According to some people that have interpreted the Mayan calendar, we have less than a year left on this rock.  2012 marks the last year of one of the most accurate calendars known to man… and it ends on December 21, 2012. Or December 12, 2012 depending on who you talk to.  This is not new to many of us, but there are still a few folks that are not aware of this little tidbit of info. This is important going into the year not because we have around 11 months to live, but because by 2012 we should not have to worry about this type of thinking, but we do. We still have people like Harold Camping;

Nutbag

this handsome young lad of only 90 years of age managed to swindle hundreds of people out of money donated to him because of his doomsday calculations that determined the end of the world was in May of 2011. When that didn’t happen the conservative Christian radio preacher claimed an “oops”  and cited his calculations were off and that the Rapture would instead be taking place in October 2011. It didn’t. Good ole’ Harry finally decided to call it quits at the tender age of 89 (in October of 2011 , of course) and in a private interview finally decided to admit that its impossible to know when the Rapture will occur. You would think that being a God-fearing man, Harold would return the donations he received from the people he suckered into his doomsday scam, but just like the Rapture, that’s not happening either.

So as the year begins,  lets not forget that magical thinking is dangerous and that common sense should not be cast aside even in moments of panic and fear.  The #1 movie at the beginning of 2012, is  The Devil Inside about exorcism. The main draw to this movie is the plausibility of the existence of demons and their possession of people. That’s right, in 2012, people still worry about demonic possessions. As a matter of fact, as late as 2010 the Catholic Church was training people on how to conduct exorcisms in Baltimore.  Do not  worry though, right down the street you too can get trained on how to get rid of the boogeyman in posh Scottsale, Arizona, by our state’s very own televangelist huckster Bob Larson. He can either help you get rid of imaginary monsters or he can teach you how to do it yourself, for a small fee of course. Never mind the fact that most “exorcisms” are the result of mental illness or seizure disorders, that could easily be explained by a competent mental health professional or neurologist. Unfortunately, for most exorcism patients in the past you can’t pray away a seizure and a little olive oil anointed on your forehead won’t get rid of your Schizophrenia.

The danger in this is not when people go and watch movies about demon possession or go and waste their money getting trained on how to use magic to deal with imaginary problems, but when people try to use magic to deal with real problems. At this point in our human existence we should not be relying on such arcane methods to solve our problems. Moreover, our political leaders should not rely on this method to handle government problems.  Just ask Rick Perry how praying our economic problems worked out.  

Our economy still sucks but I guess God probably won’t bother fixing it since this is our last year here anyway.

Arnie Bermudez

“Kindereggs are the best product ever invented. Toys encased in chocolate, even drugs don’t sell that good.”- Me