Originally posted on 03/19/2018:

The very first thought that crossed my mind was, I hope he didn't die, I hope he wasn't involved in a bad traffic accident or spending some serious time for a serious condition in a hospital. When a guy like brooks disappears from a place where he literally lives one might think the worst. Seriously, I wish no harm to no man and that includes my antagonists on this very forum. Each man's death diminishes us all in some small way.

Now my best friend dwightie often told me to...go kill myself. Yeah, true story. The poor guy is unable to defend himself intellectually so that is all that is left in his arsenal of weapons. "go kill yourself". But that is another story, told and retold for years.

Schadenfreude, do you know what that word means? If you are of German heritage you might, if not you probably don't. It is a word that basically means to take pleasure in another persons pain. How about that for strange. Well leave it to the Nazis. That is a very unfair statement, the German people and nation have made great strides in the past 70 or so years. A nation completely vanquished, hundreds of thousands died after the war from starvation and disease. American GI's after the war stated you could walk for miles and miles and not see a young man. All that one could see were women, old men and children. The remaining soldier aged men were either dead, or in some prison camp. The lucky ones in England or US. The unlucky in the USSR and 90% never returned. And the USSR had hundreds of thousands of German POW's.

Yes, Germany has made a huge comeback and they are to be admired. They went from an authoritarian extreme right wing government to a liberal democracy. Having said that Germany and many other nations are again returning to far right politics. Not conservative politics which is perfectly okay but far right politics which always includes extreme nationalism and hatred of immigrants. That never, ever turns out well for the country or for the world. If you consider yourself a far right crazy, if you think extreme nationalism and bigotry concerning immigrants is okay, well you are an extreme right wing crazy. Nothing else to be said.

Immigration in every single country should be carefully looked at and it should be limited, very few people argue with that fact. But, when a leader claims it is a good idea to stop all people from one particular country that is complete craziness. If you claim to be a conservative with conservative values you should be all for a free movement of people, with some very stringent rules. If you claim free enterprise is important well a spoke of free enterprise is the free movement of all people (within rules). You people that claim to be conservative but don't really know conservative values make me weak in the knees.

How do you think the USA became the powerful nation that it is. A bunch of reasons, many reasons but one of those important reasons was and is diversity. People from all over the world came and called the USA home, and the huge majority of those people added to our country, they didn't subtract. If you don't know that you don't know American history.

When the Irish first came over in huge numbers they were not appreciated. Why, why did the American natives (and I don't mean Indians) hate on the newest Irish immigrants. They claimed they stole jobs, that happens everywhere in every country, eliminating immigrants isn't the fix. The real reason was they were different. What people settled and founded the USA, basically they were WASP. The Irish are mostly Catholic that fact alone was what spurred much of the hatred. They believed in a pope and a bunch of other stuff that the English and Germans didn't. Now Scot/Irish are a little different.

We will always have people and leaders looking for a scapegoat. Today it is black people and immigrants. Those people were wrong throughout history and they are wrong again today. Big surprise right, they are never on the right side of history.

Earlier I wrote that I don't relish the demise of any human being and that is a true statement. I wish no harm to no human, even those I don't like. Now think back when you were young, a teenager or even in your 20's. How about some of the bad decisions you probably made. When I think back I am amazed that I made it out alive. Really, the stupid shit I did was simply amazing. Probably you too, right. One bad memory is driving on a rural road at 100 mph. I think about that and shiver. Any number of bad results but I got away with it. How about getting into fights. I wasn't much for fighting but every kid, or almost every kid gets into teen age fights. You wanted to pulverize you opponents face, nothing was severe enough, remember those days. Why? Why do young people make such bad choices? Not all do but most do.

Well it turns out that it isn't simply being young, or peer pressure even though they are important but recent science has uncovered that young people have an underdeveloped brain, especially the part of the brain called the pre something cortex. The exact name escapes me. That part of the brain controls impulse and decision making and it isn't developed, thus bad decisions. Young people almost can't help it. That is why good parenting is essential.
So if you have a young kid around and he/she is making bad decisions this knowledge might help you cope with the situation.

Back to the original premise. Brooks is okay and he is lurking. I know that for a fact. No need to worry about his underdeveloped brain it is still active, if you can call it that.