Bushbred,
sorry my attitude was a bit brusque, but then I do recall being called a "smart arse" and a "spoilt kid".
It seems OLO is dominated not only by males, but by elderly ones. We spend half our lives getting some sense and the other half repining its colossal expense. As Montaigne says: "To learn that one has said or done a foolish thing, that is nothing; one must learn that one is nothing but a fool, a much more comprehensive and important lesson."
I turn fifty this year, but I can boast of not being spoiled; after an indifferent education I worked in factories from the age of fourteen until about seven years ago, when I was widowerred(?) with four kids under eight (one still in nappies) and (delightfully) obliged to chuck it. Of course child rearing is a tedious business so to pass the time I sat the QTAC nonsense and got a degree in my spare time, then honours, now PhD. Of course I had a huge advantage--lots of reading and very little schooling!
My mature age studies left me disillusioned too--in an aesthetic that seemed almost palpable when I was reading (my eclectic list of) the greats. It was all chucked away (Arnold, Leavis et al) for culturalism and an anti-aesthetic. I'm in the process of redressing the balance!
Anyway, I wouldn't worry about the attitude of the grandkids; Some of us are slow learners, but nine (more like 5 probably) out of ten come to realise (as the dear queen mum put it) that good manners will get us through most of life's disasters.
...Of course I'm afraid, however, that manners no longer help in the world we leave behind, they may even hinder.

Squeers, thanks for the more tender comments, mate. After all, guess the best way to keep the OLO going is to finally get along with each other.

Anyway, guess we are bit the same in a way.

What I mean is your determination to look for some sort of good in this world.

That's why with others I am trying to give Obama a go, though could say with what's been happening lately it's likely to be close to a touch and go.

Bushbred: "I am trying to give Obama a go, though could say with what's been happening lately it's likely to be close to a touch and go".
Obama's just hit the wall of establishment--the geo-political "reality"; idealism can't stand up to that, it's just political fodder after all (Joh feeding the chooks, writ large). We live in a world of political realism, the rest is spin. Witness DavidF's CIA hitlist; 6mil and counting wasn't it?)

DavidF: "Isn't Marxism an ideology?"
Yes, but I'm not trying to resurrect Marxism.
Also: "How does one feign triumphalism?"
You were dishonestly triumphing over me: "I have shown where the manifesto calls for murder and specifies tyranny."
"Dishonest" because you must know that Marx was answering charges, here, that his system denied individuality. I cannot believe that such a learned man would "incompetently" quote out of context.
FYI: Francis Fukuyama instances another case of "feigned triumphalism".
Enough though.

God is certainly a human invention. But it surely wasn't an arbitrary invention? It was based on something. Why should human consciousness/intelligence be out of kilter with its experience of the world, such that metaphysics is entertained so obsessionally down through the ages?
The issue isn't that man invented God, it's why?

Squeers wrote: "God is certainly a human invention. But it surely wasn't an arbitrary invention? ... The issue isn't that man invented God, it's why?

OK. We agree that God is certainly a human invention. We can ask why the eastern religions such as Buddhism, Hinduism and Shinto didn't invent God. Why is it that the JCI religions invented God and others didn't? Is it arbitrary or is it a consequence of the difference in the societies?

I voted for Obama and still like him. His health bill will see 30,000,000 more Americans with cover. He is increasing taxes in the upper bracket, and that will reduce the disparity between them and the rest of us. He has started to funnel money into education. His Cairo speech was magnificent. Unlike most past presidents he is capable of admitting US wrongs and by interacting with such as Chavez indicates that the US is no longer the bully that it has been. He is ushering in a new era in US international relations. He has announced his priorities as health, education and energy. His health bill does not do everything I would like it to do, but it goes farther than any move in that direction in the past. He has announced that the US will be out of Iraq in 2011. If McCain had been elected we might be at war with Iraq. The US is in a de facto war economy, and that cannot be changed in a moment without great social dislocation.

DavidF: "Why is it that the JCI religions invented God and others didn't? Is it arbitrary or is it a consequence of the difference in the societies?"
I don't see the question of deity as all that important, since all religions (I think) are baed on the human sense of the numinous, for want of a better word. The reason, "why" humans inveterately invent gods is to make sense of their experience of the world; not because of their existential angst, mind you, but because of an inate capacity to perceive the anomolies in "reality". They're gods of the gaps. The answer might be simply that; that humans have genuine "spiritual" or uncanny sensations, perceptions. Religions rise up to cater for or exploit this capacity. So the next question is, what is this anomolous perception?

I like Obama too, he's an idealist like me. The problem, imho, is that the system is rotten; it has to be changed. As the rabid republicans are screaming, socialising healthcare will send the US broke. The so-called "third way" is unsustainable without increasing taxes, indeed without steep progressive taxation; it's also only sustainable in a global context. Australia's celibrated healthcare system is crumbling for the same reason; drastically uneven distribution of wealth. This third way is arguably what has prolonged capitalism, by creating a broader bourgeois base, its members happy to fantasise themselves as (petty) capitalists. The only way capitalism can keep going is to share the wealth more evenly (actually, it also has to become ecologically sustainable)--which would be preferable to a disastrous revolution. Reinforcing ideology with pathetic chants of "that's communism!" will eventually lose its efficacy (the masses are dim but will eventually wake up). Capitalism based on perpetual growth is unnecessary, as is creation of ever more production (rationalised as raising the masses out of poverty!). Such is only necessay to sustain the obscene wealth of a tiny minority. Capitalism is 'too big to fail', but it must reform

Hiya, agen', Squeers.

Yep, had a fair bit to do with capitalism, actually and naturally it was copied from a Jewish term early in the Enlightenment, interesting that the term sacrificial appears to be part of it.

Certainly sound original terms should make a difference as do stupidly simple terms like Free Market and Deregulation, sounding too much like - go for broke or rip, sh-t and plunder.

Seems like Michael Moore wants to get rid of Capitalism, with his call for a New Economic Order....