is always another risk to invent or elevate - to rationalize the need for More. More itself habituates and ironically with its free floating never ending only momentarily tamped down anxiety actually comforts (with familiar habituation) as an altered state not having to deal with 'why I am" - one is meant to be - meant to do. And ironically, more better now has a way of becoming, in time, less worse later' while the anxiety and habituation are the placeholders.

Also note more is reinforced by concept of 'haves and have nots' with the unstated underlying behavior of- have a little want some more (and not smores....).

More goes to 'I did it. Mine. 'Ownership' whereas enough owns UP to connecting (yes, Tzavta/daat?) maybe to 'what one is meant to be; meant to do.'

That doesn't mean enough solves (as Sowell said, 'there are no solutions only tradeoffs') - if anything 'enough' confronts - the question of meaning IN one's life (unless the individual circles back to more - being a MOREon.)

However, enough may give the opportunity as to 'enough to live for; enough to live on' - developing one's chalek (one's portion – or as Rush Limbaugh would state ‘one’s talents on loan from God’) - in continuing to complete one's incompletions.

Abundance, in contrast, goes to enough to being satisfied with one's lot, developing one's chalek, wanting what one has --- abundance is enough - not more.

Finally, if you the reader will excuse my Judaic reference & orientation, it is no coincidence - (God’s way of winking that there is no word for God connoting the word more in Hebrew as in the 100 plus names and or references. However, I believe the third name for God in Genesis if not mistaken is Shaddai - containing the root word – dai – meaning enough. And ‘in the beginning’ after each of  5 of the seven days - the reference at the end of each of those days was 'it was good' (as in it was good enough'. I don't recall in nomenclature the translation the phrase 'it was good more'.

One may take the connection (Tzavta) from enough (especially functioning as daat as well connection, attach, exchange) especially in development of character, chalek, and meaning IN one life -- abundance. It is questionable that more facilitates connection/daat mode other than  plaques, and recognized in the society columns for a contribution to CUPS (monuments, buildings) rather than Coffee (the actual cause – direct dollars in).

And so abundance as --More, better, now (more, for more's sake) has a habit of becoming  less, worse, later - AND that's the LESSon increasing personal financial anxiety, as I see it.

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Finally, the above said there is a question of distribution (being a distributor of the community – a Judaic concept). Distribution is OWNing UP and is extremely difficult given the preponderance of 'displacing bodily fluids down one's leg' by so called self serving charitable institutions ‘dissipating abundance.’ The self aggrandizing holier than thou charitable institution bureaucrats masquerading as ‘do gooders’ do not understand nor wish to understand social entrepreneurship, accountability, output - preferring its own perks, salaries, perpetuation CUPS giving good lunch and shiny plaques (sans Prevacid and or beta blockers) rather than accomplishing its mission (which would put the bureaucrats out of business). Thus March of Dimes is still taking quarters (excuse me ‘reinventing itself.’)

Being content with one’s portion (chalek)– developing your portion rather than coveting (which is externally comparative) - is Judaic.

More vs Enough vs Adaptability & Resourcefulness Part II

(For Heaven’s sake) to manifest the spark of the divine within (each of us)

Judaic thought

QUESTION: What is ‘more’ useful to the creation process & its derivatives: the Yes FOR the NO; the No FOR the Yes; the Yes AND No): MORE or ENOUGH ?

DEFINITIONS:

ENOUGH: healing personal financial anxiety, puttin’ money (the current currency) in its place, to transcend, connect & align to one’s signification/assignment – what one is meant to do & meant to be – with enough to live for & enough to live on

MORE: a never-ending Sisyphusian test of worthiness, usually leading to increased personal financial anxiety, less and a Sense of ‘LACK’ (S.O.L.) as ‘there is never quite enough’ Note: More, Better, Now has a habit of becoming Less, Worse, Later.

            .

            Ironically, both MORE and ENOUGH may be contraindicative (counteract)  to the   creation/destruction – yes FOR no, no FOR yes, yes AND no process..

But what I do have are a very particular set of skills

Liam Neeson in ‘Taken’

            Each of us has not only a spark of the divine within to manifest but also a portion (chalek) to discover, develop, & materialize . This portion/trait may be revealed & cultivated as a particular set of skills or remain buried within. In addition, most of us have exhibited – but give little value to let alone monetize - our adaptability and resourcefulness in the face of the resistance of NO’s (difficulties, challenges, and in particular financial obstacles). If anything,  we tend to minimize – actually devalue these  YES capabilities – these particular set of skills – in terms of our ‘net worth-iness’ preferring to believe in the ‘current currency’ (money).

To have more doe not mean to be more

Rabbi Abraham Heschel, Sabbath

            In the past, at ENOUGH Personal Financial Life Planning workshops, I would often ask clients or participants for a show of hands relative to the questions:

·         Have you incurred difficulties and especially challenges at one time or another in your life.?

·         Did you have overcome those difficult situations?

Invariably every attendees raised their hands.

When I would ask for how many put – monetized – their adaptability and resourcefulness on their net worth – balance sheets, I got incredulous looks (and no hands). After all, other than inheritance, isn’t it, in great part, the individual’s adaptability and resourcefulness which helped to ‘create’ the ‘financial net worth?’

Who is rich?
The one who is appreciates what he has…
(Talmud—Avot 4:1)

And the Chinese variation per Tao Te Ching, ‘He who is rich? He who knows what enough is.”‘

 And yet, the  focus is on LACK, its derivative Acquisition (Cain in Hebrew) and the subderivative MORE for redemption, after life insurance, and or just palliation with higher and higher dosages required to offset this LACKtose intolerance. The MORE idol becomes both the yes for fear of the no.

The chalek, developed inside out, when paired with meaning IN one’ life furthers creation (climbing the mountain – the YES) and even creative destruction (strip mining (the NO)) both in dialectic tension as:

• pressure on coal is required to yield a diamond,
• the agitation of sand on the clam creates the pearl,
• clothes don’t get clean without an agitator in the washing machine
• no one likes an alarm clock

The NO for YES is sharpened by the chalek when paired with meaning IN one’s life and therefore ‘being fruitful and adding.’

Still, devaluing our resourcefulness, adaptability, and chalek we complain. Per a Judaic story, a man complains to God, ‘Almighty this life is a terrible, challenging, tough destructive, unfair (imitating a progressive Democrat?) tough world – can’t you send someone to help?

The Almighty replied, ‘I did. I sent you.’

A Story:

            A dog with a bone in his mouth looking into a river sees his reflection and mistakes it for a dog with a larger bone. Discarding his own bone, he jumps into the river to battle and seize the larger bone from the other dog. After giving up in futility, he emerges sometime later from the river with no bone and his fur matted for his efforts.

MORE  versus ‘ENOUGH 

The LESSon – The boner.      

            MORE tends to divert attention away from chalek development and  toward acquisition of ‘an enough’ which is always just ‘a little MORE’  – just in case.’ In addition, the never quenched thirst of the Sisyphisian MORE is increasingly adding boogie men to the equation. Solve threat #1 to MORE and real or typically imagined threat #2 is promoted as the  MORE  ‘The Rat-e of Return’ hamster wheel continues to spin.

When one reinforces & pairs chalek to meaning IN their life – then ‘ENOUGH  to live for ENOUGH  to live on’ increases the probability of manifested creation. And yet, ENOUGH  sans dovetailing with one’s chalek and meaning IN there life has a habit of recycling to eventually MORE, and MOREonic behavior with the collateral damage being the unmanifested yes FOR no and no FOR yes. Here is the sequence of  this ENOUGH  returning to MORE:

• Get ‘a cushion just in case,’
• Secure the means to the ends and move the ends apart,
• Escape ‘meaning – the will to meaning’ by doing one’s someday things (throwing pots in Vail or rearranging their spouses’ spices in alphabetical and size order –(I kid you not – these are real examples)
• With spouses complaining ‘for better or worse but not for lunch’ in gradations  to adventuresome capital forays begin rationalized as “I can make more which I can redirect to good causes,’ or
• running for political office – to make a difference.

So with ENOUGH  uncoupled to meaning IN one’s life & one’s chalek, – the spark of the divine within like MORE remains buried unmanifested under developed and the process of continuing the completing of one’s incompletions (the soul curriculum) is held back – and failing to be fruitful and multiply rather than skipping grades for creation: Yes FOR No and or No FOR Yes.

The journey is not in seeking new lands but seeing with new eyes

Proust

MORE vs ENOUGH Vs Creation - Part I

The only people that like change are wet babies

Don Robinson

            Creation creates change.

And change generates movement.

            All movement involves friction

            People don’t like friction – except as sexual friction accomplices – however linguistically rationalized.

            Thus, the means will always be criticized regardless of ends (creation, destruction) given  ‘friction,’ movement and the prospect of change – as we aren’t wet babies.

There are haves, have nots, and have a little want some more

            The haves seek to ‘keep;’ the have nots want to ‘get,’ and the have a little want some more want ‘some more.’

            All three seek to ‘acquire’ (which requires friction) – more or less

• The ‘haves’ to ‘keep’ seek ‘less’ risk to what they have & ‘more – ‘just in case’ – for ‘certainty
• The ‘have nots’ to ‘get,’ by merit or take by hook or crook (in the name of redistribution confiscation rationalized as ‘fairness, social justice, you didn’t make it’ aka leftist PC  progressives) – for MORE (which is never ENOUGH )
• The ‘have a little want some mores’ want ENOUGH ’ which is ‘just a little bit MORE’ (rarely defined) –also ‘just in case’ - for greater ‘certainty’

            The only thing certain about change, friction, movement is change and uncertainty in time. Thus, MORE (actually the ‘promise’ of MORE and what it should provide)- being acculturated, instinctual, and buttressed by fear of extinction (as the body) is never ENOUGH. FurtherMORE, MORE (like the delusion of happiness) doesn’t yield certainty, permanence nor continuity due to the continuous process of: creation/deconstruction – yes FOR no, the no FOR yes – the yes AND the no.

            Friction is necessary for the process of creation and yes, destruction.

            Friction is ‘not nice’ (save friction accomplicing).

Friction with another often results in ad hominems from ‘you’re difficult’ to expletives camouflaged sometimes with euphemisms and niceties but still, with a smile disguising, the ‘f**k you, very much.’

           

            Even STP™ (the racers edge) doesn’t lubricate this friction of creation’s movement, change & destruction.

Money can therefore cause endless anxiety, for no matter how much you have, you are ever sure whether you have enough or whether you will not somehow lose it all…

Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson

            MORE parches thirsting for MORE believing MORE will lubricant when MORE requires higher and higher dosages – resulting in increased friction that 50 weight nor an additional 50k can’t grease.

            The question is ‘is MORE necessary for the continuous process of Creation/Destruction (yes AND no, no FOR yes) with the flipside does ENOUGHinhibit Creation?’ which will be examined in PARTII

Exodus - Living 'For,' Living 'To,' & 'Living Be-'CAUSE' - A Passover Blog

 Exodus – Out Of & Out Toward: A Passover Exercise

In working on the 3rd edition of ENOUGH (working title: ENOUGH(sm): Jewish Personal Financial Life Planning©) in particular creating the new chapter of said name and updating the chapter More vs ENOUGH(sm) as well as The Soul Resume: After Life Insurance(c), three critical questions evolved which may be useful for Passover as we observe the Exodus (going OUT of - while going TOWARD) - as an 'inside out process'.

             What do you: Live ‘For,’ Live ‘To,’ Live ‘Be-Cause’

·         Live For –(whom, what)

·        Live To (continue i.e.. continuing to  complete incompletions in one's soul, or work on your Chevy Vintage Chevelle?)–

·         Live Be-‘Cause’ (inside out)

(Please notice - the inside out approach in this exercise) - and the bold in 'Cause' (as in one's causes)- the external starting from the 'Be' (internal) - inside out ('Be' starts first.)

            Live For, Live To, Live Be-'Cause'...???

While the Exodus is -  leaving from - the questions to ask then 'what is one leaving towards' as we leave our Egypts (restrictions, limitations, narrow places) this Passover?

Follow UP

Guirjieff once stated that you can’t tell a prison to escape from a prison if he doesn’t know he is in prison.

And escaping one prison cell into another – is not an escape, let alone an exodus from slavery – just another form of incarceration. Thus, the requirement of not only an escape from the slavery – the bondage – but the aim – the goal in the escape from & the advancement towards – the live for, the live to, the live be-‘cause’ – otherwise – one’s has just chosen another different  prison cell. 

And what does this have to do with ENOUGH(sm): Jewish Personal Financial Life Planning© - let alone ENOUGH(sm)? 

Everything if the aim of personal financial life planning is just a tool for:

"Healing personal financial anxiety, putting money in it place, to elevate, transcend and connect to one's signification/assignment what one is meant to do, meant to be - enough to live for, enough to live on"(c) 

Proposal: Universities & Colleges (The Perpetrators) Pay For The Student Loan Bailout Fund

Disclaimer: I was a scholarship student at the University of Denver from 1967-1973 (Bachelors and Masters). Some might say what follows violates the Talmudic saying, ‘don’t throw dirt down the well you drink from.’ If anything, the problem described below and the outline of a partial solution is to save Higher Education from itself rather than throwing dirt down the well I drank from – graduating Magna cum Laude, The Wall Street Journal’s Outstanding Senior Finance student and with an MBA. (The other solution of restoring academic integrity and freedom of expression – ridding Higher Education of its censoring bullying with speech codes, trigger warnings, political correctness and discriminatory practices against conservatives while hypocritically spieling ‘diversity’ is beyond the scope of this writing- cumbaya.)

Part I: The Problem & The Perp

Applying the cumulative inflation to the University of Denver's annual tuition (school year 1967-1968) to the University of Denver's 2015-206 school year the $1500 tuition in 1967 today should be $10, 627.64

Tuition 2014- 2015 at the University of Denver $43,164- 400%+ over the cumulative inflation rate. (Parents and students think what that $30,000 per year $120,000 - invested just at 6%- 8% would have meant to parent's retirement, to the down payment on a house, to not having the burden of this huge student debt would have meant in life choices as well. You can thank the real perpetrators - The Feudal Liberal Progressive Bonnie & Clyde Jesse James' of 'Higher' education Class Cabal- and stop pointing fingers at conservatives.

Question: did students get a 400% increase over inflation in their learning?

               did the students get a 400% increase over inflation in their starting salary?

OR

               did the students get saddle with huge student loans, jobs that were not commensurate with the 400% over inflation starting salary?

               did parents get stuck with diverting monies from their retirement - and thus delaying their work free retirement

               will students have to defer their first home due being saddled with large student loans

AND

                could the American taxpayer be about to feel the BERN or Hillary is their pocket bailing out the Feudal, Corrupt, Sanctimonious, incompetent, featherbedding, condescending, pompous college tenured liberal/progressive tenured scholar barrens and their weasel cowardly pusillanimous overpaid administrators.

This indentured servitude and potential bailout was brought to you by the Censoring Bullying Liberal Progressive Cumbaya Academia that never met others' money they couldn't spend, waste - and complain there was never enough of and needed more.

So ask yourselves, were the conservatives shtupping you or was it the Progressive Liberal Democrat you hold them we'll shtup them College Complex - administering the mooching without Vaseline(tm from the rear of the graduation line during pomp(osity) and circumstance? And stop your whining - be thankful - and tell your parents 'parents lives matter'

Part II (Partial Solution) –

University & Colleges Funding of The Bailout

Instead of the taxpayer, parents and students picking up the tab for a student loan bailout, why not seek redress from those who perpetrated the gouging of collegiate tuition and costs - the colleges, universities, bloated overpaid administration and featherbedding tenured scholar barren professors? 

When tuition runs 300%-400% of the consumer price index, when professors teach but one course (giving them time to practice non diversity, discrimination and censorship of academic freedom whereby per the Higher Education Research Institute only 12% of university faculty identify themselves politically right of center and only 5% of professors in he humanities and social science departments so identify, let them take a 20% cut in their pensions as well as a current 20% cut in salaries to fund the bailout administered by Bernie Sanders

Furthermore, 20% of all interest, dividends, capital gains realized on the University’s otherwise tax free endowment (slush) fund (not less than 5% in any case), should be redirected to pay down – their former students’ tuition debt that is above a negotiated figure (say $$20,000) as a flat debt forgiveness amount per year akin to the dividend Alaska state citizens get from oil. However, the amount goes directly to the lender – and yes, students you pay tax on the repayment (which at even 30% is a 70% savings to students). Should the universities resist-  20% of all new state and or federal grants – per contract - which otherwise goes to University overhead (often a charge of 70% to over 100%) should be suspended put into escrow. Should a University or College play a shell game with allocating its overhead charge, treble damages and legal fees paid to the debt forgiveness fund.

(You do the crime ((ok price gouging or incompetent)) - 1967 Denver University tuition was $1500 which given the cumulative consumer price index of inflation should be $10, 627 but is now $43,164 for a $120,000 cost over inflation adjusted – you pay on your dime. Universities are not professor and administrator transfer/welfare payments. See more PART II)

Furthermore, fire all administration on a Friday with the task, if they wish to be rehired, or proving per zero based budgeting why on a cost benefit basis (sans any cumbaya, leaving multisyllabic motherhood and obfuscations with their local Starbucks barista) why they should be rehired. By the following Monday their cost benefit analysis should be provided. (If they indicate more time is needed that is prima facie evidence indicating the lack of value their position provides. If there is great value provided and evidence based – there is no question – the administrator can provide the evidence readily.)

Terminate all future tenure - instead offering 3 - 5 year contracts as tenure was to protect academic freedom which 1) wrongful termination laws now exist 2) if anything faculty has engaged in the censorship and suppression of the academic freedom upon which tenure was based.

Last but not least - the non tenured are treated like indentured slaves on the university plantation (the only thing missing is the Yes Ma'am yes, Master intonations and the scarf around the hair (though kissing ass and prostituting one's academic beliefs has taken these artifacts place) - and paid as such - at colleges and universities. Getting rid of future tenure releases resources not only to fund The Feel The Bern Bailout but to recognize merit rather than longevity sitting on one's tuchis with yellowed course notes.

The Feel The Bern Student Loan Bailout Fund - 'shared sacrifice' for Universities, Scholar Barren Tenured Professors, & Bloated Administrators....Cumbaya.

Proposal: Universities & Colleges (The Perpetrators) Pay For The Student Loan Bailout Fund

Proposal: Universities & Colleges (The Perpetrators)

Pay For The Student Loan Bailout Fund

Disclaimer: I was a scholarship student at the University of Denver from 1967-1973 (Bachelors and Masters). Some might say what follows violates the Talmudic saying, ‘don’t throw dirt down the well you drink from.’ If anything, the problem described below and the outline of a partial solution is to save Higher Education from itself rather than throwing dirt down the well I drank from – graduating Magna cum Laude, The Wall Street Journal’s Outstanding Senior Finance student and with an MBA. (The other solution of restoring academic integrity and freedom of expression – ridding Higher Education of its censoring bullying with speech codes, trigger warnings, political correctness and discriminatory practices against conservatives while hypocritically spieling ‘diversity’ is beyond the scope of this writing- cumbaya.)

Part I: The Problem & The Perp

Applying the cumulative inflation to the University of Denver's annual tuition (school year 1967-1968) to the University of Denver's 2015-206 school year the $1500 tuition in 1967 today should be $10, 627.64

Tuition 2014- 2015 at the University of Denver $43,164- 400%+ over the cumulative inflation rate. (Parents and students think what that $30,000 per year $120,000 - invested just at 6%- 8% would have meant to parent's retirement, to the down payment on a house, to not having the burden of this huge student debt would have meant in life choices as well. You can thank the real perpetrators - The Feudal Liberal Progressive Bonnie & Clyde Jesse James' of 'Higher' education Class Cabal- and stop pointing fingers at conservatives.

Question: did students get a 400% increase over inflation in their learning?

               did the students get a 400% increase over inflation in their starting salary?

OR

               did the students get saddle with huge student loans, jobs that were not commensurate with the 400% over inflation starting salary?

               did parents get stuck with diverting monies from their retirement - and thus delaying their work free retirement

               will students have to defer their first home due being saddled with large student loans

AND

                could the American taxpayer be about to feel the BERN or Hillary is their pocket bailing out the Feudal, Corrupt, Sanctimonious, incompetent, featherbedding, condescending, pompous college tenured liberal/progressive tenured scholar barrens and their weasel cowardly pusillanimous overpaid administrators.

This indentured servitude and potential bailout was brought to you by the Censoring Bullying Liberal Progressive Cumbaya Academia that never met others' money they couldn't spend, waste - and complain there was never enough of and needed more.

So ask yourselves, were the conservatives shtupping you or was it the Progressive Liberal Democrat you hold them we'll shtup them College Complex - administering the mooching without Vaseline(tm from the rear of the graduation line during pomp(osity) and circumstance? And stop your whining - be thankful - and tell your parents 'parents lives matter'

Part II (Partial Solution) –

University & Colleges Funding of The Bailout

Instead of the taxpayer, parents and students picking up the tab for a student loan bailout, why not seek redress from those who perpetrated the gouging of collegiate tuition and costs - the colleges, universities, bloated overpaid administration and featherbedding tenured scholar barren professors? 

When tuition runs 300%-400% of the consumer price index, when professors teach but one course (giving them time to practice non diversity, discrimination and censorship of academic freedom whereby per the Higher Education Research Institute only 12% of university faculty identify themselves politically right of center and only 5% of professors in he humanities and social science departments so identify, let them take a 20% cut in their pensions as well as a current 20% cut in salaries to fund the bailout administered by Bernie Sanders

Furthermore, 20% of all interest, dividends, capital gains realized on the University’s otherwise tax free endowment (slush) fund (not less than 5% in any case), should be redirected to pay down – their former students’ tuition debt that is above a negotiated figure (say $$20,000) as a flat debt forgiveness amount per year akin to the dividend Alaska state citizens get from oil. However, the amount goes directly to the lender – and yes, students you pay tax on the repayment (which at even 30% is a 70% savings to students). Should the universities resist-  20% of all new state and or federal grants – per contract - which otherwise goes to University overhead (often a charge of 70% to over 100%) should be suspended put into escrow. Should a University or College play a shell game with allocating its overhead charge, treble damages and legal fees paid to the debt forgiveness fund.

(You do the crime ((ok price gouging or incompetent)) - 1967 Denver University tuition was $1500 which given the cumulative consumer price index of inflation should be $10, 627 but is now $43,164 for a $120,000 cost over inflation adjusted – you pay on your dime. Universities are not professor and administrator transfer/welfare payments. See more PART II)

Furthermore, fire all administration on a Friday with the task, if they wish to be rehired, or proving per zero based budgeting why on a cost benefit basis (sans any cumbaya, leaving multi syllabic motherhood and obfuscations with their local Starbucks barista) why they should be rehired. By the following Monday their cost benefit analysis should be provided. (If they indicate more time is needed that is prima facie evidence indicating the lack of value their position provides. If there is great value provided and evidence based – there is no question – the administrator can provide the evidence readily.)

Terminate all future tenure - instead offering 3 - 5 year contracts as tenure was to protect academic freedom which 1) wrongful termination laws now exist 2) if anything faculty has engaged in the censorship and suppression of the academic freedom upon which tenure was based.

Last but not least - the non tenured are treated like indentured slaves on the university plantation (the only thing missing is the Yes Ma'am yes, Master intonations and the scarf around the hair (though kissing ass and prostituting one's academic beliefs has taken these artifacts place) - and paid as such - at colleges and universities. Getting rid of future tenure releases resources not only to fund The Feel The Bern Bailout but to recognize merit rather than longevity sitting on one's tuchis with yellowed course notes.

The Feel The Bern Student Loan Bailout Fund - 'shared sacrifice' for Universities, Scholar Barren Tenured Professors, & Bloated Administrators....Cumbaya.

Dogs & Cats: A Deductible Medical & or Charitable Expense?

                          

            Until we get a flat, flatter, or consumption tax to replace the income tax, our dogs should be a deductible medical expense subject to the amount over the 7.5% and 10% adjusted gross income thresholds given:

           

·         AIG study/commercial having a dog increases our longevity 7 years (can you say that for your resentful college graduate now living in basement still requiring you doing his or her laundry while hearing how stupid your are?)

·         Study after study has proven dogs reduce blood pressure (especially on Wall Street – Dr. Karen Allen, University of Buffalo)

·         Having dogs around babies lowers the future probabilities of allergies

·         Gazing, staring at, loving on our dogs increases Oxytocin (the love, happiness hormone). The only thing that one’s resentful unemployed college student stares at gazes at is his or her Smart(dumb?)phone increasing the agitation hormone.

·         Dogs are cheaper (and more effective) than shrinks and others in the psychobabbaltariat whose fees are deductible medical expenses – and not evidence based for remuneration - unlike the cost/benefit of having dog(s) & cats)

·         19% of senior citizens are now estimated to be orphans (no family). The companionship of dogs and cats reduce needed psychological costs and are cheaper than Visiting Angels.

L’chaim (to life)

Judaic thought

Thus our companion animals are good for our health and they are good for spiritual lives.

Look into your dogs eyes (with or without treat in hand). I know I see God – I know there is God. (Ok, a little Challah or biscuit in hand makes one almost godly – but that apart – tell me a smile doesn’t come to your face, and thoughts of Hillary Clinton or Debby Wasserman Schultz don’t vanish from your mind?) And when the poop hits the fan, who is there by your side (saving your kosher bacon if necessary), regardless – even sans Challah in your hand – dog – God’s emissary to man since being Abel’s watchman and even Cain’s protector when banished.

In most of the proposed tax plans, kept intact is the deduction for one’s primary mortgage and charitable giving. Given, dogs are good for the soul, even with elimination of the medical deduction, expenditures on our dogs should be considered a charitable deduction – not competing with established religions but in many cases more effective. We spend more time on poop than in the pew. (And sarcasms aside, I am the Jew I am because of the dogs that know, have known, and will know me again.)

Cats? Well, they should be CATegorized as qualifying business expenditures (rather than medical or charitable deductions) as while dogs think we are godly, cats think we are servants. So cats are a costs of goods and an administrative expense though without matching FICA (social security contribution) requirements.