Excited for Obama

I admit it. I am excited for Barrack Obama to be President of the United States of America. I think we should all be. I liked McCain better, liked his stances on the moral issues better, and agree with McCain's economic views (Purely that they were less damaging than Barrack's, not because they were more promising).

I do not want to hear any more jokes about Barrack Obama. He is the President elect and put your sore-loserness aside and be patriotic. It does not mean you should or shall agree with what his does, it just means to be optimistic and ready to be involved and active in things you see that are good. I have spent the last 4 years watching bitterness effectively null promising policies and ideas from the Bush administration. People unwilling to put love of country ahead of personal pride killed the oppurtunity for many to get involved and active in truly effective Bush policies.

I will not be that person with Barrack. I will work and be involved with things that I agree with, and not take part in what I do not. Barrack will not make me encourage abortions are make me participate in homosexual activities. I do not condone them. I will not take part in them. I do believe however that Barrack will usher in a new culture of social responsibility. We need that. We need to be kinder, and more willing to serve and give to those around us. We can do with a little less, and give a little more. So I am willing. If I get super rich, I will be okay with getting taxed more. I would be the one living the American dream, and my conscience mandates I extend that oppurtunity to others.

Be patriotic,
get ready to support President Obama.

(Palin is still hot)

I'm not the proton you need

You were like an unstable electron,
looking for a proton,
any proton.
And that's why you were so wrong.
Bouncing around the universe,
unversed, yet traversed,
you thought tou knew it all,
you just didn't get it doll.
You tried to hit it wrong,
and fouled off,
each swing a foul ball,
you got it all out,
and ended up a foul mouth,
you flew way south,
and lost my respect.
Now your bet,
is I'll still be at the plate.
Ready to take another swing,
But the truth is another thing,
I'm not even on deck.
This was Toulouse,
So now I gotta Trec.
and now your cryin,
sayin your goin through heck,
baby, wait a sec.
Yeah, you wagered a bad bet.

So I got it figured out,
I know what your all about.
Power player sayin what you want,
and then you pout.
We know what you're about,
about me?
Let me get it all out.
I'm not about to get up and give you my time.
I keep on smiling because I know you know I'm lyin,
I won't be back around to see you,
I don't need a sign,
I'm walking out because my hind-,
sight is 20/20, back then I was blind.
So baby take your time.
Pledge your promises,
like rhombuses,
their awekwardly shaped.
Over frivolence their draped,
baby my ears you've taped.
But while I've got my sanity,
I passionatly say,
baby go away,
come back another day.

BeLeave

BeLeave, and just leave it behind. Talking with non-member friends the hardest thing that is going on in their conversion is believing that they will be like a member. Somehow in their head they got this screwy idea that members are saints or something..... DOH! I mean perfect or something. No member who had lived their whole live preparing for a temple marriage will marry me when my life seems to have been a life lived so wrong. How can I date a member, I don't want to explain to them my shortcomings but I also don't want to leave them in the dark as to who I am? Doubtful, unconfident, and hurt is how we feel when we don't understand how truly beautiful the atonement is. When someone accepts the atonement and the forgiveness therein they are completly forgiven. Their sins are forgotten. Their hearts are mending and they are allowed, no, commanded by God to forgive themselves. Then they MUST forgive others. Why is it that we still dabble in doubt? 2 scriptures

Prov. 3: 26 For the Lord shall be thy confidence, and shall keep thy foot from being taken.

Prov. 25: 19 Confidence in an unfaithful man in time of trouble is like a broken tooth, and a foot out of joint

Both scriptures refer to the foot. This is what we have to stand on. With the Lord as our confidence we can procede steadily knowing that He has forgiven us of our sins. Without repentance and forgiveness we are as unsteady as a man with a foot out of joint. Nothing to stand on, our belief shaken and our confidence as ashes in the wind.

Forget the fools unwilling to forgive. FORGET THEM. I wish that those who have stepped outside the church and those wanted to step in will do so with confidence that those who have accepted the atonement will also accept the responsibility of "taking upon us the name of Christ" and forgiving other. Especially when they didn't know the gospel before those mistakes were made. If you have overcome so much to get to where you are, and someone dismisses you because when you were 13 you went to football games instead of church and drank before you were baptised your freshman year of college, forget them.

The key, in my mind, is repenting and recieving that confidence, and if they don't repent and recieve that, well, then don't stoop to their level.
I mean, I have lived my whole life being a Peter Priesthood and hanging out with Molly Mormons. I have never drank, I am still a virgin, and I went on a mission. If I wasn't raised a member, I can't say that any of those would be true, so why would I excpect it of others?

Ok, gotta get back to work, I just had to get that out of me. Get it out of my head

Ben is married

Ben is married.

Let me just let that have its own line. I think today I finally hit me. It is crazy but Sterling and I are the last amigos. Single and happy. We high fived each other each time we saw some kid screaming or something happening that made us happy to be single. Of course the wedding was awesome. Ben and Brittany looked so happy, and a little stressed. The decorations were amazing as well.

Ben is married.

Meanwhile my dates have consisted of cops ruining the view and making us put out hands on the car, rattlesnakes stopping hikes, park rangers locking up the car, and brothers and sisters watching movies with us. Maybe one of these days I will actually do something but I doubt it. While I hang on to my BAVL status (Born Again Virgin Lips) I increasingly realize I have no moves.

Ben is married
I have no moves
Things aren't looking good

Meanwhile I think I am catching up to life since the car wreck. I was ordered by the MD to totally abandon sports for the last almost month. It has been bad, I finally played soccer last week and scored in 2 minutes, puked in 6. So I was a victorious loser. I am not yet caught up in work but I am no longer behind in school. I joined the xTax team and am hoping to actually win from ASU. We're going to go buy suits and work hard so that may take all my extra time for the next month. I think maybe a national tax championship will replace my so-so grades this semester. I also want to win for the money and the lavish trip to Washington D.C., but who can blame me..... seriously.

This trip has also reminded me how much I love my family and am so thankful for their example. It has been so fun hanging out and playing with my nieces and nephews. Mos definatly the best part of the trip. It was funny all the single ladies at the reception were all over me, grabbing me by the hand and taking me to the dance floor. The only thing was is that all of the single ladies at the receptions were my nieces. Sarah learned how to do a spin and Sariah learned how to go behind my back switch hands and spin. Both demanded two dances so it was pretty tough, lol. Sarah is two so she would go back forward and then spin, I was really impressed. She is one of those girl who loves to imitate.

Ben is married,
and I am glad.

Dreams.... Dreams... Dreams

The recent restart of school and work and everything else that dominates the life no longer mine has left me delirious and sleepy in the hours I can claim to rest. This has made me ever more susceptible to those deep dreams that you remember for days. I think they have significance and some of them are rather chilling, but I will leave that up to you to interpret beyond what I think.

First, I have been playing soccer 2 or 3 times a week. For hours. I get tired, I run around, I try really really hard and am playing well but it seems lost because my Spanish team isn't winning. We also can't communicate and they won't play me where I will be most effective. So one night when I stumbled in at like 2 in the morning I dreamt that I was in St. Johns and that I had a game and I had arrived late. I ran onto the field took a pass and scored. The announcer said, "Blake Gray is now the all time leading scorer for St. Johns High School!" I was so excited and happy and I felt vindicated for all the hard work I had put in. I raised my arms above my head and looked into the stands and saw..... no body. It was weird when I woke because I ran my hands over my head and thought, there are some things that I do that honestly don't matter. It hit me hard. It made me think.

I also got called to be the Ward Mission Leader, if I get anything accomplished there it is a testament to the power of God to make weak people workable. After a long day of ward and stake meeting I went to a "Sunday party" to play board games and did nothing but talk about the gospel. When I got home I sank into my bead and dreamt about the ward mission and about the ward missionaries and how many haven't experienced the "Declaring of the Gospel" and are so excited and green. In my dream I walked into a room where one of the new ward missionaries was teaching and I sat there and admired how she taught point after point so well and clearly. One of the students raised his/her hand and asked some rude question about some misconception coming from some pastor. The girl was flustered and soon the classroom swirled into uncontrolled contention and she lost control of the lesson. I got so mad. I was screaming and throwing things and challenging them to answer doctrine to which that had no answer. I was screaming, "In the beginning was God, who was before God? If no one or thing was before God who created Satan?" I just kept screaming that over and over again, "Who created Satan!" It was weird, I lost control and even when the students quited I still kept railing them and proving to them that they had so much to learn. I assume these students were not members. When I woke I was a little stressed about the prospect of setting up a booth at ASU and putting ourselves out there to be destroyed and conversed with by those around us, who have so much to learn. I was worried for those who were about to teach and those who get teased. Then I logged on to realclearpolitics.com and read some articles about Mitt Romney as a possible VP pick and when I read the comments at the bottom my heart dropped. Comment after comment was more of the same 'ole Anti-Mormon closed sentiment that they would never vote for him. What Bigotry was displayed. I started to honestly feel afraid that he would be chosen and me as a green inexperienced WML would face the brunt of this influx of attention toward the church as politics delved into religion.

Side note to current topic of dreams and stuff, this year has been ugly for politics. We have seen Feminism and Ant-feminism, The Race card, the White guilt card, and the reverse racism card played, we have seen Religion being thrust in the face of voters and tempers flared over items that were never meant to be part of the political system of the United States of America. As the campaign continues on, I wonder more and more if the individuals and families of this country will make the difference, because if it is BH Obama or McCain running the country it really comes down to how we run our lives and our families.... to much attention is put on things that don't matter ...... which goes back to dream # 1

Who's to blame for record profits for the oil companies?

Much has been made of the recent profits that oil companies have made at a time when gas prices are making headaches for Americans. Democrats lead by BH Obama have proposed a windfall profit tax to tax oil companies for their "excessive profits". While such a strategy is sure to make oil prices increase by adding additional costs to oil companies, I never saw that oil companies were really making extreme profits as many posted only a 3% profit margin. This last week though the top 5 oil companies all posted record profits and incredible profit growth over the last year. It actually started to bother me. For once maybe I saw some reason in the unreasonable. So I started to delve into the major question, who is to blame? Oil speculators? Greedy oil profiteers? Democrats? Wait, wait, wait, could it really be the Democrats... weren't they the ones against big oil?

Yes, but once again in their quest through unreasonable means they have caused the opposite of what they want to happen to happen. By reducing the areas that oil companies can drill in legislation has effectively limited the supply of oil and the ability of oil companies to increase that supply. Combine the limited supply on the WORLD market for emerging market's (like China) desire to secure future energy shares for their growing production need you have the rights (futures) of future oil shares being bought up for ever increasing prices. Some have blamed speculator for driving up prices, and/or US oil companies for driving up production but the US isn't the number one producer of oil and speculators' purchases of oil pale in comparison to the aggregate world purchases of oil for actual use. The DEMOCRATS proposals of punishing speculators and oil producers have one fatal familiar flaw; they can only punish AMERICAN producers and speculators leaving foreign producers free to carve a larger share of the oil market out for themselves and making us MORE DEPENDENT ON FOREIGN OIL. Reduced profits for American companies also mean more induced hardships for American citizens.

All of these has produced a higher-per-barrel price for companies. Unlike many companies, oil producers have had no control over the price of barrels. Once on the world market, competition for oil shares decides the price. Basic economics, when competition for a product increases and supply remains stagnant, prices increase. This has played to the advantage of oil companies as no additional costs of production were incurred. So as prices increase and costs remain stable, all the additional rise in oil price is PROFIT. This is why Exxon was able to post record profits of $11.68 billion. So when prices were pushed from $100 a barrel to $120 a barrel that equated to nearly $20 a barrel PROFIT. So who is to blame for increasing oil prices? Legislation on regulation. AKA, the Democrats. This blew my mind when I realized that these profits were directly links to the Democrats. Of course then when they propose to punish oil companies for these profits.... I shake my head. More control, more power, please.... no more Democrat moves like these.

Days go bye.... They go bye too

Things are as they should be. I just got back from muh hometown and enjoyed the July 24th celebrations. It was everything that it should have been, from the country dancing to the parade. We also had our Crosby reunion at the same time and it was the first one I have been to without my Grandpa being there. We had a part where each child of my Grandparents got up and told stories about them and that, couple with my own personal memories drove me to think of the duty that I have as their grandchild to be something more. I think that if I had been given to tough life that my grandpa had been given.... Well I don't think I would have made it. I just have always been so proud of him. I remember always going to the apache county fair and finding the sheriff's booth and going up and asking them if they knew my grandpa, because he used to be the sheriff. I would point to his picture if it was up and say proudly, "That's my Grandpa." He was also a lesson in reform, from the rough and rowdy boy to the Grampa who demanded respect and whose spiritual presence was demanding, even if he never said much. I remember his last words to me before I left for the Philippines. Learn to trust the Lord. It seems hard at times because I have so much family to trust and it always seems like we can work things out. I don't pray to ever be pushed to the point where it is just I and the Lord, and no one else, but I wonder if I would have the fortitude. Like my Grandfather and Father before me. We must always remember who we are, and who they were. Whoever it is for you, we all have so many inspirations and rather then sitting around waiting for those inspirations to happen we must become the inspirer. Most of our influences in our lives are not those who were given much, but those who made much from very little. So we know so can we.

En requim
Grampa

Work

I feel like with everything I write there has to be a corresponding journal entry. If I add a sentence, I should credit my stock hold of sanity in my brain. So I have been working at a CPA and pretty soon my brain will be MIA. Actually that's not true, sadly, I really like it. It's like a big puzzle you have to put together and if it doesn't fit, you'll know. The people here are really nice too and it is such a relaxing environment. Paid lunches, call a friend.... just keep working too. (I'm not comfortable enough to do stuff like that though.... except the paid lunches and the blogging during lunch) Everything else in life is going well. I meant to take a social timeout for the summer but it hasn't worked out so I am going to try again...... I'm single what am I supposed to do!

I've been spending a lot of time focusing on economics and politics. I just finished my first non-scriptural book .... "Basic Economics" written by Thomas Sowell (great book). I just finished watching Al Gore talk about his version of solutions for our energy crisis. He had some good points, even though several times during his speech I felt to boo him. One of the things that we need to do as a country to improve our energy independence is start with the infrastructure. We need to start by revamping our outdated power grid. Power outages and defects costs American business $120 billion dollars a year. Thats a lot of billions.
The thing is though is that in order to revamp our power grids, build cleaner and more efficient power plants, and provide long lasting solutions to our current problems Americans have to unite under a common banner. This is going to be expensive and will need funding. Why doesn't the US give Americans the opportunity to put their money where there mouth is by offering energy bonds? With our highly regulated domestic electricity markets the government has much say in how the companies conduct themselves. Whether or not this is advantageous to our economy is not my point, my point is if we are to cut on energy consumption and increase energy production then we should make Americans the invested stockholder in our futures. The energy bonds could be converted into a common stake in such things as updated power grids and new power plants. Power companies already have to pay fees to other companies when their power travels across their lines, so the bonds could be repaid through those fees. The cut in energy loss should provide these companies with a cut in costs which would allow them the financial mobility to repay these bonds. I know, I am just firing this out, but it gets you thinking a little bit to.

So maybe I am a staff accountant/intern at a small public accounting firm. Maybe I don't know what the heck I am doing anyway (well not actually maybe) But I think that I have a vested interest in my future and I think that someday I will either end up in politics or will be on TV saying something about politics, even if it is only a 5 second clip, I gotta get in there somehow.

Say what? What you say?

Blake Gray

Life

Sometimes life really takes you by surprise. Sometimes it kicks you in the face. I think this last almost year of being back from the mission has been a huge roller coaster. In the end, I think I'm finally starting to really get comfortable with the flow of life. This, is of course great news..... at least I'll not call live links so often now.... it was starting to get kinda expensive. Totally kidding. Most of all I have to say the past year has been a rough change. I've always been as happy as always, but accepting that things will never be the way they were takes time. It is sort of a coarse recourse. I am happy to say a friend will be getting sealed soon. I think that has given more of that real happiness than anything else lately. I've had no role, no influence (positive), on anything to do with it. So good for them....

I started working at an accounting firm. My main prima set me up with it and now she is training me. It is fun to watch her twitch as I work. I really suck, but I'm learning. (I know it is hard, just be patient please) I have been happy with the past couple of months because I have returned a little more to my family. I could be successful in school, work, sports, politics, or anything. But if I am not a part of my family. I am nothing. I don't even want to be successful in my family, however that would be measured. I just want to be there when the pictures are taken.

This is what you get when you don't post for a while and find yourself looking back on the past in overview. I guess it is a little healthy.