Sherman's March

The Trip to Ohio

2009-08-15T20:59:00.002-04:00

Hey there! I've been gone for a couple of weeks now, due to a visit from my two daughters. I haven't been with them since Christmas '08 and wanted to devote every moment to them. I've been oblivious tothe whole town hall health care metting thing, but I am looking for the first one I can find to attend. Anyway, here's a letter going to the management of Northwest/Delta Airlines regarding the trip with my girls back to thier home in Ohio.

Dear Sir or Madame,

On August 10, 2009 I set out with my two daughters L****** (9 yrs. old) and E**** (5 yrs. old) to travel from White Plains, NY (HPN) to Cincinnati, OH (CVG) with a connection in DTW. They had been visiting me in Valhalla, NY and I was returning them to their mother in Lebanon, OH.

The first leg of our trip from HPN to Detroit Metro (DTW) aboard NW flight XXXX went fine. We arrived at DTW to make our connection to CVG aboard NW flight 2451. That is when all the trouble started. Before we got off the aircraft, the flight attendant announced that our gate for the connecting flight was at C36. After de-plane-ing I checked the video board and saw the gate had changed to C16. When we got to C16 the departure time had changed to 8:00 p.m. instead of the scheduled 7:15 p.m. Next the gate was changed again to gate B4. So my little troupers and me walked down to B4. I need a crutch to walk correctly so it took a bit of time. Arriving at B4 the departure time had changed again to 8:30 p.m. Now I had to get in touch with Enterprise Rent-A-Car to let them know my arrival was going to be delayed because I knew that their CVG facility closes at 10:00 p.m. and I didn’t want to get stranded at CVG without the ability to get a car to drive my minor children the 45 miles to their home in Lebanon.

After a brief stay at gate B4, NW once again changed the gate to gate B6. It was the next gate down, so to was not a big hassel to move. But when we got to gate B6, yet again the departure time had been pushed back to 9:00 p.m. So I had to make another round of calls to secure a car, and to notify my ex-wife of our ever changing arrival time. My poor daughters would now not be getting into their beds until way past midnight. After a brief stay at B6, NW announced again that the gate was changing and everyone on flight 2451 now how had to hike back to gate C14.

At C14, NW again delayed the departure time to 10:00 p.m. They also announced that the actual aircraft was at the gate, but the crew had timed out and a new crew was on the way to fly us all to CVG. At about 10:15 NW announced that flight 2451 to CVG was now cancelled, and the real fun was about to begin.

After approximately another 15 minutes, the NW representative announced that NW was arranging to hire a bus to drive the passengers of NW2451 from DTW to CVG that very evening. A 5+ hour drive, in the middle of the night. How very sensitive and caring of NW to provide their passengers with such accommodation! The NW representative then told us that first we had to walk down to Luggage Claim belt #3 and collect our checked baggage in order to bring it on the bus with us. He told us the bus would have a luggage compartment for our bags, and that he would meet us at Luggage Claim belt #3 at 11:45 p.m.

My little girls were totally exhausted at this point and the long walk with a daddy using a crutch wasn’t a memory they will enjoy. All the passengers of NW2451 got to Luggage Claim belt #3 and collected our bags. NW finally did something competent at DTW! The NW representative arrived at midnight, and told us the bus was about 30 minutes from arriving. We would be ON THE ROAD around 12:30 a.m., 8/11/09, to arrive at CVG with the days sunrise. BTW, I had my return flight to HPN scheduled for departure at 11:15 a.m. on 8/11/09, just to let you know.

It was shortly past 12:35 a.m. when the “bus” arrived to drive all of us to CVG. The passengers of NW2451 were expecting an over-the-road type coach bus, with baggage compartments and padded reclining seats. After all, NW was sending us on a 5+ hour ride, in the middle of the night, with no chance to get any sleep.
The vehicle that showed up to transport the passengers of NW 2451 to CVG was nothing anyone expected, not even the NW representative. Our “bus” was an around-the-town, see-the-sights-of-Detroit-in-three-hours tour bus. It had no luggage compartments, forcing the passengers to ride with their checked baggage on their laps, and the seats –oh the seats-, these were two-person common park benches made with wooden planks for seats and seat backs and wrought iron arm rests!!!! And NW expected us to sit for 5+ hours on these with our luggage on our laps. Who at NW thinks this was acceptable accommodation or service for the passengers of NW2451?

About twenty of us decided that enough was enough and we were no longer going to stand for anymore of this piss-poor treatment. We got off the bus and demanded the NW representative make us more acceptable arrangements. After telling us of his own embarrassment at what his company was providing, he went and got the “protestors” vouchers to spend what was left of the night at the Four-Points Sheraton. He also told us that there would be a proper coach at Baggage Claim belt #3 at 7:00 a.m. to drive us to CVG. He also got some booking agents to re-arrange our flight schedules upon our arrival at CVG. When it was my turn at the counter, the agent said the first available flight from CVG to HPN would leave CVG at 2:30 p.m. on 8/11/09 for DTW, with a connection in Detroit at leaving at 5:40 p.m. to HPN. When I asked if she could book me on a direct flight from CVG to HPN, I was told that I did not pay for a direct flight, so none was going to be offered. What rude, un-accommodating people and practices NW/Delta employs. NW/Delta was the cause of all this trouble and all your company was trying to do was to get rid of the “Interrupted Travel” passengers as cheaply as possible. This is no way to run an airline, and when your company fails, it will be because it deserves to.

Anyway, on with the record of events. A shuttle to the Sheraton arrived to take us to the hotel with our vouchers. BTW, no vouchers for food were provided, and none of us had eaten for at least 6-7 hours. Another consideration completely ignored by NW. Before we left DTW, we were told that the shuttles ran every 10 minutes and our bus in the morning would leave DTW at 7:00 a.m. So we got to the Sheraton, checked in, ordered cheeseburgers, went to our room, ate and went to sleep. It was 2:15 a.m., 8/11/09.

Our 6:00 a.m. wake-up call got my girls and I moving and we got to the lobby at 6:30 a.m. I asked the desk clerk when the next shuttle was leaving, and she said “they leave on the half-hour, the next one leaves at 7:00 a.m.” Just great! Now the three of us are in danger of missing the bus to CVG. When we got to Luggage Claim belt #3, there was no bus to be found, and no other passengers of NW2451 to be found. I returned to the counter where our re-booking took place 5 hours earlier, and no one at the counter knew anything about the morning bus. One woman who appeared to be in charge said she heard about the bus, but that it left at 1:00 a.m. She said she’d try and find out more information about what was going on. That was the last straw. I was no longer willing to let NW/Delta have any control over my daughters and myself. I asked the woman for a local phone book, which she provided and I called a car service. I made arrangements for a car to pick up my daughters and myself at DTW and drive us to CVG. I left the NW/Delta people to themselves.

The car arrived and my girls and I left DTW. I had the driver make a diversion to my girls’ home in Lebanon, OH then proceeded to CVG arriving at 12:30 p.m. to check in for my 2:30 p.m. flight to DTW then onto HPN.

When I got to the gate for my flight to DTW, once again the departure gate had changed. When I got to the new gate, the departure time had also changed. Here we go again. Now the flight was going to leave at 3:00 p.m. Then 3:30 p.m. Then 4:00 p.m. They finally boarded the plane at 4:30 p.m. and once on the plane the pilot announces that someone wants the plane to fly a new route to avoid some weather issue and it would be sometime before the new route was planned and approved and any extra fuel required was put onto the aircraft. When the clocked showed 5:00 p.m. and the plane was still on the ground, at the gate, I knew I had no chance of making my connecting flight at DTW. So I told the flight attendant that I wanted to get off this plane to make other arrangements to get back to my home in Valhalla, NY. I was no longer willing to trust NW/Delta to get me home. Once off the plane the NW gate agent told me that there were no other flights on any airline at CVG that would get me to HPN on 8/11/09. So I had him book me on another NW/Delta fight to DTW, then onto HPN leaving CVG at 6:40 a.m. on 8/12/09. So I went and got myself a room at the CVG airport Sheraton, where I had dinner in my room and spent the night.

On 8/12/09 I finally got on the flight to DTW, where upon arriving at my connecting gate, once again NW/Delta had changed the gate. This incompetence just would not stop! The flight to HPN eventually got off the ground and arrived at the gate at HPN about 30 minutes late. But at least I was no longer in the clutches of NW/Delta. And never will be again. NW/Delta has not lost just one customer. You have lost three, because I will not trust NW/Delta with my or my daughter’s good treatment any longer. Me and my daughter L****** are both SkyMiles members, but not for very long.

What I am requiring from NW/Delta is the following:

•Full re-imbursement for our complete flight (3 tickets) from HPN to CVG on the day of 8/10/09. Please don’t offer me any credits, or say that I don’t deserve re-imbursement for the HPN to DTW leg of the trip. That amount is $ 4XX.XX

•Full re-imbursement for the $15.00 checked baggage fee that I paid at HPN on 8/10/09

•Full re-imbursement for the car service from DTW to CVG on 8/11/09. That amount is $6XX.XX

•Full re-imbursement for my stay overnight at the Sheraton at CVG on 8/11/09. That amount is $1XX.XX

•This comes to a total re-imbursement of $XXXX.XX

I have included copies of all my receipts and “Interrupted Travel” documentation. Everything else I have said in this letter, you can check through your own records.

I have never had such a foul travel experience in my life. I would like to describe the service provided by NW/Delta in the most disparaging terms I can find, but I cannot. The reason I cannot is because NW/Delta did not provide ANY SERVICE to speak of. Service was non-existent. And I don’t blame the people that we dealt with face-to-face. The blame rightly falls on the decision makers behind the scenes, and the management that put these shoddy screw-the-customer policies in place.

I will not be deterred from collecting my re-imbursements either. My younger sister is an attorney here in New York, so I get my legal services for free. It won’t cost me a dime to get my money back. And the “best man” at my wedding, a friend for 30 years is a producer for Fox News Channel at their headquarters in Manhattan. FNC, especially the Fox and Friends morning show with Steve Doocy, Gretchen Carlson and Brian Kilmeade is always looking for human interest “filler” segments, and airline horror stories are particularly desirable and popular. And boy does this one fit the bill.- partially disabled man, travelling with two minor children gets totally screwed over by NW/Delta.

My contact information is as follows:

Domenick A. Colangelo Jr.
194 ******* Ave.
********, NY 10***

***-***-3659 (H)
***-***-8150 (M)

Email: dcolangelojr@******.com

I hope NW/Delta chooses to settle this matter quickly and completely without trying to wriggle out from under with the cheapest cost possible. If I do not receive everything that I feel is due me, which I have outlined above, I will not hesitate to make every effort to get this story into as many media outlets as possible (beginning with Fox and Friends) and earn for NW/Delta and it’s management (right up to the CEO) the kind of publicity no company wants. I await your response.

Signed,

___________________________
Domenick A. Colangelo, Jr.

Cap and Trade, A Carbon Copy Precedent On Deadly Ground

2009-08-06T21:16:00.010-04:00

A Washington mimics Hollywood’s Art Memo by Individualist (TheIndividualist@comcast.net)
“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

We’ve heard the pontificating speeches of our Greenier in Chief and similar ones from the Hollywood Actor Steven Seagal before him in the movie “On Deadly Ground”

What was a panned movie rumored to be the end of an actor’s career is a starting play for a Presidency. Two heads on the same bad penny. However, being a bad actor in Washington is seldom punished.

On Deadly Ground is a 1994 environmental action-adventure film, co-produced, directed by and starring Steven Seagal. The film was a commercial disaster and is rumored to be the death knell for Steven Seagal’s career as a number one box office talent. The movie takes aim at oil companies depicting them as evil murderers out to pollute the world. Steven plays an ex Green Beret/ Navy Seal CIA part Eskimo superspy who just wants the nice quiet life of a specialist in putting out oil fires. Go figure, the evil Big Oil men however have other ideas and so we have action, murder and adventure on the Alaskan frontier. The movie held all the predictable liberal clichés against the Oil Companies but the real kicker was the three minute speech at the end in which Steven as Forest Taft rails against everything from corruption, to government ineptitude even suggesting we had cars capable of running on water and electricity for 50 years if only the Oil companies had not stopped it. He even took off the tinfoil hat. The eerie thing is that President Obama has given many parts of this same speech over and over again. The rhetoric is a carbon copy of the same tired propaganda that has been pushed on us since Jimmy Carter.

The only thing that is new is that now these individuals finally have a short window of uncontested power due to political serendipity. Despite the slim margin of victory ( 52% to 46%) the media has used its monopolistic influence to push drastic and radical changes exacerbating and creating one of the greatest economic crises since the FDR era. The democrats have been placing one bill after another indebting our country and reducing our standard of living to meet their utopian fantasies. The most recent bill is the boondoggle tax nightmare called Cap and Trade which the Obama Administration admits will skyrocket electricity costs.

How does this law work, essentially it is the worst of a tax and a regulation scheme. The government places a cap on the amount of greenhouse gases that a producer can emit to a “desired” limit. Producers will have to get a permit for the amount of pollution they emit. A producer that manages to somehow reduce emissions below their allowance will then have a permit that they can sell to other producers that cannot as yet meet the limitation. The sinister issue with this law is that the government is free to change the caps on different businesses thus allowing them to pick winners and losers. Given that the government is now a major stockholder in several banks, auto companies and General Electric due to the Fascist manipulation of the TARP funds they have incentive to do just that.

But the real question is this. Why? For what reason are we enacting an 800 billion dollar a year regressive tax that will trickle down to the consumers? The short answer is Global Warming. But what does that mean? How do we know this is even necessary? This is the issue that I wish to discuss in this article. The Science or the relative lack thereof is what we are concerned with at the present time.

I have spent some time over the last three years looking into what I could of this issue out of my own curiosity. What I can tell you is that the reports and data that are made available for the general public seem to focus on discussing the negative consequences that will inevitably arise from effects of increased carbon in the atmosphere. When the causes of the increase are discussed one is usually referred to a graph that shows a “Hockey Stick”. The last ten years plus the next projected 10 years show an increase in CO2 levels that is an increase made to appear at least 10 times the changes in the last 800,000 years. In some graphs the stick is left open ended to indicate no limit to the increase. This however does not reference the proof for this claim.

In my research initially I found reference to three experiments designed to illustrate the CO2 levels over time. These were the Antarctic Ice Cores, The Greenland Ice Cores and a study of the pores in leaves. The research I read two years back referred to the fact that the Antarctic Ice Core samples were considered the premium source of evidence. The tree leaf study was said to be varying too much because of seasonal changes and was considered the worst evidence. In researching this article today I did not find mention of this study, it may be that it is no longer considered valid so I will instead concentrate on the ice core samples which I could obtain support. Essentially the ice cores are measured to indicate the year the ice was created. This ice is then melted in a vacuum chamber and the resulting concentration of gases can evidence for you how much CO2 was concentrated in the atmosphere at the time.

Of note is the fact that the experiments between the Greenland Ice Cores and the Antarctic Ice cores do not really agree. The concentrations in Greenland are much higher and not just in the last 50 years. Scientists explain that this is due to the calcium carbonate which contaminates the ice. This residue is due to the large amount of volcanism in Greenland. The scientists state that when you carefully select ice cores in Greenland that are apart from the volcanic activity that they in fact agree but the articles never seem to state which parts of the glacier this is so I don’t know more than that.

The US Global Change Research Program is set up by congress to provide a report detailing the effects of climate change. Like the other research I found it references in detail the projected effects of increased CO2 in the report titled “Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States” produced by this organization. On page 13 of the 196 page report is shown a graph indicating the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere in parts per million (ppm) over 800,000 years including the infamous “Hockey” stick. The caption and legend in the graph explain that this research comes from the Antarctic ice cores. This report made by the Cambridge press was delivered to congress as evidence.

Fair enough, so Indy we have the proof, we have the report. Antarctica is in the South Pole, away from pollution therefore it is the superior evidence. Here’s my observations:

Antarctica is probably the coldest place on the planet. The coldest recorded temperature is -89⁰C in 1983. The south pole ranges from -115⁰F (-81.67⁰C) to -6⁰F (-21.1⁰C). The reason that Antarctica is so cold is due to several factors including the fact that it is landlocked and has a higher elevation. The key point is that the temperature falls below -78.5⁰C at times. This is the temperature at which CO2 condenses as a solid in normal atmosphere. We note that temperatures in Greenland while cold and considered Arctic do not seem to get low enough to condense CO2.

CO2 is heavier than water. It weighs 44g/mol as opposed to 18g/mol for H20. Water is also a very unique substance in that it is actually lighter in its solid form that its liquid form due to the ability of the atoms to form crystals. We note that like a miner panhandling for gold the heavier substances will tend to go to the bottom due to their weight. Antarctica is noted for whiteouts and storms where the wind picks up ice and moves it around.

So when we obtain an ice core form Antarctica the question becomes what effect on the amount of CO2 found dissolved in the ice is the fact that the CO2 for a time is frozen, moves below the ice and then later sublimates (turns to a gas) and escapes. Would we not expect to find that there would be elevated levels of CO2 in the upper levels of the ice cores. This is just my hypothesis because in what I have been able to read this issue does not seem to be discussed although the issue of calcium carbonate is discussed for the Greenland ice Cores. It is also possible that less CO2 could be found as a result although I can’t determine why this should be so via thought experiment. It is interesting to note that the modified Greenland studies eliminating the Calcium Carbonate are said to match Antarctic cores when Greenland does not get cold enough to freeze CO2. If Antarctic temperature is a factor then would we not have to gauge the temperature during the yearly cycles in order to get a true picture of the data from our ice core experiments? What is the result of this on the experiments and what if anything was done to account for it? Would this mean the CO2 increase is less than the “Hockey” stick projects? I am not sure but then again the articles are silent on the subject as well.

The next question I have for the scientists that I have found little information on and no one seems to answer is quite simple. If the levels of CO2 in our atmosphere at the present time are not optimum whether due to nature or the activities of man then what is Optimum. If I had a magic wand and could magically set the (ppm) of CO2 in our atmosphere what is the number that you suggest. You say we moved from 280 to 380. OK what number should it be? Do we even know? If not what numbers do we guess that it should be at? To my mind if I were going to force industry and ultimately the taxpayer to spend 800 billion dollars on a project to terraform mother earth this is the first question I would want answered before I began on that prospect. One thing I do know is that that this number must be somewhere below 5% of the atmosphere. That high a concentration is lethal to most plants and animals. Beyond that I have no idea nor has anything that I have read which discusses Climate Change ever even mention this line of reasoning. This I find curious.

I do know from watching the science channel that deep in the earth’s past at the dawn of the age of the reptiles that there was thought to be five times the level of CO2 in the atmosphere than today due to volcanism. It also is thought that the planet had twice the biomass (the amount of life on the planet). Given in recent history we are lectured on the population bomb by the same liberal interest groups, would increasing the amount of food we can grow not be a benefit.

I did find the following articles that found some benefits to elevated CO2:

Elevated carbon dioxide and ozone levels have surprising effects on northern hardwood forests

“Kubiske says he looks at the elevated CO2 issue a bit differently than most scientists. “Green plants and all they co-exist with have evolved over time. If you look at most of the green plants today, you find they have an excess capacity to take up carbon dioxide. That’s why they grow faster when you give them more CO2. Their physiology allows that; it evolved in the distant past, when CO2 was higher. So my response is, if green plants have excess capacity to make use of excess CO2, why not the whole system have this capacity? This isn’t the kind of thinking that has steered the scientific community, who has been looking for a more negative consequence of elevated CO2.”

Surprise: Earths’ Biosphere is Booming, Satellite Data Suggests CO2 the Cause

This article suggests that NASA satellite data show the earth has had an increase in biomass.

On Saturday June 7 an article appeared on the Financial post website labeled “In Praise of CO2” by Don Mills, Ontario. The article stated that GPP and NPP are on their way up. From the article:

“GPP is Gross Primary Production, a measure of the daily output of the global biosphere –the amount of new plant matter on land. NPP is Net Primary Production, an annual tally of the globe’s production. Biomass is booming. The planet is the greenest it’s been in decades, perhaps in centuries.”

I will reprint the text of the article for reference as it is no longer available on the website if I am able. It is interesting.

My greatest fear about what the liberals have done by politicizing this issue is the ultimate retardation of scientific progress in this area. They have latched on to this issue in order to justify their controlling policies as a method of back door socialism. In doing so they attack and do everything in their power to discredit and counter dissent. Anyone who questions is treated as an enemy because to them the political gain and not the science is what is important. When I read that scientists have uncovered some aspect of this issue that leads to a positive benefit to increased CO2 on some scale there is a reluctance that can be garnered from the tone. They begin with apologies or statements that the negative benefits outweigh the good or they are couched in the body of the article in scientific prose designed to put the lay person asleep before they get to the point. Scientists practically live off University Tenure and Government grants. They have a vested interest in not making public any finding that would thwart the political powers that be. True scientific progress cannot be made in a climate of fear.

If the politicians are perpetuating a fraud (knowingly or unknowingly) or are simply exaggerating the problem for political benefit it will eventually be found out. Granted from a political perspective it may be so far down the road that the reveal does not or cannot derail the policy as it becomes ingrained. How many of us remember the politicians or scientists who just 20 years ago told us man made pollution would put us in an ice age?

However, in the public mind things like CO2 levels will become that erroneous thought process that was debunked. Science in this area will then have no funding. This is unfortunate because the actual science behind this is crucial to the prospect of being able to engage in terraforming of other planets, most notably the planet Mars. Levels of CO2 and Water Vapor, what they mean and other such mysteries are a necessary understanding to have in order to be able to make an inhospitable planet livable. This issue should be researched for the purposes of science and politics should be kept out of it.

Alas the Democrat party will not allow that. They make ridiculous claims such as in 25 years if we do not do something earth will no longer support life as we know it. The rhetoric is eternally ramped because the more we shout and ooh and aw the less likely we are to pay attention to the man behind curtain.

Obama is showing us the true meaning of the phrase: “The more things change, the more things stay the same”

Indulging Craziness

2009-07-26T10:40:00.001-04:00

I'll bet this has happened to you. Some friend or relative is a little bit nuts -- maybe they just are, or maybe they have been burned by painful experiences. So they get very anxious about imaginary threats and outraged by imagined injustices. Maybe they're paranoid because they're smoking dope, or they drive drunk because they're young and stupid and think it's cool. Or maybe they're just jealous of people who look happier, or prettier, or have better toys. It's just ordinary human folly. And to keep the peace, we indulge their craziness.

That's our biggest mistake. That's why we are in such trouble as a people and a culture.

We have been taught to indulge craziness. It's supposed to show that we're "compassionate". Psychiatrists know this: If you let crazy folks set the rules, you have to get crazy right along with them. It doesn't matter if your client is crazy for good reasons. The cause doesn't matter one little bit. Good therapists are taught never to indulge craziness, because that just makes everything worse. Alcoholics Anonymous has long understood exactly the same thing. Real compassion doesn't mean joining people in the pits. That just means that you get two crazy people instead of just one. And then you get more and more, as the phony compassion spreads.

Our culture is now actively teaching racial paranoia to blacks, gender paranoia to women, and abuse paranoia to everybody with a beef. All those exaggerated fears and phony fits of rage have been cynically whipped up by the Left to grab more power. That's their Compassion Fascism. The rest of us go along, because we don't want to be bothered to stand up against it. But in the aggregate, over time, we have become a culture driven loopy by race, gender, and group paranoia. We have adopted the madness of the most race-obsessed people, and made them rich. Over time, they have worn down our sanity, so that our culture has literally gotten crazy.

Obama's first crazy-making person was probably his father substitute in Hawaii. By all accounts Frank Marshall was a race-obsessed black guy. It's not that he was wrong to feel angry, at the time. There were a ton of injustices against blacks. It's rather that he turned his pain into fanatical campaign of hatred, spreading it around to everybody else. That was Obama's first father figure in Hawaii.

Enter Henry Louis Gates, Al Sharpton, Jeremiah Wright, Louis Farrakhan, Attorney General Eric Holder and Barack Obama: All of them built fame and wealth on paranoid race politics. Enter Ruth Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor, Barbara Boxer (I'm no lady, I'm a Senator!), and an endless Conga Line of victim feminists. Look what those folks have done to Sarah Palin -- a high-tech lynch mob, driven mad with envy of Palin's good looks, popularity and joie de vivre. In the universities raging feminists, blacks, Hispanics, Native Americans and Queer Studies nabobs -- among others -- have exploited the career specialty of victimology. It's a standard way to get tenure and promotion -- by slander, rumor-mongering and intimidation. We've seen the faculty lynch mob at Duke U going after white lacrosse players. At Harvard, it's how the Left fired Larry Summers for daring to tell the truth.

Summers used to be a respectable economist, more or less, but now he is toeing the mendacious Obama line on the economy. Is it possible he was just burned at Harvard? Maybe Larry learned fear of the lynch mob at Harvard U, and Obama now has him under his thumb.

You see fear in the eyes of white guys around Obama. Brian Williams has his eyes cast down. Tim Geithner has this little head bow, looking at Obama with fear in his eyes while keeping his head bowed down. They look for all the world like Step ‘n Fetchit. That's all very amusing for purposes of racial revenge, but it means Obama is surrounded with lying commissars who fear to tell him the truth. Michelle is even scarier than hubby, and must be a terror in the White House. It was Michelle who got IG Walpin fired from her private playpen, Americorps. It's Michelle who is the child of the Chicago Machine, after all.

So this White House really does have Czars - Obama being Numero Uno -- and a Czarina -- Michelle, who supports the atmosphere of intimidation. If Obama seems badly out of touch with reality, the answer should be obvious: By spreading fear he guarantees that his commissars will lie to him. That's how the Roman Caesars drifted more and more out of touch as they gained more and more power. It's how Europe's monarchs managed to live in isolated splendor, totally in a glass bubble. It's how the Chinese and Japanese courts began to live out a Noh play.

Humans have a hard time facing reality. Power-hungry people drift into their own fantasy world by cutting off the truth-tellers. This is the most fantasy-driven administration in US history. That will be their downfall, as we are already beginning to see right in front of our eyes.

“CHINA, HOW YOU GONNA KEEP THEM DOWN ON THE FARM” (A Parody in Song)

2009-07-25T21:52:00.000-04:00

Visual Poetry by Individualist (TheIndividualist@comcast.net)“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

These verses are a Parody of the song How you gonna keep em down on the Farm inspired by the metaphor of my post comparing the situation in China with the Book, the Animal Farm.

Enjoy

Note: General Secretary pronounced (Gen’ral Sec’try in the song)

Verse 1:

General Secretary I’ve been Thinking
Said the Bureau Chief
“Now the US is in our debt,
It’s no trouble to control the farm”
General Secretary, started barking
Wiping away the sweat
He pulled the aparatchik up close
And then Threatened with a grin

Chorus(Repeat Twice):

How we gonna keep em down on the farm
When the Freedom Bell Rings
How ya gonna keep em away from You Tube
Tweating Protests
All over the net
How will the State keep the people in fear
That’s the test you see
They’ll never carry your little red book
Who will give your half truths a second look
How will ya know Mao’s Thoughts are all they’ll hear
When the Freedom Bell Rings

Verse 2:

General Secretary, Your mistaken
Said the Bureau Chief
“Once a worker always a prole
And workers always pay the state’s toll”
“Oh Bureau Chief, I’m not fakin’
Tho’ you may think it strange;
But Liberty’s call plays the mischief
With the hammer of the state”

“CHINA, HOW YOU GONNA KEEP THEM DOWN ON THE FARM”

2009-07-25T20:53:00.001-04:00

By Individualist (TheIndividualist@comcast.net)“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

Over 150 Dead in riots in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region in clashes between the government supported Han Chinese and the Turkish speaking Muslim minority the Uyghurs. Recently the Obama administration has released several Uyghurs to Bermuda. The question is what is going on in Western China and why has the American government not been more forthright in detailing what is going on. In reviewing the various facets of the story which I could sneak past the Great Firewall of China (Thanks Google – Don’t Be Evil), I realized that to truly understand this story we must go back to the simple basics found down on the Farm”.

The Animal Farm that is………………………………………………………………

The area known as the Xinjiang Autonomous Region of Communist China is located in North Western China. It is populated by Turkish speaking Muslims. Independence in this area is not some dream that is supported by wishful thinking anti-communist conservatives in the west. Since the end of the Qing Dynasty they have had different degrees of independence and self governance. In October of 1933 they declared independence and formed the Islamic Republic of East Turkestan which lasted one year. Again in 1944 they declared Independence as the Second East Turkestan Republic under the guidance of the Soviet Union but were retaken by China in 1949. China reclassified the area as an autonomous region in 1955.

Oddly enough the region is rich in oil and the economic opportunities have driven interest by the Chinese government. The government has encouraged migration to the area by Han Chinese. The population of Han Chinese has increased from 5% in 1940 to 40% as of 2008. The facts that I have garnered above come from my research at the websites of NPR and the Council of Foreign Relations. In analyzing the racial aspect of the situation we note several Easter eggs the Chinese government has hidden.

There is a great deal of racial tension among the groups and ethnic discrimination in China is a major problem that the Chinese government tries very had to hide from the west. Ethnic tension among the Uyghurs dates back to the 1750’s. In America we would call this attitude racism but since China is a utopia for leftists the terminology is altered somewhat to soften the impact. It can be inferred by an analysis that the actions of the Chinese government are meant to inflame racial tensions among the ethnic Muslims. In 2002, the Chinese government gave information that the separatist group the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) was receiving aid from Al Qaeda. Since the communist government is known for falsifying information the exact nature of the claims is suspect. There is some conjecture that the ETIM does not have significant ties to the Bin Laden network but have had some contact. This explains our reluctance to return the Uyghurs captured in Afghanistan back to China and instead we have removed them to neutral countries. In 2006 we transferred Uyghurs captured to Albania and again in 2009 to Bermuda.

These then are the relevant facts of the case. What exactly is it that one should derive from them. For me I can’t help seeing many parallels between the governments, the people involved and the media outlets and the book by George Orwell, “Animal Farm”. I think that I will do my best to describe the metaphor by trying to point out who is who in the cast of characters.

Snowball

Rebiya Kadeer is an activist for the Uyghur people. Her story is one that in one sense is even more compelling than that of Andrew Carnegie, John Rockefeller, Henry Ford, Bill Gates or Herman Cain, each n their own right a great American “Industrialist”. She started out in the Uyghur Autonomous region of China as a laundress and managed within communist China as an ethnic minority to become a millionaire. She was such an outstanding success that the Chinese government appointed her to the National Congress.

When she spoke out against the abuses of her people however they stripped her of her power and put her in jail for five years. Due to her humanitarian efforts she won several awards which forced the Chinese government to release her in 2005. She now works from a small office in Washington DC. The Chinese government has used its influence to threaten the Norwegian Nobel Committee to keep her from obtaining a Nobel Peace Prize. She is followed by the Chinese version of the CIA, An Chuan Ting and there has been one assassination attempt on her life in Virginia.

Her story is told in the book the Dragon Fighter.
Dragon Fighter
One Woman’s Epic Struggle for Peace with China
Rebiya Kadeer
with Alexandra Cavelius
Introduction by His Holiness The Dalai Lama
Kales Press, a W. W. Norton affiliate
ISBN-13: 978-0-99798456-1-1

Rebiya is a perfect example of the metaphor George Orwell was attempting to explain in the character of Snowball. Although he was a revolutionary in his own way Snowball was unknowingly for capitalism. He was the inspiration for the idea of the windmill on the farm. He was the one that wanted to use the capital of the animal’s labors to better their plight. This is something the industrialist, the small business owner, the inventor and the marketer of ideas does through free market capitalism. To me Capitalism is not a philosophy like Marxism, Fascism or Libertarianism. Capitalism exists no matter what form of government you employ. There will always be capital and any society will have to make use of that capital in order to continue. Whether it is handled by individuals or collectivist organizations, the laws that will dictate the results are best explained by Capitalism. Capitalism therefore to me is a science, a model in much the same way that gravity or quantum physics is a model for the associated aspects of the Universe. What we refer to as the philosophy of capitalism I think is better stated as Free Market Individualism. Something I wholly support. Thus like Snowball the ruling pigs in China had to force Rebiya off the farm because her ideas were troubling their endeavors to create a collectivist state to rule.

The Young Pigs and the Hens

In the book the Animal Farm any animal that was perceived as trying to stand up for themselves or questioning the ideas of Napoleon ended up being put to death. These included among others the Hens who started the Egg rebellion and the four young pigs who spoke against Napolean in the meetings before they were disbanded.

As in the book this story has its victims. Among these are the 165 dead in the riots and sadly Mrs. Kadeers youngest son, Alim Abdureyim who on July 1, 2006 confessed to political crimes authorities in China after being tortured. The torture began on June 25, 2006.

We are not sure as to his injuries, I have no knowledge that he is even alive and how do I find out. Ask the Chinese consolate? Why believe them? All I can do is pray that the angels watch over him. The NPR article states the the Chinese government has a 99% conviction rate because evidence of torture is not reason to throw out a confession under Chinese law.

Napoleon and the Rulings Pigs

In Animal Farm the pigs take the leadership role supervising the work and eventually moving into the manor house to take over as the de facto leaders of the farm, rewriting the rules to suit themselves and others. I understand that China is ruled by the Communist Party, that they are controlled by a Central Committee but what does that mean, exactly. To gain further insight I decided to go to the Constitution of China itself. In particular the 2,618 words (translated to English) and five pages dedicated to membership in the Communist party.

Evidently it is not as simple as going down to the DMV, filling out the registration form and placing a check by the D as a communist in America would do. No you have to be 18, you have to show knowledge of Marxist Leninism with Mao Zedong thought, you must have the recommendation of two full members of the Communist party who are responsible for your work ethic and ensuring you think like a communist, you have to fill out an application which must be reviewed at a general meeting where it needs approval, and then you are a probationary member. After a year’s probation where you show you are worthy you will be accepted as a full member and even then you must “work on party programs” and pay dues. Geez even the Unions in this country don’t expect you to actually work.

Within the membership section it explains that all members must join a branch or a cell which shall be subordinate to higher party organizations which in turn take their marching orders from the Central Committees and the National Congress. While it does say that the election of delegates shall be held by a secret ballot (Hey at least that is better than card check), it does state that who gets to be on the list is subject to “full deliberation and discussion”. The thing I find hilarious is that the Article 11 of Chapter I Membership of the constitution gives specific instructions on how to handle those elections where there are more people on the ballot than are delegate slots available as if that is a rare occurrence. Of course if there is any issue with a lower party branch’s elections, the next ruling body has the authority to invalidate that election and take appropriate measure. Makes you rethink the purpose of the hammer and sickle.

The words in the Chinese constitution that provide the best metaphor for the Pigs in Animal Farm are from Article 2 of Chapter I Membership which is listed below:

Members of the Communist Party of China are at all times ordinary members of the working people. Communist Party members must not seek personal gain or privileges, although the relevant laws and policies provide them with personal benefits and job-related functions and powers.

Don’t seek material gain and of course you are then bestowed with material benefits. It must be a Zen thing I guess. To Hu Jintao I only have this to add. Would not the following have been easier than five pages of complicated rules and still have said the same thing:

“All Animals are Equal
Some Animals are more Equal than others” - George Orwell, Animal Farm

Squealer

In Animal Farm, Squealer represents the propaganda arm of the government. He is the Pig that has the gift of the blarney and will go out to tell the carefully crafted lies to the workers and people in order to cover up, spin and explain away the actions of the government. He is the huckster working the three card Monte deck who seems to be able to use his verbal sleight of hand in such a way that you only see the red queen when he wants you to see it. In our metaphor Squealer is represented by the Chinese government’s diplomatic mouth pieces.

It really is not important which marketing agent the Chinese use to spread their message so much as it is the message itself. In regard to this I have two examples

South African Article

The following article can be found on IOL a premiere news service in South Africa entitled “Racism still rife in US, says China”. It describes allegations made by the Chinese government concerning denouncing “widespread discrimination in the United States”. The Chinese seem to be lapping up each and every canard of the race mongers in our country that exacerbate white guilt at the least of provocation. The purpose of the article is to ridicule reports by the US decrying human rights violations in China. They make the following statement:

Blacks are given heavier criminal penalties, arrested more frequently and are more likely to be targeted for hate crimes, the report said.

What is actually surreal about this statement is that black people are considered “Black Demons” by the Han Chinese. Despite what Al Sharpton would have us believe Racism and Discrimination is a wholly human condition and there is not one group of people in the world that at one time have not been guilty of it or haven fallen victim to the embrace of its way of thinking.

China calls for the probing of Human Rights abuses in the United States. I would ask this question of the Chinese government: If you are so concerned with Racial Harmony, why are you promoting unrest in Xinjiang and Tibet engaged at reducing the numbers of the cultural residents that currently reside there?

We also have an individual that responded in comments to NPR as Datang Immortal (Datang Immortal 4th) who seems to take the other tack:

The racial issues in the US had made remarkable progress in the last 50 years, but it come at a cost. and China want to learn from America's success in racial integration. But there are certain people in the name of preserving minority culture were actually fueling the racial divide, and brain wash the Uighur that they are not Chinese. What if someone educate American kid, you are not American, you are African, you are Hispanic, you are Japanese? we all know this is wrong, but if you think this is wrong to America, how this could be right to China?

Shame on NPR, worse than communist propaganda, you are fueling racial divide here ! Rebiya Kadeer Terrorist, supporting East Turkestan Islamic Movement a terrorist organization listed by US, China and Russia, that's why she's arrested. before that China promoted her to great success.

Authors note: In statements Ms. Kadeer has called for Non-violent solutions to the problem which is one reason human rights groups give her humanitarian awards and she is a candidate for a Nobel Peace prize, her alleged support of terrorism by this Datang individual notwithstanding.

Now I am not certain whether this individual truly believes what he is saying or if the comments are manufactured by him. I will state that the comments are, making amends for the fact that English does not appear to be his first language, very lucid and probably very close to what someone who was repeating them for the sake of propaganda would say. Since it is the message I am concerned with here for my metaphor I will give Datang the benefit of the doubt but I will not treat his message with the same generosity.

So in Africa America is terrible and harming its African American citizens but in America “We have made great strides” and China just wants to learn from us. The message is formed to get the best response which seems to be “Hey, Leave us to torture our ne’er-do-wells in peace and tranquility”. Marxists are well known for their use of the oxymoron.

The Sheep

In the end of Animal Farm the pigs finally take down the commandments of Animalism and begin walking on two feet, the veil is finally lifted. The Animals begin to get angry but before they can react they are drowned out by a chorus from the Sheep, “Four Legs Good, Two Legs Better … Four Legs Good, Two Legs Better”. This mantra drones on for 15 minutes until the animals become lulled into complacency. Perhaps more than any other part of the story this is the saddest part. We end up enslaved by the senseless.

The Chinese government seems to have been successful in getting some individuals to believe that any criticism by Americans of their government’s actions must be founded in racism.

Demonizing China
If the Chinese are putting lead into our toothpaste and children’s toys, speaking out against it is “racist” since many other countries and companies’ make mistakes. Never mind that a totalitarian government has no incentive to enact standards or pay the prisoners doing the manual labor a decent wage which might be factors, racism is to be the only consideration deemed politically correct.

Chinese Espionage
If a Chinese national working for the American government is accused of espionage then of course it must only be racism.

The Media on China
Here is a fellow that even thinks among other things that the outcry against the Olympics over the treatment of those dying in Tibet was just another example of the blue eyed devil’s hatred of those who don’t look like him.

Black and White Cat
Here is an interesting post from a blog called the Black and White Cat which does proffer the mythology of the Berkeley left that all interaction with missionaries is somehow tied to oppression. In expressing the sins of the recent past of the colonizing era of the European powers, the connection is somehow used to divine the true intent of our current leaders whose decisions must be enslaved to their upbringing. Specifically:

“Non-white countries, on the other hand, might sometimes be feared - eg. China, Iran, Bolivia, Venezuela - but they also have to be saved. I’m not really sure why we’re supposed to be afraid of Bolivia and Venezuela, but it seems that we are.”

Now to be fair I think this individual is intelligent and thoughtful but the message is couched in dialectic that does not I believe allow one to see past its spinning logic to understand what is going on. I think this is the point. (As an aside I have been to Recife, Brazil which is some 90 miles from the Venezuelan border. The majority of the people that live there are “white” and came from the same European continent I did. The notion we have in this country that to be Latin is to be another race is laughable. Yet it persists as a myth in our culture.)

The individual states they do not know “Why” Venezuela is to be feared. Hugo Chavez has defrauded the Venezuelan voters twice to maintain his Presidency. The first time when protestors (students) marched against him he had thugs open fire on them from roof tops. He controls the press in that country and has been aiding FARC guerillas in destabilizing the Colombian government. He set up military bases in Bolivia which have angered Peru and inflamed tensions with Chile over access to the sea from land lost in a War in 1884. He recently threatened to invade Honduras and has publicly threatened Brazil and Mexico over trade agreements. He once told the Venezuelan people on his Radio Sunday show “Alo Presidente” that his political opposition refused to run a candidate against him in the election in a desperate attempt to make him “look” like a dictator. I for one don’t question why one would fear Venezuela at all. It is run by an egocentric paranoid tyrant.

These are communist dictators. They delve in the totalitarian socialism of Fascism and Leninist Marxism. They prey on the individual and use their collectivist philosophies to enslave. To get the message out one has to speak above the bleating of the sheep. We are inundated with the chants and slogans designed to deflect and obfuscate. Is China killing Tibetans? Should we support them? “America Racist! Minorities Good!”. Is Chavez a dictator threatening his neighbors? “America Racist! Minorities Good!”. Should we stop drug dealers who from crossing over from Mexico? “America Racist! Minorities Good!”. Should we allow North Korea to send missiles over Japan? “America Racist! Minorities Good!”. Should we buy Chinese products that have lead in them? “America Racist! Minorities Good!”.

The individuals that I have illustrated here have really done nothing wrong and I am not disputing their right to make those points. What I am trying to do is to illustrate the unconscious message whose underpinnings are supported. That is what is being manipulated. We have allowed ourselves to become so obsessed with Race that we see bogeymen hiding in children’s cartoons. We have come to the point that we question whether a black person is a racist against other black people because he lives “white”. Living “white” evidently is having more money than what Jesse Jackson thinks is allowed. These individuals are just repeating those parts of the cultural world view that is indoctrinated into us all when we watch the news and listen to entertainment. The guilt of being discriminatory will cause us to edit ourselves even with the actions of a communist dictatorship that kills its own people. It is this flaw the Squealers of the world are willing to exploit. In the end the Sheep are not just these people but all of us. This is how propaganda works. It is the art of editing the truth.

But there is Hope!
Furniture Tax Protest

From the BBC “Protesters in the south-eastern Chinese city of Nanking have overturned police cars and blocked roads over plans to more strictly enforce payment of taxes”. This event was about taxes on furniture in the Nanking a port city in central eastern China. We Americans can’t talk, we started a Revolution over the price of Tea from China.

I misremember the words but today I am thinking the song starts off with:

“China, how you gonna keep them down on the farm, after the freedom bell rings………”

Christopher Columbus - Crazed Killer?

2009-07-24T19:51:00.032-04:00

In 1492 a genocidal maniac named Christopher Columbus persuaded a mob of crazed killers to climb into small, crappy little boats without GPS, LORAN, radar, electricity, proper sanitation, a health spa, free ice cream, 21 bars and lounges, a fog horn, all you can eat shrimp, two heated pools, plasma screen T.V.'s, a ball room with 37 piece orchestra featuring "Tony Orlando and Dawn", a Bingo Hall, a "Disco", a 24 hour buffet featuring an ice sculpture of Oprah, room service, a rock climbing wall, beach volleyball, premium suites facing the ocean, a sauna, a sushi bar, a masseuse, a guy dressed like Mickey Mouse, a shopping mall with duty free merchandise, a wait staff, Wi-Fi, life boats, a desalinization unit, and last but not least, a complete lack of laundry facilities, and blindly sail westward; a journey of thousands of miles into the great unknown.

Apparently, according to modern liberal sociologists and historians, their true purpose was to wipe the indigenous people occupying the land they "found" from the face the earth. We all know the false story of Columbus, we learned it in school, back in the "bad old pre-P.C. days". You know, he sailed over to get some spice, establish a Spanish colony, hopefully find some gold, then sail back. But do we know the "real truth" behind Columbus' journey?

Here's the liberal establishment's version of the "real truth". In reality it was a mission planned to inflict utter destruction on all living organisms, flora and fauna on the continents of North America and South America. Obviously their aim was to subjugate or kill any humans or animals that got in their way. Here's part of a popular little ditty that helps to propagate the lies of the day and mask Columbus' true intentions:

"In fourteen hundred ninety-two Columbus sailed the ocean blue. He had three ships and left from Spain; He sailed through sunshine, wind and rain. He sailed by night; he sailed by day; He used the stars to find his way... Columbus sailed on to find some gold To bring back home, as he'd been told. He made the trip again and again, Trading gold to bring to Spain. The first American? No, not quite. But Columbus was brave, and he was bright."

Now, is that a load of crap or what?

The land Columbus invaded, raped, and pillaged was pristine, it was unspoiled, it was bucolic...hell it was basically unoccupied!

North America is a land mass covering approximately 9,450,000 square miles. NINE and a HALF MILLION SQUARE MILES!

Here is an estimate of the population of North America in 1492:

"The population of North America prior to the first sustained European contact in 1492 CE is a matter of active debate. Various estimates of the Native population of the continental U.S. and Canada range from 1.8 to over 12 million. Over the next four centuries, their numbers were reduced to about 237,000 as Natives were almost wiped out."

Here are some modern scholarly opinions about the aftermath of European incursion into North America:

"The destruction of the Indians of the Americas was, far and away, the most massive act of genocide in the history of the world." David E. Stannard.

"This violent corruption needn't define us.... We can say, yes, this happened, and we are ashamed. We repudiate the greed. We recognize and condemn the evil. And we see how the harm has been perpetuated. But, five hundred years later, we intend to mean something else in the world." Barry Lopez.

"By then [1891] the native population had been reduced to 2.5% of its original numbers and 97.5% of the aboriginal land base had been expropriated....Hundreds upon hundreds of native tribes with unique languages, learning, customs, and cultures had simply been erased from the face of the earth, most often without even the pretense of justice or law." Peter Montague

Well, that's their opinion. What was the opinion of a world class thinker concerning the "occupation" of the "New World" in the time of the settlement of North America?

Here's what John Locke had to say about the issue in his Second Treatise of Civil Government 1690;

Sec. 34. "God gave the world to men in common; but since he gave it them for their benefit, and the greatest conveniences of life they were capable to draw from it, it cannot be supposed he meant it should always remain common and uncultivated"

Sec. 40. "Nor is it so strange, as perhaps before consideration it may appear, that the property of labour should be able to over-balance the community of land: for it is labour indeed that puts the difference of value on every thing; and let any one consider what the difference is between an acre of land planted with tobacco or sugar, sown with wheat or barley, and an acre of the same land lying in common, without any husbandry upon it, and he will find, that the improvement of labour makes the far greater part of the value."

Sec. 41. "There cannot be a clearer demonstration of any thing, than several nations of the Americans are of this, who are rich in land, and poor in all the comforts of life; whom nature having furnished as liberally as any other people, with the materials of plenty, i.e. a fruitful soil, apt to produce in abundance, what might serve for food, raiment, and delight; yet for want of improving it by labour, have not one hundredth part of the conveniences we enjoy: and a king of a large and fruitful territory there, feeds, lodges, and is clad worse than a day-labourer in England.

Do we really think that Europeans wanted to wipe out the inhabitants of the New World? Christianize them against their will and appropriate any wealth they found lying around perhaps, but wipe them out? According to modern "scholarly" propaganda that is what many school children are being led to believe.

Obviously the European invaders knew they were carrying micro-organisms that the indigenous people had no natural defenses to, right? I mean, come on, Columbus must have know that, right? Ask a college sociology or history professor, they'll tell you it was intentional genocide. Jewish Holocaust? That was nothing; these Europeans were on the rampage. No wonder "white guilt" helped get an under qualified guy from Harvard that had a cup of coffee in the U.S. Senate elected, right?

A new narrative is emerging, telling us of a of Pre-Columbian America that perhaps wasn't the "Fantasy Island" that some would lead you to believe, here is a sample;

"...it was the introduction of Old World diseases, especially smallpox and measles, that claimed the majority of the native inhabitants of the hemisphere.
Because the suffering and mortality occasioned by these epidemics was so great, one can easily understand why native writers looked back on the past as a time relatively free of disease, and ultimately as a time when peoples' lives were longer and happier. While this tendency to romanticize life in the Americas before 1492 may be understandable, it does not make it so...." The Great Killers in Precolumbian America. A Hemispheric Perspective
Suzanne Austin Alchon

In reality, disparate civilizations collided with catastrophic consequences for the indigenous people of North and South America, that's a fact. Likewise misrepresenting the world the Pre-Columbian people inhabited as bucolic and peaceful is dishonest and ridiculous. The New World was a violent and sometimes sick place, the arrival of the Europeans just added to the stew already filled with death and disease. Let's just be honest about it.

JULY 22, 2011 OBAMACARE

2009-07-22T18:34:00.023-04:00

July 22, 2011, two years from today. It's a lovely summer day in Bridgeport, Connecticut, an old "factory town" that has seen its factories shut down and move overseas and its middle class move away. In some ways it's a town that has seen its better days. But things have improved since the 70's and 80's and Bridgeport is coming back in this new year of 2011, life here has been better lately. Like in all of New England as in too much of the country, the citizens of Bridgeport have bought into "hope and change" and helped elect a little known, or "too little is known about" junior Senator from Illinois to become the 44th President of the United States of America. "Life would be even better" after that heady day in November, 2008 they said. Optimism would flourish and after real change "took hold in America" and "after the world loved us again" all would be well. Obama had "audacity", and the citizens of Bridgeport believed him when he promised a tax cut for 95% of the citizens of the U.S. and health care reform resulting in "coverage for all".

As Teddy Kennedy, New England liberal's favorite drunken embarrassment of a son said;

"But quality care shouldn't depend on your financial resources, or the type of job you have, or the medical condition you face. Every American should be able to get the same treatment that U.S. senators are entitled to.
This is the cause of my life. It is a key reason that I defied my illness last summer to speak at the Democratic convention in Denver—to support Barack Obama, but also to make sure, as I said, "that we will break the old gridlock and guarantee that every American…will have decent, quality health care as a fundamental right and not just a privilege." Newsweek: July 18, 2009

Of course Teddy didn't have thoughts of "health care for all" or even arrogant self righteousousness brimming in his whiskey addled mind the night of July 18, 1969. He was busy "allegedly" covering up what should have been, at the very least, a charge of manslaughter for driving a car off a bridge and drowning an innocent young woman, Mary Jo Kopechne. Instead, he "allegedly tried to save her" then neglected to call anybody like say, the police, but instead called Kennedy insiders while he was most likely "allegedly" sobering up in a near by hotel and trying to establish a suitable alibi. But I digress.

Eleanor Bigsby is a widow, though only sixty two. Bob Bigsby Sr., her loving husband of forty two years passed away in the late nineties from lung cancer, the scourge of the cigarette smoker. Bob was a tough guy, a factory guy and a Korean War vet who thought of himself as invincible; he wasn't. Eleanor's two children, Bob Jr. and Cassie check in on Mom often and Eleanor has managed her finances wisely and frugally since Bob's passing. Eleanor had begun feeling poorly the last few days and Cassie had been stopping by and keeping her older brother advised.

Finally after three days of feeling "not quite up to snuff" Cassie insisted that her Mother call her doctor and set up an appointment. Eleanor assured her daughter that she would "get right on it". Later that day Eleanor called Cassie and asked her to come over and help her make an appointment. In the year since "Obama-care" had become the "law of the land" neither of them had been sick and neither were aware of the changes beyond the casual mention of "Obama-care" on the local T.V. news. A manual had arrived from the Federal Government the year before, and Cassie went to fetch it. Mom kept it under the phonebook, it rivaled the Bridgeport phonebook in size. Cassie was shocked. After much searching and page flipping they located the "authorized procedure for seeking medical treatment" on page 782. paragraph 3 Sec.(b). Cassie called her mother's doctor. He had just retired. Cassie returned to the "manual" and found the procedure to locate and secure another doctor and an appointment. After two hours on the phone Cassie worked her way through the maze of bureaucracy and red tape to get the name of a local physician. After 40 minutes on hold she was given an appointment date and time when her ailing mother could be seen. Ya, they could "see" her in SIX MONTHS, on December 18, 2011. Is this, she wondered, is the"Hope and Change" for which they had all voted?

Cassie called Bob Jr. and they decided that Mom couldn't wait six months to be seen by a doctor. So they put their mother in the car and drive her to St. Vincent's Medical Center, a local Bridgeport Catholic Hospital run by the Daughters of Charity. Or rather it had been run by the Daughters of Charity. It seems under the auspices"Obama-care" religious orders were "incompatible with the vision of the Administration and it's sub-departments and therefore a violation of the strict separation of Church and State Sec. 6-66, subsection 35; paragraph 2 part (d)". They looked at each other and thought, well regardless, Mom needs to see a doctor. Eleanor's children checked her into "Vincent's Government Health Center"that afternoon.

Several hours pass before Eleanor is assigned a bed on the 6th floor of "Vincent's G.H.C." Finally settled in, Eleanor and her adult kids wait for a doctor come in and give her an examination. The wait has been torture but waiting isn't new when it comes to "things medical" they suppose, so they remain "patient" and chat despite Mom's discomfort and pain.

Finally a short, thin man in a lab coat, not a typical white lab coat, but a medium brown lab coat with a red armband enters the room. He has a gaunt face and pencil thin moustache. His slicked back, dark black hair gives him the look of an actor from a thirties era film, a bit of an odd look for 21st century American Eleanor thinks, but she keeps it to herself, besides she feels too bad to quibble about details. "I'm Paul Joesph Goebbels III, I'm from your Collaborative Referral and Assessment Program, you can vill me Paul Joesph, how are you?" "Well, um...Paul, uh... Joesph, not to well I'm afraid" said Eleanor as she manages a pained smile. "OK then, let's get started" "Do you..." "Are you a doctor?", Eleanor interrupts. " No, I assess your situation then I consult with the doctors about your case, I'm you Assessor" says Goebbels with an sharp air of authority that Eleanor and her kids find eerily unsettling.

Goebbels begins his assessment; "Do you smoke?" he asks. "Well, not in many years. I stopped when the kids came along." He shoots her a glance over his clipboard. "Do you drink?" "Not much, a beer here and there". "Did your husband smoke?" "Yes he did, he died of..." "Mom, can I talk to you?"interrupts Bob Jr. "Is there a problem, Sir?" barks Goebbels in Bob's direction. Bob, a solid guy at six feet one and 210 pounds stands up and takes a step toward Goebbels. "I advise that you stand down, Sir" Goebbels barks as he takes a whistle from his pocket. He gives it two loud, sharp blasts. In burst three "security personnel" with strangely vintage looking Luger handguns drawn. Bob steps back, a odd look on his face. "Who are these guys?" "They are from the Civilian National Security Force" says Goebbels calmly as he wheels about and orders "Take him away, SCHNELL!" In an instant Bob Jr. is dragged out of the room and down the hall, his loud protestations ignored. Bob had forgotten about Obama’s pledge to build a separate security force. He is harshly reminded of that old campaign promise from three years ago, but "nobody keeps that kind of campaign promise" he thinks to himself as he sits handcuffed in the hospital brig, chained to a wall.

"We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded." B.H. Obama July 2, 2008 Colorado Springs, CO.

Eleanor and Cassie are horrified and both begin to complain and demand an explanation. "This is America! Where are you taking my son?" demands Eleanor as Cassie starts to quietly cry. "What kind of care is this?" she asks imploringly. "I voted for CHANGE Sir, this is not change!" " "It's not?" says Goebbels as he continues to write notes on the pad he carries on his clipboard. "What kind of change did you expect, hmmm?" "Well, you know change...Bush, he was,... he was...you know, Iraq and stuff!" "Well, it's CHANGE YOU GOT, YA?" sneers the Assessor. "But Bush was kind and he helped Africa and he was only tough on our enemies, I thought, right?" Besides, she continues "Leno and Letterman said he was dumb, and wrong...and you know Texans, they like to fight..." her voice trailing off in despair and pain.

Goebbels then declares "I believe I am done with you, ya?" He clicks his heels and turns to leave. "What about my assessment?" ask Eleanor, "When do I see a doctor?" Goebbels turns slowly, a wry sarcastic look coming over his face, his thin lips curled into a cruel smile...."Doctor?, see a DOCTOR?" A deep, evil laugh erupts from what seems like his bowels, the very bowels of HELL..."You VILL SEE NO DOCTOR!" "You have lived a life that I deem unworthy of living. There will be NO medical intervention, ya?" "You may not buy the right to see a doctor, ya?" "Furthermore the database will identify you and you vill not be admitted in any U.S. medical facility!" "Do you understand me?" "You have smoked, you have been a drinker, you have not met the standards set forth by C.R.A.P. and the Obama Administration!" "Please get dressed and leave this facility AT ONCE!"

In stunned silence Eleanor and Cassie return to home. "But I believed in Obama..." "He said everything was broken...it was all Bush's fault, and the Republicans...all the comedians and news guys like that Stewart and ya know, Saturday Night Live,...they said Palin was stupid and a whore...what happened?" Eleanor thought some more, then said "But I had my doctor, he would see the next day or that week...if I was sick like I am now he would see me right away...what happened?" "My taxes are higher, I thought it would be OK because I would get universal health care and we wouldn't invade, you know, the Arabs or whatever...people in the world would like us better...Obama, he said that..he did." "I know Mom, me too." " I mean John Stewart has the news every night, he said that Republicans were all stupid, not smart as he is..." she says her voice trailing off...

Two days later Eleanor Bigsby received a letter from the C.R.A.P./Obama-Regime Administrator for National Health Disbursement. It was actually a bill for her assessment, it read:

"Dear Comrade Mrs. Bigsby, a sum of $500 a month in addition to your 'contribution through federal mandate' will be appropriated from your retirement income. It will be DEDUCTED as a means of penalty for your use of tobacco and alcohol. There is NO APPEAL. Failure to comply will result in a mandatory hearing before the Civilian National Security Force."

Eleanor thought of her son Bob who was summarily sentenced to three months hard labor for his run-in with the "Assessor". She laid down the letter and began to cry..."Where is the America I grew up in?" "What happened to my country...?" Sorry Eleanor, it "CHANGED"...

Walter Cronkite --- War Criminal?

2009-07-19T17:21:00.009-04:00

No, "Uncle Walt" didn't fit the text book definition of a "war criminal" anymore than George W. Bush or Dick Cheney ever would. He was a "newscaster" or "newsman" or, as they call them in Australia, a "newsreader" He seemed benign enough, very "grandfatherly", a nice, regular old guy. But behind this facade was a doctrinaire liberal with the bully pulpit to shape public opinion in a very powerful way. People trusted him and took his word as gospel on the issuses of the day. So when he became an anti-Vietnam War mouthpiece, the viewing public followed him. The thing is, he misunderstood or didn't care about dreams and aspirations of the people South Vietnam. He eventually became the "posterboy" for the leftist media machine that mobilized into an all-out media and college campus revolt that aided the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army and, in my opinion, the blood of dead G.I.'s and South Vietmanese civilians drips from Cronkite's hands. Yo, Walt...report the news accurately, don't lie. TET was a U.S. VICTORY, yet you ignored that and offered your now famous opinion that the war was lost. His sins of omission and commission are being carried on by the likes of modern Main Sream Media cesspools MSNBC, CNN, and psycho leftist web sites like HuffPo and Daily Kos.

If you'all will please indulge me for a second and come along as Sherman and I climb aboard Mr. Peabody's "Wayback Machine" and go back...back...back, to 1969 America. I was a smart ass 10 year old and even then thought I "knew it all". I didn't then, I don't now. We would watch network TV because you had three channels in the pre-cable days of late 60's and early 70's El Paso, way out in hot, dusty far-West Texas. The national news casts began at 5:30 local time. My little brother Frank, a.k.a. the "channel changer" sat nearest to the TV and changed the channels. There were no remote control so that was his job. You had Walter Cronkite at CBS and Huntley-Binkley at NBC, and I think Frank Reynolds at ABC. That was it. Most often we got our national news of the day from CBS and "Uncle Walter". He wielded tremendous influence over American TV viewers during his years as the CBS anchor. I don't remember the assassination of J.F.K., I was too young. Cronkite made his reputation with his now very famous live newscast confirming the death of our young American President. He later confided that that was as close to 'breaking" on the air that he ever got. (Larry King interview May, 2001) and that was totally understandable. We Americans pride ourselves on peaceful executive transitions free of the subterfuge and rankor like the attempted hi-jacking by Al "Globalwarmer" Gore attempted in 2000. That was an attempted "coup by lawyer" and he was correctly rejected by the Supreme Court. The funny thing is, had he not tried to "cherry pick" Democrat friendly counties in and around Miami and instead recounted the whole state of Florida, he might have won. Or he might have been totally crushed. Those same lawyers have perfected "election theft by lawyer" tactic, Gore's guy was David Boies, Franken's is the firm of Perkins Cole of Washington D.C.; they helped Al "the mysoginist idiot" Franken keep counting votes until he was ahead and win a Senate seat in Minnesota that he has no business defiling. Stealing elections seems to be a Democrat lawyer "growth industry", but I digress.

Much has been made of quotes attributed to a North Vietnamese general, Vo Nguyen Giap, and whether he really said the following: "What we still don't understand is why you Americans stopped the bombing of Hanoi. You had us on the ropes. If you had pressed us a little harder, just for another day or two, we were ready to surrender! It was the same at the battles of TET. You defeated us! We knew it, and we thought you knew it. But we were elated to notice your media was definitely helping us. They were causing more disruption in America than we could in the battlefields. We were ready to surrender. You had won!" --this quote is popularly attributed to Gen. Giap but is probably not accurate. He did site the U.S. media as an ally in a more mild way and wasn't the only N.V.A. officer to make such statements. It was obvious that North Vietnam was out gunned and needed American opinion to sour for the tide of American opinion to turn against the war.

The Kerry Presidential campaign in 2004, opposed by the Swiftboat Veterans For Truth political group ambushed Kerry with his own words and puffed up deeds when our young Lt. Kerry returned from Vietnam and latter embarked on his political career. The group Kerry later led, Vietnam Veterns Against the War, famously exaggerated and misled the Senate Committee called the Fulbright Hearing. During the Vietnam War in 1970 he told a Congressional committee that American soldiers, "...raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of [J]enghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks..." -- see http://snipurl.com/10yof

Kerry's people sluffed off his traitorous lies and deeds as well as the words of Gen. Giap concerning the effect of American traitors as just "urban legends" despite evidence to the contrary. An N.V.A. general staff Colonel, Col. Bui Tin echoed Gen Giap's sentiment that anti-war propogandists and activists undoubtable helped the North. In a 1995 Wall Street Journal interview Col. Bui said the following:

Q: How did the Hanoi intend to defeat the Americans?

A: By fighting a long war which would break their will to help South Vietnam. Ho Chi Mihn said "We don't need win military victories, we only need to hit them until they give up and get out."

Q: Was the American anti-war movement inportant to Hanoi's strategy?

A: It was essential to our strategy. Support for the war from our rear was completely secure while the American rear was vulnerable. Everyday our leadership would listen to the world news over the radio at 9:00 a.m. to follow the growth of the American anti-war movement. Visits to Hanoi by people like Jane Fonda and former Attorney General Ramsey Clark and ministers gave us confidence that we should hold on in the face of battlefield reverses. We were elated when Jane Fonda, wearing a red Vietnamese dress, said that she was ashamed of American actions in the war and that she would struggle with us.

This brings me back to good ol' "Uncle Walt". How he could, in all his college dropout wisdom, shove his spectacles down to the end of his nose, lean into the camera and tell the good citizens of the United States of America in this now famous editorial that:

"Tonight, back in the more familiar surroundings in New York, we'd like to sum up our findings in Vietnam, an analysis that must be speculative, personal, subjective. Who won and who lost in the great Tet offensive against the cities? I'm not sure. The Vietcong did not win by a knockout, but neither did we. The referees of history may make it a draw. Another standoff may be coming in the big battles expected south of the Demilitarized Zone. Khe Sanh could well fall, with a terrible loss in American lives, prestige and morale, and this is a tragedy of our stubbornness there; but the bastion no longer is a key to the rest of the northern regions, and it is doubtful that the American forces can be defeated across the breadth of the DMZ with any substantial loss of ground. Another standoff. On the political front, past performance gives no confidence that the Vietnamese government can cope with its problems, now compounded by the attack on the cities. It may not fall, it may hold on, but it probably won't show the dynamic qualities demanded of this young nation. Another standoff.We have been too often disappointed by the optimism of the American leaders, both in Vietnam and Washington, to have faith any longer in the silver linings they find in the darkest clouds. They may be right, that Hanoi's winter-spring offensive has been forced by the Communist realizationthat they could not win the longer war of attrition, and that the Communists hope that any success in the offensive will improve their position for eventual negotiations. It would improve their position, and it would also require our realization, that we should have had all along, that any negotiations must be that-negotiations, not the dictation of peace terms. For it seems now more certain than ever that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a stalemate. This summer's almost certain standoff will either end in real give-and-take negotiations or terrible escalation; and for every means we have to escalate, the enemy can match us, and that applies to invasion of the North, the use of nuclear weapons, or the mere commitment of one hundred, or two hundred, or three hundred thousand more American troops to the battle. And with each escalation, the world comes closer to the brink of cosmic disaster.To say that we are closer to victory today is to believe, in the face of the evidence, the optimists who have been wrong in the past. To suggest we are on the edge of defeat is to yield to unreasonable pessimism. To say that we are mired in stalemate seems the only realistic, yet unsatisfactory, conclusion. On the off chance that military and political analysts are right, in the next few months we must test the enemy's intentions, in case this is indeed his last big gasp before negotiations. But it is increasingly clear to this reporter that the only rational way out then will be to negotiate, not as victors, but as an honorable people who lived up to their pledge to defend democracy, and did the best they could.
This is Walter Cronkite. Good night.”

Gee thanks, Walt! TET was a U.S. victory. Could you have found that out from the comfort of your hotel in Saigon? I doubt it. Did you find some rubble to stand in front of to make nice "photo ops" out of? Ya, that was easy. Finding out the truth about TET would have been harder, maybe even dangerous. I know Cronkite covered WWII as a reporter for the UPI, and I salute him. Was he of the age in the late 60's that Vietnam was too perhaps too hazardous for him to accurately ferret ou the truth? Did perhaps age and a wisdom lead him to stay to out of Viet Cong machine gun range?

There is no doubt that North Vietnam propagandists used the Walter Cronkites' and John Kerrys' of this world to force the U.S. out of S.E. Asia with catastrophic results for the millions of innocent victims left behind. The South Vietnamese that didn't or couldn't flee were subjected to unspeakable misery. Cambodians were punished for resisting communism by dying by the millions in Pol Pot's Killing Fields. Communist Vietnam plods along today, a third world sweat shop, cranking out cheap athletics shoes and other easily massed produced consumables. The "People's Paradise" in deed.
Good bye and good riddance "Uncle Walt"; you helped sow the seeds of what the American people are reaping decades after the "end" of the Vietnam War. You falsely led the despots of the world to view the U.S. as just a "Paper Tiger" without the political will to stand up and fight for what is right and liberate people from the bondage of oppression without the lie that America is an Imperialist occupier. Thanks Walt, you emboldened a group of raggedy assed "students" to occupy or Embassy in Iran in 1979. You set the stage for incursions by Sadam into Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. When repelled by U.S. led coalition forces Saddam resorted to duplicity and terror. Saddam's threat to Saudi Arabia, our "ally" in the Middle East, led to U.S. airbases in the land of Mecca and Medina igniting Al Queda's current wave of terror attacks and general Jihad against America and her allies. A strong U.S. victory in Vietnam could have changed history, but you sat at your typewriter and unilaterally decided that we "LOST" the war, like our present day Democrat Sen. Harry Reid. Walt, you've passed on, but 300 plus million Americans live with consequenses of you shooting off your mouth, getting it wrong, and giving our enemies a blueprint to defeat us and ginning their confidence way up. Thanks for NOTHING, and that's the way it really is.

I Honestly Don't Understand

2009-07-15T18:43:00.002-04:00

Honesty is good. Honesty is true. Honesty is a virtue worth having. But the problem is most people cannot handle complete honesty. People do not want you to be honest with them. Honesty is not the best policy. Well, not complete honesty anyway.

Now I am not talking about honesty of opinion. When it comes to being honest about our own opinions of things, very often we must use tact and employ consideration about the feelings of those on the receiving end of our opinion(s)so that our opinion is taken as an opinion and not some ad hominem attack. The classic question from a wife to her husband, ‘Does this dress make my butt look fat?’ is an example of what I mean about honestly giving one’s opinion and using tact and discretion while doing so.

Do not be confused when it comes to “the truth.” People deal with partial truths every day and still claim to be “honest”. The government does this all the time. Think about the so-called Truth-In-Advertising laws. These laws specifically permit partial “truths” (lies) to be used in ad campaigns. As a newly minted diabetic I found out that “sugar-free” does not mean the product is free of sweeteners that can be bad for a diabetic.

Even when people are given the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth most people are inclined to add layers of supposition, conjecture and outright distortion on top of the truth to come up with a conclusion well tailored to their own prejudices. It is now approaching five years since I became the center of a situation, not of my choosing, that has affected many people close to me and others who no longer are. I determined at the very onset that I would be completely honest and truthful about the day-to-day circumstances and also about the consultations I had with various professionals trying to help me through my situation. And still many people around me came to very wrong, very destructive conclusions. Often times denying what was true and conjuring up their own separate “truths”.

I truly do not understand how this can be so. How does a person sit in a pool of water and say he is not wet? What makes a person run from honesty, or pare it down to a form that fits inside their comfort zone? What is so attractive about living in denial? I want my two daughters to understand that in life they will face decisions - they can choose to hide behind lies and obfuscations, or they can choose to rely on truth and honesty and come out better for having done so. Honesty and truth are not always pleasant. But surely it is more unpleasant to live inside a world that is full not with the reality that honesty provides but instead inflated only with the vapor of denial.

The Jimmy Cater Comeback?

2009-07-13T00:49:00.001-04:00

An interesting article from the Washington Examiner.

Has the rehabiliatation of Jimmy Carter begun?
By: Mark Tapscott
Editorial Page Editor
07/12/09 2:32 PM EDT
Those too young to recall cannot appreciate what a terrible state the country was in during the four long years in which President Jimmy Carter was in the White House. The nation lurched from one crisis to another, with double-digit inflation, soaring interest rates, long gas lines during the summer, and natural gas shortages in the winter.

There were Democrat majorities in Congress determined to make everything worse with higher taxes, government-guaranteed jobs for everybody, and an unprecedented blizzard of new bureaucratic regulation issuing from Washington departments and agencies, including two new ones created at Carter's suggestion, the Department of Energy and the Department of Education.

In retrospect, it was almost no wonder that Carter was blown out by Ronald Reagan, while the Republicans regained a Senate majority for the first time in decades in the 1980 election. Carter went home to Plains, Ga, to sulk for a few years, then began, slowly but surely, reminding us of what a disater he was by making steadily more frequent public appearances. Along the way, he was bought and paid for by the anti-Israel lobby, and, in more recent years, has repeatedly demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of the legitimate and vital role of the U.S. on the world stage.

Now along comes Ohio University historian Kevin Mattson's "What the heck are you up to, Mr. President." In the words of Carlos Lozada, deputy editor of the Outlook section of The Washington Post, Mattson "offers a dramatically different reading" of Carter and his infamous "Malaise" speech.

As described by Lozada, Mattson argues that "the speech, far from a miscalculation, was a brave attempt by a thoughtful president to reimagine the nation and bind citizen and government in a common purpose, one that the author believes should still resonate today."

Lozada adds that, according to Mattson, "if the speech failed, it was not because of the president's words, but because of the way his message was twisted by his opponents and because of strategic flubs Carter made shortly thereafter."

I freely admit to not having read Mattson's book, and odds are good that I never will. I lived through the Carter years, saw those interest and mortgage rates up close and personal, and sat in the long lines waiting to get 10 gallons of gas. I also marvelled at the short-sightedness of Carter's "inordinate fear of communism" speech and his obvious inability to deal with either the Iranian hostage crisis or the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan, (he at least admitted that the latter "surprised" him).

Carter's was a disastrous presidency from beginning to end, and nothing that Mattson might say will change the facts of history. On second thought, I might buy it for laughs. It must make for hilarious reading to find somebody trying to rationalize an incompetent, mean-spirited peanut farmer as an underappreciated or misunderstood chief executive.

What strikes me about Lozada's mostly sympathetic review is the above quoted passage about Carter's attempt to "reimagine the nation and bind citizens and government in common purpose." It has been quite some time since I encountered a sentence that so captures the liberal mind in all its conceit and arrogance. This is the eliteratti at its most vivid.

There are two things that bear discussion here. First, "reimagining" is another word for re-founding. Liberals want a "living constitution" so they can continually reimagine it further and further from the Founders' intention. It is an illustration of the gnostic habit described by philosopher Eric Voegelin in his landmark book,"The New Science of Politics" as "immanetizing the eschaton."

Thus, "reimagining" should be seen as the imposition of the liberal's abstract conception of what should be on the always recalcitrant reality of what is. Since the abstract can never be perfectly achieved, the political process is thrown into a permanent state of upheaval. Sooner or later, those who oppose the march to the progressive liberal/socialist/marxist nirvana end up as silenced second-class citizens, in prison, re-education camps, or worse.

Second, note the equal status of "citizen" and "government" in the effort to bind both to the [new] "common purpose." That formulation neatly puts aside the fundamental fact of the American regime - the federal government is the creation of the people, acting through their state governments.

Thus, the 10th Amendment's reservation of all powers to the states or the people that are not explicitly given to the central government. People and government are in no way equal. The people rule, the government is ruled. That is also why, incidentally, to be conservative in the current American political context is to be populist in the most fundamental sense of that much-misunderstood word.

Remember that the next time President Obama summons us to his latest version of reimagining the nation. Interestingly enough, Lozada commends Carter's "malaise" speech to our current chief executive because, "with the economy again in crisis and Iran again in turmoil, the parallels are hard to ignore."

Indeed the parallels are hard to ignore, though not for the reasons touted by Lozada or Mattson.

Liberty For All (Dedicated to my Nieces and Nephew)

2009-07-09T19:48:00.010-04:00

by Individualist (TheIndividualist@comcast.net)
“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

I spent this Fourth of July with nieces. This year however their crazy uncle embarrassed himself at the Fireworks Display at the River by trying to handout green bandanas purchased at Walmart to anyone who would listen about the cause of the Iranians. I tried to get people involved to very little success. My family wore the bandanas even though they were embarrassed by my antics. They tried to tell me but my refrain was “I cared”.

My precocious niece, I call her RALA B asked me why it was so important. I found myself explaining about Liberty, the founding fathers, their principles and the terrible situation in Iran today. She then put me on the spot, “Why don’t you write something of Freedom on your blog and I’ll take it to show and tell.” So what can I say of our Independence Day and Iran’s predicament. The first thing that comes to my mind is Cripus Attucks and Neda Soltan. They are the first martyrs in their country’s Fight for Freedom.

RALA, I am wholly ill equipped to this task. I want to explain to you why Freedom is so important. I want you to understand why it is the best thing our country has to offer its citizens. I want to ensure that you see the real meaning of Freedom and why you should care deeply when you see the garden that grows those flowers trampled by knaves on black bikes with sticks and guns. Why it is important to get involved in seeing the fruits of the Tree of Liberty grow in soil that has been salted by the blood red stains of Tyranny.

So if you will indulge me I have decided to borrow from the words of great men who helped to found this country. Those Great men who wrote “something” of Freedom to instruct their children, the people of the Thirteen Colonies of England. You may not understand everything at first. I think you will find as I have that you must from time to time come back to these writings to have further mysteries revealed.

I will begin first with the man who I think without dissent can be likened to America’s Spark of Enlightenment. A prolific writer I will suggest we begin our tutelage with the treatise he wrote “on Liberty and Necessity”.

Liberty and Necessity

This is a philosophical treatise on the nature of God and Free Will and an attempt to explain Good and Evil in this world and why God permits it. One quote stands out:

“If a continual Weight is not applied, the Clock will stop. And as soon as the Avenues of Uneasiness to the Soul are choked up or cut off, we are dead, we think and act no more. This Uneasiness, whenever felt, produces Desire to be freed from it, great in exact proportion to the Uneasiness. Thus is Uneasiness the first Spring and Cause of all Action; for till we are uneasy in Rest, we can have no Desire to move, and without Desire of moving there can be no voluntary Motion. The Experience of every Man who has observed his own Actions will evince the Truth of this; and I think nothing need be said to prove that the Desire will be equal to the Uneasiness, for the very Thing implies as much: It is not Uneasiness unless we desire to be freed from it, nor a great Uneasiness unless the consequent Desire is great.”

Now to be fair the main premise of Mr. Franklin’s thesis is to explain that the soul’s actions are therefore only taken in this life and in death we return to its state before we are born, one that I am not sure is solidly explained or that I wholly accept but that is a discussion for another day. The ideas I want to discuss are about pleasure being derived from the overcoming of pain. These do strike a chord with me and I think are germane to this debate for one reason. Necessity is the first enemy of Liberty. It in one sense as Mr. Franklin explains is what drives us to act and to want to be free. It is as Mr. Franklin states the natural order of the soul when experiencing pain to act in order to be free from it thus granting pleasure. So too is it the natural state of individuals in a society when controlled and oppressed by the government to want to be extricated from that authority thus granting the pleasure of Freedom.

As Mr. Franklin is our inspiration, our spark of enlightenment then so too is the next man the Engineer of Liberty. He is the industrialist whose words gave us the practical application of thought to define our Engine of Freedom and develop the ideas of our constitutional government. He is by his own pen the purveyor of “Common Sense”.

Common Sense

Common Sense is a famous pamphlet which was published anonymously by an Englishman named Thomas Paine which is considered to be the blueprint for the ideas of independence that fueled the American Revolution and created the Blueprint for our Republic. Here is a quote from this pamphlet.

“SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness POSITIVELY by uniting our affections, the latter NEGATIVELY by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher.
Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one: for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries BY A GOVERNMENT, which we might expect in a country WITHOUT GOVERNMENT, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer.”

The relevant points here are that no matter who the actors behind a government are, that left unchecked they will assume more power and eventually abuse it. We are instructed to remember that our culture, our society and our desires as individuals are separate and distinct from the state. When we look to governments to provide for us security and well being we will instead obtain oppression and frustration. This is important since the original revolutionaries in Iran have stated their goal was freedom. Even the Islamic leaders stated that goal of an Islamic Republic was to ensure the rights of the people by following the Will of God. Through Thomas Paine we gain the insight that the best government is the one that preserves the rights of the individuals. Incorporating Ben Franklin’s religious insights we see that a government which enhances Free Will enhances God’s Will because it was God’s Choice to give Man Free Will. He wants us thereby to use that Free Will.

If Mr. Paine is the Engineer who drove the Engine of Liberty then this next individual is the steam whistle that sounds to get that engine moving. More than any efforts of the other founding fathers, this man’s speech at the second Virginia Revolutionary Convention on March 23, 1775 galvanized the nation on its course. He was the fire starter of the revolution.

Liberty or Death

At the end of his famous speech Patrick Henry said the following:

“There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave.……
……..Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable--and let it come! I repeat it, sir, let it come.”

“Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death! “

Here then RALA is the cost of obtaining Freedom. It is the last full measure of devotion given again and again by patriots, soldiers and even innocent citizens going about their day. We remember the dates of these events, December 7, 1941 and September 11, 2001. We remember the places, Pearl Harbor and Gettysburg. Patrick Henry reminds us that obtaining and keeping our Freedoms will take brave action and constant vigilance. Every child will know this from the moment they are faced with a school yard bully. Only those that stand up will gain that Freedom and keep it. The forces of the statists and dictators must be met everywhere they assert their control for like a potato chip they cannot stop at dominating one person, they will want more. While we have a President who worries about diplomacy and does not wish to “meddle” in events in Iran and now China we have to ask “Why do we stand here idle?” Will the regimes stop at the borders of Iran, will they be satisfied with just the Jews who live in Israel. No Mr. Henry points to the threat we face and asks us to meet it while we still can.

As Patrick Henry is the Fire of the Revolution, the voice that sings the Song for Freedom, this Great Scholar can be thought of as the Prophet of Liberty. He like Moses who brought down the Ten Commandments gives us with words inspired by his love of God and his fellow man a Declaration of Freedom. This is the Declaration of Independence.

Declaration of Independence

Now many may at first balk when I state that Mr. Jefferson’s words were inspired by God or that I am somehow equating these words with the text of the Torah, the Bible or the Koran. I cannot explain these texts to you since I will admit I am not privy to discussions with the Deity beyond whatever thoughts may arise in my mind on those occasions that I do take time to meditate and pray. I am not qualified to speak as to what is entailed in making these three tomes “Holy” except to say that by the fervor of their followers I believe that they do have positive effects on my fellow man when viewing the actions of their believers. On my better days I myself can even be held in that camp.

What I am saying is this. That Mr. Jefferson sat in a room on June 11, 1776 and for Seventeen days he labored in deep thought and prayer to write a document that would justify to the world the actions of the colonies in demanding their freedom. He chose his words carefully and he explained in a way more eloquent than I could muster that such an act was a choice and a duty of Men as directed by almighty God. When a man writes thus as Mr. Jefferson had, even if he does not realize it, he is taking upon himself a role akin to that of a biblical prophet. He is speaking his mind to the authorities as to the direction God expects them to take. He is usually not of the clergy or ruling power and is correcting them as to what he thinks is God’s Path. In the bible there were true prophets and false prophets. In reviewing this man’s life, in seeing what he is requesting, I feel that it is obvious that Thomas Jefferson was speaking from the Heart in a principled position come to in no short order through many hours of deliberation with himself and the Creator. I feel also that his words are timeless and will resound in all generations to come. The words in this document proclaim the duty of all men to seek their Freedom, every day and in every way great and small.

“When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security”

Mr. Jefferson said it all RALA. Freedom is a Gift from God. It is made available to all men and the greatest sin that one could potentially perform is to take that Freedom from another individual for your own Self Aggrandizement or Ambition. It is always the Politician that performs the greatest Evil. God made each and every one of us and he placed us here I believe to see what we could do with the short time that he has allotted to us. We are given Free Will as a grand experiment. As any Father he is proud of our accomplishments, sorrowed at our pains, joyous when we are happy, satisfied when we do right and disappointed when we do wrong. It is in this way that our existence serves His purpose. Even those who do not believe in Him or who turn from Him teach the Deity the one thing He cannot know until we have acted. That is what choice we shall make with our own Free Will. Thus I believe in the same Individualism of our Founding Fathers. That government should increase and not limit our Freedom. That society should be allowed to thrive to the extent that it can without the limits of Government. That we as individuals should serve the interests of Society and not the State because Tyranny arises when we assume that these two separate things are one.

So in conclusion there are those that question supporting the efforts of the people of Iran to obtain Democracy. They say we are meddling. We are lectured that the tyrants will make accusations of us if we enter into the situation. We are told the embattled opposition candidate strongly disagrees with our country’s course of action, anyways so it is not in our best interests.

Thomas Jefferson tells us that it is our duty to throw off government that reduces people to a state of absolute despotism. When the Tyrants kill the innocent for speaking their mind, we must do what we can to help those who are being oppressed. Otherwise we will one day find ourselves under the despot’s thumb.

When I read the Declaration of Independence I say to myself, “Amen” which means “I believe it”. I hope RALA that you shall always have Lady Liberty to guide you and will hold her close to your heart and remember the ending words of our Pledge of Allegiance, “Liberty for All”.

My Friend John - RIP

2009-07-01T14:31:00.004-04:00

The happiest day in the life of a very, very good man.

“I cried when I wrote this song,
sue me if I play too long”

Wow. I am having a hard time coming to grips with John’s death. You don’t just let a friend of 29 years slip out of your life without a lot of memories coming back. Over the course of a lifetime we make many friends. We have childhood friends who sometimes don’t stay in your life very long. Children grow up and families move away. We get into adolescence and we make new friends who share our expanding interests. Then many of us go to some type of higher education and again our personal circle of friends changes and grows. Finally, we go out on our own. A fourth group of friends begin to assemble in our lives. For the most part, this fourth group will differ significantly from the first three.

Each of the first three groups will be limited by the amount time we spend together, our common geography, and our common interests. All of these will change in our journey to adulthood, and we will lose association with many of the friends we make along the way. Lots of us are fortunate enough to have friends that go all the way back to childhood and it is a great thing. But the friends we have that go all the way back to those first three groups are a lot fewer in number than those we have from the fourth group. And for me, the experiences that I’ve shared with my friends of the “fourth order” (if I may call them that) are of a much greater significance than those of the first three. Really, which is more significant, winning a high school championship football game, or the birth of a child? See what I mean? Between me and my fourth order, we shared things as men. We shared, and do share the hard and great things of life. And in my life I have only two friends from my fourth order that have been present at, or shared with me, every one of the hard and great things of my life. With some of these things, only one was there, sometimes both. But combined, all. I am blessed with other friends of the fourth order and I very much love them all. But if all my friends of this fourth order, were drowning, and I could save them all, I would reach with for these two first, each getting one arm. But today, only one remains.

I’m not going to write about all that John was and what he meant to others. And I’m not going to tell much about the things he thought and felt. I leave that to others who spent more time with him, and who knew him at an even deeper level. I’m going to tell the story of what I know to be the happiest day of John’s life. August 10, 1982. I’m only going to tell what I know and saw, only John could fill in what happened during the hours we weren’t in contact.

This actually begins on the afternoon of August 9, 1982. We were working together in Memphis, TN for an engineering firm whose client was Federal Express. John owned a mid 1960’s gray Pontiac convertible (a Bonneville I think) that he called “The Gray Ghost”. The Ghost was having some front end problems, and as skilled as John was when it came to auto repair, this job was beyond his tool arsenal and he arranged to get it fixed at a local repair shop. Before we left for the day, he asked me if, in the morning, I could follow him to drop off the Ghost and give him a lift to our office, and drive him back to the shop after work to pick the car up. I said sure.

On the morning of August 10,1982 it was typical August weather in Memphis. Temperature at 7:30 a.m. already past 85, the humidity likewise, and sure to get worse. Real uncomfortable. Things went as John had planned. We dropped of the Ghost and made it to our office on time, about 8:45 a.m. No more than 15 minutes into the workday, John takes a call, hangs up, and is visibly shaken. He looks at me.

“Can I take your truck and split?”

“Sure, was that the shop?”

“No, it was Mare. She says it’s time.”

Did I mention that John’s wife Maryanne was 9+ months pregnant? So John hustles out the door and we are (there were 8 of us “consultants” in our field office) all hopeful and happy at what the day may now bring. We were also having a good chuckle at John’s panicked demeanor as he hurried to get to Maryanne.

About 11:00 a.m., two hours had gone by, and John comes strolling through the office door, drops my keys on my desk and sits down at his.

“Well?”

“By the time I got home, Mare had called the doctor and he said her contractions were coming too far apart for her to go to the hospital. He said to wait and call him back when they start coming closer together.”

I swear John had barely gotten the words out of his mouth, when our secretary called back for him to take a phone call. After hanging up he looks at me again with this why-is-this-happening-to-me look all over his face.

“I gotta go. It was Mare, she said the contractions are coming about two minutes apart all of a sudden. Man, I have to split.”

‘Take the truck and go. I’ll take care of the Ghost and come to the hospital after work. Don’t come back here no matter what anyone says. If this isn’t it, stay home anyway, just in case.”

It was maybe between 2 and 3 p.m. when our secretary told me to pick up the phone, it was John calling. His voice was cool and relaxed as was almost always the case.

“She had the baby. Anya Marie.”

They already knew it was a girl, and weeks earlier I had tricked Mayanne into telling the secret, but kept their confidence. He told me the time, weight, length, room number etc., so we all could go and play the lucky numbers with our friend Kenny back home, who moonlighted as a bookie. We were a colorful little bunch of miscreants.

“So what happened?’

“When I got home Mare was havin’ the contractions and we went right to the hospital. Her water broke when we were standing at the registration counter. What a mess. They took her right into surgery and did the C-section, and she’s fine too. Mommy, baby, 10 fingers, 10 toes, everybody’s fine.”

“How are you?”

“I’m kinda fucked up right now. Everything’s going so fast.”

“Have you called your folks? Reg, Mund, Walter?”

“I spoke with my folks, but everyone else is still at work and I don’t remember those numbers.”

“Okay, congratulations. What do you want me to do about the Ghost? You want to keep the truck and I’ll pick up the Ghost and we can switch tomorrow?”

“What do you want to do?”

“Well I wanna come to the hospital and see Mare and the baby, sorry, Anya.”

“Okay, but I don’t know if you’ll see Mare, she’s still in recovery. But the baby, oh, Anya, gotta get used to that, is in the nursery.”

“That’s good enough for me. I’ll see you when I get there.”

When 5:00 p.m. rolled around, I got one of our other co-workers to drive me to the shop, and along the way we enjoyed a bit of the good smoke. A colorful bunch as I said. At the shop I took the information on what was done, paid the bill, got the receipt and drove off to the hospital. The day had gotten hotter and more humid. Even with the Ghost’s top down it was oppressive. Coming up on a traffic light, the car in front of me stops kinda short, and my mind being elsewhere, I bumped, not smashed, into that car’s rear end. We both pulled into a parking lot beyond the intersection to inspect the damage. Thankfully, there was none to either car. The woman driving the car suggested we call the police just to get a report. But I managed to convince her that because there was no damage or injury, no report was necessary and our insurances would go up, blah, blah, blah. I apologized, waved her good bye and got to the hospital.

I saw John in a lounge close to the maternity ward. He had this joyful, thankful, exhausted expression on his face. He just stood up and with as big a smile as I ever saw just said, “C’mon, she’s over here.” And we walked through a set of doors to the nursery. And like every scene in every movie or TV show, we stood in front of the picture window and he pointed out the bassinette that held Anya. “GIRL – Dorowski” on a pink card. She was sleeping, and only her tiny face was visible under the hat and swaddling blanket.

“She’s really beautiful.”

“Yeah, it’s amazing.”

“Yeah, the whole new life into the world thing sure is that.”

‘That ain’t what I’m talking about. I’m talking about how much I love her. In an instant. Right from the second I saw her, before I even touched her, I love her more than anything in this world. And it’s a different love than how I love Mare, or my folks. It’s just so….arrrragh…I can’t explain it.”

“I get it.” I was lying. I couldn’t get it. It wasn’t until February 10, 2000 that I actually got it. And on that day, some of my first words to John (who was the first non-family member I spoke to) were, “now I know what you meant.” He remembered instantly what I was referring to.

We spent a couple more years together working in Memphis. For John and his young family it was vey good. Me? Not so much. But among the 8 guys working in our office, John and I were a terrific team. An engineer for FedEx once said that some people can work faster, and some people can work better, but nobody works faster and better than John and Dom. And the management of FedEx expressed this literally when the time came to close out the contract and wrap up our firm’s participation in the project.

Except for two of the eight guys working in the field office, everyone was to pack up and return to our home office in Greenwich, CT. I was told by our VP, that John and I were specifically requested by FedEx to be the two who remained. In the final months in Memphis, I decided for personal reasons to leave our company and stay permanently in Memphis. Permanently lasted 6 months. But John and I always stayed in touch even when he got relocated to Indianapolis, IN. We always knew what was going on in each other’s lives. But on the day he and his family left Memphis, I heard these words on the radio:

Johnny's takin' care of things for a while
And his style is so right for troubadours
They got him sitting with his back to the door
Now he won't be my fast gun anymore
Say goodbye to Hollywood
Say goodbye, my baby

So many faces in and out of my life
Some will last
Some will just be now and then
Life is a series of hellos and goodbyes
I'm afraid it's time for goodbye again
Say goodbye to Hollywood
Say goodbye, my baby

John was never now and then. John was one that lasted. I say goodbye to the sound of his voice, I say goodbye to his slap on the back, I say goodbye to the glint in his eyes. But I will never,…never, say goodbye to John.

of Zohak, The Serpent King

2009-06-30T19:29:00.017-04:00

Visual Poetry by Individualist (TheIndividualist@comcast.net)
“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

I have promised myself to do something to cover the events in Iran which fill me with Dread and Hope for the future. But as our media find distractions for the story we hear less from the President on the matter and I am saddened. The emotions in me are too strong to address with reason and satire so I have opted for this poem instead. The story of Kaveh the Blacksmith is maybe the most popular Iranian tale and the allusions in the poetry, such as they are, refer to it. This link gives a version of the story.

I regret to the people of Iran that this humble effort appears to be the greatest I am capable of helping with the cause. God protect you all from despots and madmen.

The Story of Kaveh the Blacksmith who defeats Zohak the Serpent King summarized from The Epic of Shahnameh Ferdowsi.

Shadow and Misdirection is his Craft
Dark Flames Veil Terror’s Sight
To Break Truth upon the Dagger’s Haft
The Dark Cold Shores of Acheron His Final Plight

The Travelers’ Flight Down Fear’s Path
Moving to Escape the Inferno’s Chain
Sweet Freedom’s Echo Rings in the Elector’s Math
The Demon’s Flawed Reckoning Sounds the Pursuing Pain

Through the Darkest Night of Sorrow’s Blue
Hope’s Glimmer Shines Through the Crooked Moon
Freedom’s Green Fields the Sayer’s Sooth
Crying for God’s Word, the Angels Happy Tune

On Clouds of Fire the Horseman Gather for the State
The Conjurer’s Spell Strikes, the Arrow Fury Enraged
Sinister Smoke Envelops the Mirrored Plate
They Cuckold Righteousness and Justice is Caged

Along Serendipity’s Road the Marchers Race
The tides of Chaos weave Silver Linings in the Thunderhead’s Brocade
Hope, Angst, Wrath and Terror fill the withering Pace
With each misstep the Falls of Time threaten to see Passions Fade

The Rising Rain flowers the Orchids of Transformation
The Fruits of Hate are Blood and Fire
The Frenzied Expressions Fuel the Call of a Nation
The “Voice” Shot Dead Thrives in the Din of the World’s Ire

Eighteen of the Blacksmith’s Rams the Supreme Leader’s Serpents shall Shear
Terror, Murder, Mayhem, on black bellies is the venom met
Kaveh the Blacksmith holds up his Leather Smock on the Spear
Independence, Resistance, Resilience, the Hero’s Standard is set

In strange Fates does desperation arise
Shining its Beacon on Freedom Travail
The Serpent King seeks the martyr’s demise
But to Allah we pray Hope’s Shade will Prevail

Give Bush Credit on Iran

2009-06-29T05:21:00.001-04:00

This is an article in Commentary by Abe Greenwald. Read the article

“Ciphering” Who Wins at Football

2009-06-28T19:24:00.004-04:00

By Individualist (TheIndividualist@comcast.net)
“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

Hello Sports Fans and welcome. Today we go to a special place. A weird and wacky place where Politics meets Football that is. Who is the “winningest” (in Sports Bars around the nation that is a technical term) Football Coach of all time Joe Paterno of Penn State University or Bobby Bowden of Florida State. This should be a simple thing that even Jethro Bodine of the Beverly Hillbillies could cipher.

Yet even as we speak today this is evidently something that must be drawn out in court of law with many thousands of dollars of tax payer money spent on lawyers, experts and who knows maybe even Rocket Scientists and Double Knot spies before they are through arguing so we may need Jethro’s help after all.

The controversy surrounds cheating in an online music history course in the fall of 2006 and the spring and summer of 2007 by several athletes not just in the football team but in many other sports as well. In all the staffers running the course helped 61 student athletes to cheat including allowing someone else to take one of the individual’s exams. Since 30% of the football team or around 25 players were involved and 11 of them starters this was a major problem for the NCAA to deal with. The cheating was uncovered when a single student athlete complained about another student being given answers to the test at the end of the 2007 year. Since many of the players might not had been eligible to play under NCAA rules it was decided that scholarships would be lost, students would be banned from bowl games and the thrust of the controversy, wins would be vacated. This is in all the sports not just football.

This is the real issue for FSU since Bobby Bowden is now one game away from outscoring Joe Paterno of Penn State in the greatest number of games won in Division 1A football. As it stands now Jopa as he is lovingly known to his fans has 383 wins while Papa Nole of FSU has 382. Given the winning rates of the schools it is very likely Bobby Bowden could overtake the Nittany Lion King. The vacation of 14 games by the NCAA however will make such an eventuality impossible.

So naturally FSU has appealed the ruling stating that they believed it to be unfair. The final verdict of the appeal has come back and the vacation of the wins stands. This means that FSU does not get credit for the wins but it does not mean the losing college will gain a win. The school is claiming that Coach Bowden is being unfairly punished for actions by other individuals for which he had no knowledge.

The FSU President is TK Wetherell is a former alumnus and FSU football player himself. According to Brent Kallestad of the associated Press in “NCAA intends to take away Florida State victories” TK Wetherell stated:

“This committee is just wrong. The rationale for doing that isn’t accurate.”

“There was no coach involved in this. The one group of people that were not involved in this thing were the coaches. They’re the one group that’s being penalized.”

“He wanted a “Blue Ribbon Commission” set up to evaluate the policy of vacating wins suspending the NCAA from enacting the punishment until the findings were released. This was denied in March of 2008. He also stated that the school would exhaust all appeal opportunities with the NCAA ‘before going anywhere else.’ ”

The appeal has been denied.

Where else is there to go except a law suit. However before we even get there we already have the media suing both FSU and the NCAA to force them to release the actual letter with their ruling which is held secret since the names of college students involved are listed. Currently the letter was retyped redacting the names. Florida has a public records law called the Sunshine Law here in the state that requires government agencies and taxpayer sponsored entities to release all minutes of meetings and public documents. I find it ludicrous that taxpayer dollars are being spent over whether a retyped document is not the same as a photocopy. The US congress has recently passed bills spending trillions with less scrutiny.

Do we have anything better to do with taxpayer money? Budget cuts enacted this year in education due to the weakening economy has cut classes and has increased college fees. I think that even Jethro Bodine and his vaunted sixth grade education can figure that one out

At the end of the day I wonder what value is there on the NCAA sanctioning of wins. I mean it is not like there is an official number. The “winningest” coach in football is an honorific that is given by the effect of the alcohol in the beer that has been consumed at the sports bar and not the striking of the gavel to conclude a pronouncement of some judge. Perhaps there will be a plaque at the Hall of Fame but even still if Bowden did win and the number of games posted did exceed Jopa, there would at the least be an asterisk by the number. The idea that we are spending taxpayer money and wasting the courts time to obtain some pronouncement that the fans at Hooters are going to discount or accept based upon their school affiliation anyways is probably a very good example of why this country is facing the deficits that it does.

The irony is that if we include all divisions John Gagliardi, Carroll College/St. John's College (Division III) has 461 wins and Eddie Robinson, Grambling State (Division III) had 408 when he retired. Just to add one more fact to muddy up the conversation at the sports bar.

I think Granny needs to start chasing TK Wetherell and these big city lawyers around with her shotgun.

But let us see what others have to say. According to Ray McNulty of the Scripps Howard News Service the NCAA is overstepping their bounds at the suggestion of academic corruption in sports.

“In reality, though, what happened in Tallahassee is just further proof that the joint pursuit of serious academics and big-time athletics is, across too much of our college sports landscape, a bad joke. And, for all its mock outrage, the NCAA knows it.”

Again from BRENT KALLESTAD article referenced above, Bobby Bowden had this to say on the subject.

“Joe, who I love to death, he and I got a battle that neither one of us thought would ever happen,” Bowden told WBRC-TV in Birmingham after a round of golf Thursday. “Joe would not want to win this thing the way they (NCAA) are doing this.”

In this case we have Bowden trying to ferret out what Jopa is thinking and predict what he would do in this situation. This is what I know of Joe Paterno. He is considered by Penn State fans to be the patron saint of football and he is held in high regard. I have a lot of respect for coach Bowden and have family members that are alumni of FSU. I say this as someone who has attended the University of Florida myself and I assure you I am not being facetious. He is a great coach and has done great things but I feel that there is no coach in football today that matches Joe Paterno because of his commitment to education. In 1966 when he was hired Joe Paterno brought with him an idea to incorporate academics and athletics from Brown College that he called “the Grand Experiment”.

According to Jeff Nelson of www.GOPSUsports.com in 2008 Penn State had 55 football squad members earn a 3.0 GPA or higher, 36 made the Dean’s list among the fall and spring semesters and the senior tackle Gerald Cadogan had a 4.0 GPA. Fifteen of the 36 had a GPA greater than 3.7. Mr. McNulty I guess Penn State is an exception to this rule isn’t it.

Penn State graduates 78% of its players in 2008, tying it for 9th place among all colleges. In contrast FSU graduates 69% making it 24th. African American players who play for Penn state have a GSR of 77% as opposed to the 58% GSR for Blacks which is the National Average. So the liberal excuse that Penn State is discriminating against poor blacks in favor of white kids from privileged neighborhoods cannot be applied here. Joe Paterno in this regard was like the Nuns back in the day at the Catholic school I went to in South Carolina that had a student ratio of 50% non Catholic black children. They did not care who you were, they were equally tough to everybody to force students to learn. And God Bless them for it.

But of even more significance are the Academic Progress Rates which the NCAA utilizes to measure not only simply gaining a diploma but how well the student athletes are performing. Penn State had an APR for Football Players in 2008 of 976 ranking the school in the 80th to 90th percentiles among football and 60th to 70th among all sports. FSU had an APR in 2008 of 932 which was in the 40th to 50th percentile among the sport of Football and 10 to 20th among all sports.

So in conclusion Ray McNulty states that academics and football are a joke yet Jopa manages to not only see that the athletes pass they excel. Bobby Bowden states Joe would not win this way and the FSU President states Bowden had no idea that one third of his team were cheats. Even if we accept that statement at face value it misses the point. The point is that Jopa would never be in that situation because as head coach he takes care to know what the academic progress of his athletes are and ensures that they work so as to not need to cheat. It is for this reason that I think Joe Paterno has earned the title of “the Patron Saint of Football”.

But fear not there is hope for Bobby Bowden. He is speculating as to what Joe Paterno thinks on these subjects and is trying to decipher his actions in the situation. In this regard he is asking the correct question, WWJD.

What Would Jopa Do?

As for ole Indy I feel that even if Joe Paterno were to be second to Bobby Bowden in total number of wins but by less than the 14 games in question that this might be in the end a better metaphor for his career than to win outright. It would tell the story that Joe Paterno’s dedication to the education of his student’s was such that it cost him this title. In this way it would show what Joe Paterno’s priorities actually were; Education First, then Football.

Now those priorities are a down home kind of wisdom that Jed Clampett would certainly approve.

Critical Thinking vs. "Feelings"

2009-06-28T13:56:00.001-04:00

This is a re-post.

A couple of days ago over at Big Hollywood I read an article by Scott Graves . In it you’ll see this quote from Mark Twain, “we all do no end of feeling, and we mistake it for thinking”. I have been thinking of ways to get this quote actually carved in stone and sent to my 9 and 5 year olds daughters, to hang on the wall in their bedrooms. My Dad has a beautiful slab of unused granite in his garage, but I don’t have the tools to shape a couple of tablet size pieces, and then carve in this wisdom. Combined Dad and I have a formidable tool arsenal, but carving stone is beyond that. Well, I guess we do have about 50 cold chisels between us, but no one would confuse my handiness with Michelangelo's. My daughters live with their mother and spend lots of time with the maternal side of their family tree. Twain’s observation is in the DNA of the people who are my girls’ exemplars of what adult behavior should be. For an aware parent, as I hope I am, the idea that my girls will be governed by their feelings rather than critical thinking scares the bejesus out of me.

How did we become a society that prefers to make the emotional choice rather than the rational one? Was it the advent of TV and the brilliant idea to sell products by emotional visual pleas to our wants and desires? I think it could’ve started there. Before TV, ads were in print or radio. The print ads had to use words to get the message across. And though words are powerful, after a while seeing the same type of superlatives over and over, most people glaze over and turn the page. Then radio came along and the words now were infused with tone and inflection that broadcast a more emotional message. But I think it was the music, specifically the jingle that was the big improvement radio gave to advertising. Everybody knows how any little ditty can get stuck in our head and not leave for days. “I’d like to get the world to sing….” Sorry, if I just did it to you.

But when TV came along, man everything changed. The moving visual image made it so very much easier to tug at peoples’ emotions than ever before. Hell that’s what makes TV content so powerful too. Seeing all the smiling actors and pitchmen with the Pepsodent smile, and Scope breath, and Herbal Essence hair, made you feel, ‘that could be me’ Even if you were a toothless, halitosified, bald snot. Let’s face it most of the people alive today who were born before TV are in their dotage and even they, having been exposed to these daily, constant emotional heart tugs have been affected. Those of us born after the advent of TV know nothing else.

Then of course we saw the emergence of the self-help industry and its partner the pay-a-whole-lot for help industry. Both of these industries have at their core this simple question – ‘how do you feel about it?’ And the implied answer is to guide yourself by what you feel. This is not a prudent precept to live by whether it is gotten off a bookshelf, an analyst’s couch or even a confessional. Yet I’ve come to believe that it dominates our society. With these possible exceptions – the scientific community (and it seems to be making inroads here) and the military where decisions are a matter of life and death, and must be governed by reality and facts. Emotion can only be given sway after the battle.

Our entertainment also became more feeling oriented. Observers who get paid to comment on the industry sometimes use the phrase sissified. I don’t disagree. The behavior of men was judged to be out-of-touch(feeling!) and emotionally repressed. So they gave us Alan Alda. Terrific actor, nice man but forever to be saddled as the example of what a limp,feeling man should be. He doesn’t deserve it, but there you go. Thank heavens for James Bond. I really do not know how the character has survived not being turned into a feelings-before-facts squish. He acts on emotion only when and where it’s appropriate and called for.

I know that critical thinking in a simple form, is one of the first things any parent wants to teach their child. The parent had better if he wants to keep his child safe during the moments the child is out of view. My mom tells me the first word I spoke was ‘hot’. Mom has always been most fine at thinking critically. If only my daughters….. Being able to assess personal safety and make the right choice is also a continuing lesson of critical thinking that continues as we grow. Learning the scientific method is still taught in school, at least I hope it is. Hell even learning about trial and error is a way of learning about how to make a choice from what you know rather than what you feel. And everybody knows how to do that. Hold on. I am wrong about trial and error. If I wasn’t, the adage “insanity is doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result” wouldn’t exist. So there are obviously people who try something, err, and feeling they must be right about their choice,try the same thing again. Hey, did I just demonstrate that relying on feelings is insanity? Whew, talk about pleasant unintended consequences.

I think feelings are favored over critical thinking out of laziness. In a totally non-scientific study, the people I know who rely most on their feelings are the most intellectually lazy people I know. Oh, they love to think they’re deeply aware of the world and how it works. They’ll scamper to the basement to surf the Internet and learn about the human genome project when it makes the news cycle, then pronounce themselves experts around the bonfire. But ask them why they support abortion, and you get the pro-choice feelings of the mother bullshit. Or some other talking points horse manure. BTW, why is it bull-shit, but horse-manure? I guess the truth is, living by your feelings is just easier to do than actually putting real thought into your actions and the possible consequences thereof. And man oh man, isn’t a whole lot of the world all about taking the easy way out?

Feelings have their proper place. I am the most emotional person I know. I can hate deeply, but love even deeper. Expressing crushing sorrow or exhuberant joy with public tears neither embarasses me or diminishes me. Exaltation and humiliation, I hold back nothing. But when decision time comes, I go by my feelings only when I’m choosing gifts for my loved ones (or gambling -don't tell anybody) The military excels by putting thinking before feeling. Because they know it is a matter of life and death. And first above all things, the military values life. To so many other people, living by feelings is the way to faster gratification of whatever desire they have. How they choose what they choose isn’t such a weighty matter to them. But they couldn’t be more wrong. Dead wrong.

A Rocker Remembers Jacko

2009-06-26T16:51:00.004-04:00

In the summer of 1973 I attended my first concert, Grand Funk Railroad at the old Colloseum in El Paso. My ears rang for three days, they were fantasic. If you wanted to hang with me and my friends it was Rock & Roll, the heavier the better. If an acoustic guitar was involved Jimmy Page or Neil Young better be playing it for it to be considered"cool". Pop, Funk and my gosh, Disco, that was music you didn't admit listen to. If I was going to listen to genres other than hard rock/metal I had to be by myself in the car driving home late at night. And that's what I did, and you know, I found out that it was ok to broaden my musical horizons. Bob Marley? Dang the man was talented, so what if wasn't really rock? Ohio Players? Now that was funky. So how does this relate to Michael Jackson? Jacko made music you didn't admit to your rocker friends that you were listening to, because he wasn't considered "cool". But I have to admit, many of his biggest hits had an infectious rhythm and some really great musicianship. He really was a master at what he did, and that was pure Pop. Remember, this is from a hard core rocker that would get to an 8:00 pm show at 9:00 am to get the best seats to see Black Sabbath or Judas Priest and fondly remembers seeing AC/DC in '77 or '78 with Bon Scott, their original singer. We had long hair and banged heads before "hair bands" gained prominence, but as the 80's settled in and "Billie Jean" came on the radio I found it was easy to admire the musicianship and songcraft of Michael Jackson.

Does his brilliance as a Pop Star erase his odd behavior or mitigate what were certainly true allegations of his improper involment with children? No. The man was an odd duck and perhaps even a criminal although he was acquitted of molestation charges once and paid off another "victim" in the 90's. Those transgressions are now refueling hate and negative feeling for the man, and to those people that feel that way, I get it and thats your right and priviledge, but for now I'm looking past that sordid part of his life.

He was a towering talent, born to entertain and he did it well for four decades. His premature death at age 50 thrusts him in to the upper strata of "Pop Culture Icons". He has joined Marilyn, Elvis and James Dean as an American Pop legend and he earned it the American way, with hard work and immense talent. We can dissect his life and criticize him another day, for now R.I.P. Michael Jackson. That's what I think, Thank You...

Dateline: London: Save the U.S from Europeanization!

2009-06-24T14:32:00.007-04:00

Some things go well together; peanut butter and chocolate, beautiful girls and powerful boats, BBQ and tailgate parties, the list is endless. Somethings don't fit together so well; the Democrat party and governence, being drunk and driving, Ted Kennedy and driving. This list is also endless. Despite what the Obama Administration and many progressive/ liberals think, the U.S. is much better off being widely separated both physically and philisophically from Western Europe. Here is the beginning of my post. The barrier of the Atlantic used to afford the U.S. enough space to breath in, to create in, to be American in. While the great old Imperial powers of Europe receded from the stage of international leadership the U.S. stepped forward. When Western Europe slipped into its current form of modern socialism, the U.S. solidified itself as the most powerful, least likely to be over-regulated, most efficient economy in world history. While science and technology in Western Europe stagnated, the U.S. continued to make one world changing breakthrough after another. We go to the moon, they watch. We build a world class medical system, they sit for months waiting to see a doctor. Why Obamatrons think that England or France just "does it better" is beyond me. Having been there, let me assure you, we don't want to be like them. The cost of fuel forces average people to ride around on scooters and in tiny little clown cars. Most of the people of Europe believe the "global warming" propaganda without question, no debate allowed. They get "free health care", the latest Obama move toward a Euro-style U.S., yet people can't find a dentist that will see them. Some people are pulling their own teeth in England, their National Heath Care system dentists have NO incentive to take on more patients. When it comes to health care in England, apparently "patience" is a BIG part of surviving England's free health care. "Cap and Trade" is certainly the biggest government power grab ever, and it's right out of the European handbook. When in doubt, tax 'em, the English top rate is at 51% and rising. The pushback in England has begun, with members of Parliment abusing the public trust with phony expense claims, living like Kings while they raise taxes on the people and are struggling to keep services in place that they have been using to buy public favor with. Believe me,we don't want to be like Europe, what they do doesn't work.

The adolescent angst of Obama

2009-06-24T02:06:00.004-04:00

This is an article by the eminent political observer Michael Barone. I don't think conservatives or liberals can rightly claim him as one of their own. He has worked for both CNN and Fox News channel, written for Time, Obamaweek, sorry Newsweek and has authored more than a few books. This article is well worth everyone's time.

by Michael Barone

There is a tendency for newly installed presidents, like adolescents suddenly liberated from adult supervision, to do the exact opposite of what their predecessors did. Presidents of both parties indulge in this behavior, though Democrats who campaign as candidates of hope and change are more likely to do so.

Some of this is a legitimate response to the political process: Voters tend to elect presidents who seem to possess qualities and views they thought lacking in their predecessors. But some of it, and especially in the case of Barack Obama, seems to come from an adolescentlike confidence that everything done by those who came before is (insert your own generation’s expletive here).

We have seen this spectacularly in the dozen days since the June 12 Iranian election. Back in July 2007, Obama said that he would meet with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad and other tyrants without preconditions. Grown-up squares like George W. Bush wouldn’t talk to these guys, so as the avatar of the generation of hope and change, Obama would. Obama figured he was cool enough to get the mullahs to agree to renounce nuclear weapons and all that hate stuff.

Obama has held to this ever since. Before June 12 he said he would give the Iranian leaders till the end of the year to be enchanted. When millions of Iranians started demonstrating in the streets, denouncing the obvious election fraud and in some cases calling for an end to the regime, his initial responses verged on stony indifference.

He expressed “deep concern” but said he didn’t want to “meddle.” He issued a statement on June 20 calling on the Iranian government “to stop all violent and unjust actions.” Finally, in a hastily called news conference Tuesday he for the first time uttered the verb “condemn” and said he was moved by the video of YouTube martyr Neda Soltan being shot down by the mullahs’ gunmen.

But he clearly hasn’t abandoned his policy of seeking the good opinion of tyrants. He didn’t even rescind the State Department’s invitations of Iranian diplomats to attend U.S. embassy Fourth of July celebrations (halal hot dogs, anyone?). If Bush refused to entertain the emissaries of the Iranian theocrats, it must be right to do the opposite. But even anonymous State Department officials are saying that the chances are dismal for fruitful negotiations with Ahmedinejad or the tyrant Obama insists on calling “the supreme leader” by Obama’s deadline —something that seemed obvious to me and many others well before June 12. A regime of tyrants dedicated to hatred of America, Britain and Israel is not going to be persuaded to abandon a central goal by even the most dazzling display of adolescent charm.

The other example of adolescent rejection of a policy has come on missile defense. Back in the 1970s and 1980s Democratic politicians opposed missile defense on the grounds — mistaken in my view, but arguable at the time — that it would destabilize the balance of nuclear terror between the United States and the Soviet Union. Democrats have clung to that position even after the fall of the Soviet Union and Obama, as a senator and presidential candidate, joined them, routinely expressing doubts that missile defense could ever work.

As president, he has singled out missile defense for cuts, even in the face of missile launches by North Korea and evidence of continuing missile development by Iran. Bush abrogated the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and pushed ahead on missile defense, so it must be bad even if there’s no U.S.-Soviet balance of terror to destabilize any more.

Fortunately there has been some adult supervision: Defense Secretary Robert Gates, in anticipation of a North Korean launch, has activated missile defense operations in Hawaii.

Obama has not taken an adolescent approach across the board. Despite the yearning of many Democrats for American defeat in Iraq and withdrawal from Afghanistan, he has pushed for something like victory in those theaters.

But he is persistent in seeking negotiations with the mullahs and obviously disinclined to increase the small chance of the far more promising outcome of regime change. Plus, Obama shows a continued distaste for missile defense when tyrants are aiming missiles at us and our friends.

These moves show an adolescent determination to renounce the policies of those who came before, no matter what. As parents know, it takes time for an adolescent to grow up.

To Arms Gentle Knights Errant, Our Maidens’ Virtues needs Defending

2009-06-20T23:47:00.006-04:00

By Individualist
“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

To Arms, To Arms my Valiant Warrior Princes
We are Charged to Protect our Maiden’s Virtue
Her voice so like the warble of Gentle Finches
Ere All Silenced by Enemy slashing Slanders, too

So I Implore you Gentle Conservative Vassals
Who wish to Arm Against the Trolls’ Breath
Carry on to Glean Shields against the Missiles
For Honor’s Loss is a Fate worse than Death

Reference: Trollywood

In the first part of this post I evaluated several examples of the liberal’s attempts to silence conservative women by quite frankly sexually harassing them. I pointed out the tactics they use. They call them sluts and attack their demeanor. They have liberals openly ridicule them; they have men lambast them by talking of sexually abusing them. They make jokes about rape and openly disparage them. Then when this is done the “feminists” will reluctantly comment on the abhorrent nature of the statements but will then proceed to lecture that conservatives should quit doing it either without giving examples or dragging out factual errors made by them 17 years ago. They do this to ridicule and condemn and to make conservative women want to stop taking a public stance in the arena of politics. Or as Andrew Klavan at Big Hollywood suggests is the standard answer of the left to Conservative thought, Shut The F*** Up.

So what are we conservatives to do? As conservatives we must step up and have at the monstrous Trolls that are behind this. We must act as the knights errant of Cervantes’ tales and defend conservative women from these attacks. We must not shy from this course. For this tactic is as old as the notion of chivalry itself, even older. If you attack a woman’s virtue you also attack the honor of the men who are their husbands, fathers, brothers and family friends. It is a Pas d’Armes and if the challenge is not answered then they have the better of you. One way to show a man a coward and thus your dominance of him is too openly disparage his woman. I know the feminists don’t want to hear it but it is ingrained in out nature. The insult is effective as it is tied to our survival (procreation).

We conservatives tend to believe in Individualism and so we do for ourselves. When we get together we focus on what the government is doing to us and how to either stop the government or get around the stricture. We don’t tend to form groups to keep people from talking, acting or thinking in certain proscribed ways. It is the opposite of our nature. We will answer challenges and speak out against policies we disapprove but for the most part when it comes to the verbal art of ridicule we are usually on the defensive.

We need to learn to take notice and stand up to these attacks. We have failed to fend off the Trolls usually under the assumption that these base statements are beneath our contempt. So now we are overrun. We need to see the signs.

Warning Trolls

But you may say to me Indy there you go again. Chivalry is dead, this is the 21st Century. These ideas are gone. Who still preaches those values. Interesting enough there is Stacy McDonald author of the book Raising Maidens who talks of teaching virtue to young ladies and the bond between Mother and Daughter.

She is a 21st century source for the virtue of maidenhood and also has some insight on her blog as to the true Knights in Shining Armor that are there to protect the young maiden’s virtue, Fathers.

In reading through here blog I can see that she would be the first to condemn any man who jokes of “rape” or “Hate F***” or whatever euphemism the leftists wish to use. There are no moral equivalencies for our mothers when it comes to this. When someone starts talking of what Rush Limbaugh may or may not have done 17 years ago I think a Mom would have this answer:

“Two wrongs don’t make a right”

I find it Ironic that in the very flower of Victorian womanhood one would have a more enlightened answer to jokes inferring the rape of daughters than the modern feminist movement.

So we must be our own men and we must protect our woman. This is the standard upon which we must charge forward. We conservative must act as the questing Knights Errant of Arthurian Legend or for the women as Le Pucelle (the Maid), Joan of Arc. At Big Hollywood several have been having forth at David Lettermen for his comments about Sara Palin’s children. But what are the weapons of a 21st century cyber knight. The Blog, Music, TV, Literature, the Theater all the trappings of our culture are the playing field. The weapons are satire, thoughtful reasoning and impassioned belief. The armor is knowledge of the facts and ability to see through sophistry and hyperbole. Are there tools of combat that we have left out? The Protest March for one. Not normally our thing, we have come out in a big way on Tax Day at the Tea Parties and it must have had an effect since the leftists at MSNBC had to devote so much time denigrating it with sexual references.

But there are other weapons, nastier ones. The Nuisance Suit is one. Sara Palin has had to spend one half million dollars just to fend off bogus lawsuits. Tom Delay was continually indicted by an unscrupulous partisan state’s attorney who for two years kept throwing out charges that would get dropped. The same guy did this to Kay Bailey Hutchinson as well. Do we have clandestine squads of bloggers to gather on the internet just to dream up ways to harass democrats. This is where I’d like to draw the line but there is also a part of me that would like payback I must admit. Part of me would like to see a concerted conservative effort cause a David Letterman to be fired through the filing of nuisance suits against CBS using the same tactics that were successfully used on fellow conservative. I’d like to see this even though I know such impulse is wrong.

Would we not like to have payback for Clarence Thomas, Judge Bork, Newt Gingritch, Carrie Prajean and all others that have been so unfairly maligned for just expressing their political viewpoints. Even if the sentiment just is to sate our thirst for vengeance. Especially if such tactics employed against Frank, Pelosi , Dodd Schumer and the rest might mean a leftist not being reelected. You see my point. Political survival can be at stake. The Knights of medieval times had considered similar issues in warfare back then. Certain weapons were considered dishonorable. One could use them to win the day but one could not regain one’s honor or the honor of those they are charged to protect if they are used. The longbow was considered as such.

But as to those who cannot be civil to a woman because she disagrees politically. Who call her slut, talk to her as if she was not human, talk suggestively of Rape. Perhaps giving this kind of grief would not be unjustified. After all is there not a difference between how a knight would fight on the field of honor against another noble knight and how a knight would deal with a horrid monstrosity such as a giant, dragon or troll. Are we not right in seeing those that act in the manner above in such a light. The question is not an easy one.

Whatever the weapons my friend the call to action must be clear. We must begin to fight back. We cannot allow this to go unanswered any more. As Edward Bulwer-Lytton states in his 1839 play Richilieu; Or the Conspiracy:

“True, This! —
Beneath the rule of men entirely great,
The pen is mightier than the sword. Behold
The arch-enchanters wand! — itself a nothing! —
But taking sorcery from the master-hand
To paralyse the Cæsars, and to strike
The loud earth breathless! — Take away the sword —
States can be saved without it!”

We must find some way to make certain that liberals who feel empowered to use lies and slander receive the biting thrust of our pens in answer. I will leave you with this quote from Cervantes’ The Man of La Mancha.

“Happy she that might body and soul adorn
With thy rich livery and thy high desire;
And see thy happy knight, by honour borne,
In cruel combat, broaching out his ire.”

Sexual Obssession, Into the Dungeons of the Mindset of Trollywood

2009-06-20T23:20:00.006-04:00

By Individualist
“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

Moving from Shadow to Night, Hiding from Truth’s Grasp
Sinking into the depths where cavernous plotting doth twist
Lies and Deception mask the Hatred and Venom of the Asp
Where Power and Fame are the Lost Soul’s only Grist

This will be the first of two posts this week related to each other in concept. This post will cover serious and adult topics of the liberals need to denigrate and humiliate conservative women through sexual depraved insults and slanders. This post will deal with the what and potentially the why. The next will deal with the possible response we should have to it. This may be lengthy as I feel I need to cover material to prove my point. Enjoy.

I have to travel a lot for my work and stay in Hotels. One particular Hotel offers movies labeled “Still in Theaters”, “Recent Attractions” and “Adult” for sale. Just click the orange button and you’ve spent $16. You can page through the movies four at a time by hitting nine. If you get through the Recent Attractions it will take you to the Adult films and the first one that is shown is below:

Just one click too many and there you have it the Best Seller 4 and a half star porn film “Who’s Nailin Palin”. What a sweet tribute to the Governor of Alaska, I wonder who is behind it. I found it so disturbing I decided to research what was behind this.

It was released by Larry Flint’s Hustler magazine in October of 2008 just in time for the election. There was a link to the script which starts out with two Russians whose Tank breaks down outside of Palin’s house and she evidently uses her “diplomatic” skills to improve relations with the Ruskies. I did not read further. At this point it is not the Porn that is getting to me it is the venomous cruelty behind it.

In my research I found that this industrious crew has not had enough of slandering the Governor, no they want to make more such movies. On June 12 Hustler’s Roger Klipon, Krypton, whatever made an offer to Carrie Prajean for $500K below:

“We were so sorry to hear about your recent departure from the Miss California Organization. However I think we have some news that can turn this situation around. Your reign as Miss California doesn’t have to end.

Hustler Video would like to offer you to play the role of California in our new interactive parody film, Your Nailin Palin. Your scene would feature some hot girl-on-girl action with adult performer Lisa Ann who’s portraying the former VP candidate. Don’t worry you’ll have some chance to have opposite sex as well. Can’t wait to hear what you think.”

Classy huh! Klipon is definitely a people person isn’t he.

Greg Gutfeld has touched on this theme at Big Hollywood.

Eminem Post

Another post by Mr. Gutfeld on Big Hollywood about the writings of Henry “the Tool” Rollins regarding Ann Coulter:

Henry Rollin's Post

Essentially Mr. Rollins expresses his superior debating skills in the old Lincoln Douglas debate format where his reasoning is as follows. You’re going to be my sex slave and I will force myself on you and then you will Shut the F*** up. Has a way with the ladies, doesn’t he.

So I am now asking myself the question what is it with the left and their obsession with conservative women. After all this is not just petty and trite, it is sickeningly mean. Larry Flint is supposedly sitting on a Gold mine so what is he so unhappy about? What the heck did Carrie Prejean do? What justifies trying to harm everyone that disagrees with you politically? How Pathetic!

Then of course there are wannabees. Here’s a juicy clip from the “Anger” guy or is it “Auger” guy. He is digging himself into a hole.

Auger Guy posted a video of two Asian women in a Lesbian scene. The video edited out by me showed another women in white panties being pulled down by the woman shown here in the picture. Auger Guy had this to say:

“And is it just me or does the girl at the front look like Michelle Malkin? Ohhhhhh, I just thought of a horribly devious thing to do. Maybe I should rename this post to “Michell Malkin lesbian sex tape released”. That oughta genrate some pervy search engine traffic.”

That’s right Auger don’t they all look alike. It’s not a bigoted cliché when “progressives” do it. When his video was flagged and removed this was his response:

“this is the work or some loser hater, not a genuinely offended person. It isn’t as if it matters anyway, this is hardly an important video to me. Either it was one of the normal boring haters who thought they were getting back at me by doing or it was a Malkin supporter. Either way, f*** you losers.”

Evidently he posts stills of naked women and suggestive titles over some liberal rant because people who like “porn” don’t know how to hit the “stop” button. But it doesn’t matter anyways (his words). What strikes me as funny is that he would post this of Michelle Malkin and then call someone who was offended by that “the Hater”. But this guy is just fooling around but he doesn’t even clue in to what a slanderous fool he is.

Then we come to David Bedwetterman. His non-apology was actually more offensive than his joke. I did not mention rape. No Dave, you just inferred it by making the impregnator in the joke a man who was publicly accused of rape. I meant the older daughter. Yes and all 17 year girls who make a mistake and get pregnant and make the courageous decision to keep their child instead of murdering it deserve to have jokes made about them about rapists impregnating them. Supposedly he gave a real apology yesterday but at this point it is just to save his career so I did not bother to find it and listen.

Just when I thought the gutter’s bottom was reached we slide right into the sewer drain. The most offensive I think came in the response from the National Organization for Women.

Now Response
“The sexualization of girls and women in the media is reaching new lows these days — it is exploitative and has a negative effect on how all women and girls are perceived and how they view themselves. Letterman also joked about what he called Palin’s “slutty flight attendant look” — yet another example of how the media love to focus on a woman politician’s appearance, especially as it relates to her sexual appeal to men. Someone of Letterman’s stature, who appears on what used to be known as “the Tiffany Network” (CBS), should be above wallowing in the juvenile, sexist mud that other comedians and broadcasters seem to prefer.

On that point, it’s important to note that when Chelsea Clinton was 13 years old she was the target of numerous insults based on her appearance. Rush Limbaugh even referred to her as the “White House dog.” NOW hopes that all the conservatives who are fired up about sexism in the media lately will join us in calling out sexism when it is directed at women who aren’t professed conservatives.”

So Letterman should be taken to task for the “slutty flight attendant” line but not for inferring “rape” of a child. Exactly what in the blue blazes does a comment that Rush Limbaugh made in 1992 have to do with it. Well NOW let’s examine that comment shall we.

Lying Liar

Let’s see, the reference you give about conservatives getting fired up evidently references the Franken lie and not the actual show that aired. Franken could not even get the year of the show correct, 1992 and not 1993. So Bedwetterman makes a “rape” joke about a child (actually two children because the listener can infer either one) we conservatives are supposed to wear hair shirts because AL Franken lied about what Rush Limbaugh said 17 years ago. I guess the line about women never forgetting slight applies here.

Ok NOW you are voted the Organization Most Likely to Support a Misogynist, the OSMOSIS award. That’s right Move Over Taliban the NOW Gals have edged you out. Watch for white powder in the reward envelope when it is sent back because I believe Bin Ladin had it last.

But we are not done with the conservobabes yet. No sir we have heard from Hustler now let’s hear from Playboy. There was an article on Playboy’s website that was eventually pulled because it was so offensive by Guy Cimbalo.

Right Wing News

It is discussed very eloquently by Right Wing News. Essentially it is a list of 10 top conservative women Mr. Cimbalo would like to Hate F***. “Rape” involves hating and intercourse does it not. Hmmm….

These aggrieved women are
• Michelle Malkin
• Megyn Kelly
• Mary Katharine Ham
• Amanda Carpenter
• Elisabeth Hasselbeck
• Dana Perino
• Laura Ingraham
• Pamela Geller
• Michele Bachmann
• Peggy Noonan

And again the so-called feminist response itself is in its own way more hurtful than the article.

Salon.com

http://www.usnews.com/blogs/erbe/2009/06/03/playboy-mix-of-sex-hate-and-politics-demeans-conservative-women.html

I could elaborate but I will chose instead to list the post by “Unbelievable” instead:

Unbelievable...
“So, advocating the rape of someone who holds political views that you disagree with is somehow less repulsive than advocating the rape of someone who holds the same political views you do? And in fact it is a sliding scale. Michele Malkin being further to one end than Amanda Carpenter.

Really? I think rape is equally repulsive no matter who the victim is. I think assigning worth to people based on their political views is also repulsive.
What? Did your editor tell you (that) you must write an article condemning Playboy and this is the best you can come up with? You're as disgusting as the author of the Playboy article.”

In conclusion what should we conservatives make of this. Right Wing News is spot on. This is not just meanness and off the cuff ad hominem attacks. This is an attempt to threaten conservative women and scare them off by indulging in the basest and sickest sexual references. The so-called feminists compound the issue with fake statements of condemnation that end up being off hand insults aimed at their conservative values. You can see with the repetition of the tactic that this a just a play from a strategy book.

But the motivations behind it are belied by their words. Liberal men fear conservative women because you actually have to listen to them and to convince them you have to show them. With a liberal woman you can pretend to listen to their rants about misogyny and equal rights and at the right time you parrot what they say back to them. Just like the snickers commercial where the guy asks the girl back to his room and then saves himself by “blogging” for the cause. Because all a liberal woman cares about is your submission to identity politics. With a conservative woman she does not involve herself in identity politics. She actually wants an honest answer. There are no cheat sheets on the correct answers in articles in women’s magazines. Hint for liberals: It’s called independent thought.

So it is easier to be crude and sexual harass them to make them feel small in an attempt to keep them from speaking out. The feminists play right into it. In the Salon.com articles Michelle Malkin has her husband to write her speeches for her. She is derided as the “little woman” dependent on some man. The insults have layers to them. The left cannot have famous conservative women because they would lose that leg of identity politics. How can you tell a 20 something male he has to vote liberal to get laid when there are gorgeous women like Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin, Laura Ingraham et al. The answer is you can’t. So they do everything to hurt these woman. Politics is more important than Truth to a Liberal.

So they act like Trolls. How a propros!

Lies, Damn Lies & The Environmentalists

2009-06-17T14:18:00.002-04:00

First off let me say that I have no interest in leaving behind to my daughters a world that is full of polluted air, poisonous water and devoid of trees. But the environmentalist movement (Eco-Nazis) have gone way too far in trying to control humanity by their constant use of scare tactics. Starting with the patron saint of Eco-Nazism – Rachel Carson – these people are responsible for more deaths than the total body count of World War Two (70 million). The Eco-Nazis are wreaking havoc across the globe and no one seems to be standing in their way.

In Africa alone it is estimated that at least 50 million people have died from malaria since 1972. Why since 1972? Well that was the year that the US and UN instituted a ban on DDT. DDT is a safe, cheap pesticide that eradicates the mosquitoes that carry and transmit malaria. Why was it banned? Because in her nauseatingly propagandistic book “Silent Spring”, Rachel Carson asserted that because DDT was working it’s way into the diets of birds, eventually the birds would produce eggs with shells too thin to survive the gestation process and therefore would go extinct and no more bird songs would be heard, therefore the “silent spring.” Everything about her claims has been since proven to be completely wrong. But the Eco-Nazis and the sheeple that support them got the DDT ban in place and now 30+ years later 50 million Africans have died plus another 20-25 million worldwide in areas prone to mosquito infestation, all because the surest, cheapest way to prevent them from contracting the disease that killed them, was denied them to save some birds who were never even in danger. Anybody out there see anything wrong with this?

How about the issue of air pollution? Remember how we were told that living in a large city like New York or LA was the equivalent of smoking two packs a day due to the poor quality of the air in places like that? Utter nonsense. If this were true, why was there never any type of spike in the incidence of emphysema or other dangerous pulmonary diseases in those cities? Same thing with “second hand smoke.” The human respiratory system is basically a filtering system that extracts oxygen from ambient air for the body to use, but also pulls out a lot of other potentially bad stuff, stuff that can be found in tobacco smoke. So if lots of these toxins are pulled out of tobacco smoke in their first filtering through the lungs, how is it possible that the filtered air expelled from the lungs be more polluted than the original smoke that was not filtered? It is stupefying how supposedly intelligent people fall for this garbage.

Because of the Eco-Nazis and their use of phony science to support their claims, the American auto industry is now a state run enterprise. The ridiculous and draconian CAFE emissions standards imposed on the industry by the Eco-Nazis and their sheeple in Congress, along with the presidents of both parties who signed the legislation, GM, Ford and Chrysler were forced to make cars that didn’t perform the way their customers wanted them too, and were made more expensive to boot. The Eco-Nazis want to eliminate the internal combustion engine and now they’ve got the means to do it. Think about this for a few minutes; the earth is 75% water, 25% land mass. So over 75% of the earth, no pollution is occurring. Of the 25% land mass only around 5% (or less) is actually occupied by man. That means that over approximately 95% of the earth’s surface, no eco-damaging activity is taking place. And I have no clue as to what percent of the remaining 5% actually has polluting activity taking place. So who in their logical mind can believe that all the internal combustion engines and all the factories, and all the campfires, and all the Bar-B-Q’s, and all the candles, and all the lawnmowers, and all the cow farts in all the world can actually have a permanent global global effect on the quality of the air on earth? Even volcanic explosions only have a temporary effect on air quality, over a limited area and only for a relatively short period of time.

The agenda of the Eco-Nazis is to control humanity. That may seem like a stretch, but it is true. And to do this they want to eliminate cheap energy. Cheap energy saves lives, it is indispensable to life in the 21st century. What would medical care look like if the energy to run hospitals or research facilities was four to five times more expensive. If the Eco-Nazis were actually serious about having safe, cheap, clean, inexhaustible energy sources there would be no opposition to nuclear energy. Solar, wind and other types of alternative energy sources are just not viable right now and won’t be for at least twenty years if then even. It is folly to spend money in these economic times to purse any of them. But that doesn’t square with the agenda of the Eco-Nazis. And now they’ve got a friend in the White House.

The Eco-Nazis and the sheeple that support them do not care about condemning to death innocent people if their needs conflict with lies of the Eco-Nazis. The Eco-Nazis come clothed in a cloak of benign desires to “save the planet.” And they are the only ones who can save it. But they don’t care about being wrong, they don’t care about tens of millions of malaria victims, they don’t care about wrecking economies, they don’t care about anything but making you live your life they way they want you to live it. And they try to do it by denying you access to the energy you need to live life as you see fit. If people let men like Al Gore and Robert Kennedy Jr. define the way we can live our lives as free Americans, well then, they will richly deserve the fate that befalls them.

Liberal Myths vs. The Truth

2009-06-16T12:08:00.004-04:00

In America, the post 1968 liberal movement has tried (and largely succeeded) to hijack the public discourse and re-write American history in the best Stalinist tradition. Here are three popular liberal myths with an acompanying short historical summary exploding each one.

Liberal Myth No.1
The United States was founded by liberals seeking a change from the status quo.

The Truth
The United States was founded (if you discount the failed Jamestown settlement) by the Puritans of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. The Puritans were the most conservative sect of the conservative Calvanist movement of Protestant Europe. These were the religious right of their day. They left their homes in Europe to be free of overbearing government intrusion in their lives. The foremost being religious persecution. They sought to build a place where they could worship their God as they saw fit. A place where the government would be relatively weak. Over time the Puritan model was used by those who wrote our founding documents as a template for the new republic. Those who preferred the European way of doing things (large powerful central governments, state run labor “guilds”, a governing “elite” class) were called “Loyalists” and we call their descendants “Canadians” today. Even then the New York colony was known to be the most liberal of the original 13. And they were the last colony to sign the Declaration of Independence. And it was touch and go as to whether or not they would. As Casey Stengel once said, “you can look it up.”

Liberal Myth No.2
It was liberals who formed the anti-slavery movement which led to the Civil War.

The Truth
The anti-slavery movement, the “abolitionists” was founded in the evangelical Protestant churches of what would become the Union states. It’s leaders from John Brown on down were conservative, evangelical Christian ministers and church leaders. These men and women, informed by their faith, were the first ones to sacrifice their lives to put an end to institutionalized slavery in the United States. And they stirred the entire nation. It was the southern states, dominated by Democrats, that tried to destroy the Union to hold onto their slaves. And once war broke out, in liberal New York, there were the “draft riots” to protest “Mr. Lincoln’s war to free the slaves.”

Liberal Myth No.3
Liberals were the prime movers in America’s effort to defeat Hitler.

The Truth
Before Dec. 7, 1941 opposition to entering “another European War” was widespread and pervaded both sides of the political aisle. FDR believed he had to keep his meetings with Churchill clandestine even after having swept into his 3rd term in 1940, because the entire country did not want send American boys to die in Europe. This opposition was led primarily by World War vets who knew what war in Europe was like and did not want to send there sons to die in another one. And as for those in America who held Nazi sympathies, can you guess which American this author was writing about?

“ Writing at the time, Joe applauded Hitler's insight in realizing the German people's "need of a common enemy, someone of whom to make the goat. Someone, by whose riddance the Germans would feel they had cast out the cause of their predicament. It was excellent psychology, and it was too bad that it had to be done to the Jews. The dislike of the Jews, however, was well-founded. They were at the heads of all big business, in law etc. It is all to their credit for them to get so far, but their methods had been quite unscrupulous ... the lawyers and prominent judges were Jews, and if you had a case against a Jew, you were nearly always sure to lose it. ... As far as the brutality is concerned, it must have been necessary to use some.” The paragraph is from a biography of Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. by Edward Renahan Jr. At the time Kennedy was FDR’s ambassador to Great Britain.

FDR himself, in his mis-guided ego regarding his own powers of persuasion, felt that he could negotiate with Hitler if the need to do so ever surfaced. He believed that Hitler would not lie to him as he had to Chamberlain (another liberal). Sound like anyone we just inaugurated? As the war in Europe approached final allied victory, FDR also believed, and told Churchill, that he and he alone knew how to handle “Uncle Joe” (FDR’s condescending name for Stalin). So he believed Stalin’s promise that at the war’s conclusion, Soviet troops would withdraw from the countries they had driven the Nazis out of, and that free elections would be held in these nations. FDR thereby consigned millions of people to Communist, totalitarian, dictatorships for the next 40 years, and gave birth to the Cold War.

Had it not been for Pearl Harbor, FDR was quite prepared to see Europe fall, relying on the Atlantic Ocean to give America enough time to build up the forces necessary to defend the homeland and make Hitler think twice about a trans-oceanic invasion.

A small historical footnote. It is an old tradition (probably going back to the Continental Army) that the officer corps of our military keep their political affiliations and leanings private until their terms of service were finished. In modern American history, only 5 men have had 5 stars on their shoulders, and they were all WWII commanders: Generals George Marshall, FDR’s Chief of Staff, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Commander Allied Expeditionary Forces, Omar Bradley, Commander US Ground Forces European Theater of Operations, Douglas MacArthur, Commander US Ground Forces Pacific, and Admiral Chester Nimitz, Commander Central Command Pacific. These 5 men developed the strategies, employed the tactics, and led the troops that secured our victories that won WWII. Conservatives or Republicans, all.

DATELINE: Omaha Beach

2009-06-15T14:43:00.002-04:00

It' serenely quiet as I walk the beach at "Bloody Omaha" of Normandy. No seagulls, no voices, just the soft lapping off the English Channel against the beach. It's a rather unremarkable beach as beaches go, and I seen a whole lot of them. Rather it's the remarkable events that started here before dawn 65 years ago that make this place special. Remarkable young men did the unnatural, they poured out of landing craft and plunged into battle, many for the first time and many for their only time. When you see the terrain you can see why it turned into a killing field. At high tide you still have quite a distance to cover to get to the rise of the land from the beach. The berns and hills above Omaha are tall and imposing. Looking at those steep approaches from their landing craft must have caused a fear I can't identify with. The courage to suck it up and burst out of the Higgins boats and dash for the shore took strength and conviction. Many never made it past the lowering of the ramps, yards from shore would be as close as they get before their lives would end. As I leave Omaha I stop to pick up a couple of peices of trash and walk up the short hill the ends at a draw that gives you driving access to Omaha Beach. German tourist look at me in a curious way as I drop the trash in a receptacle near the parking lot. It clear to me that the don't feel that "Bloody Omaha" is sacred ground, every bit as sacred as Gettysburg or Iwo Jima. I say nothing as the tourists fall silent and munch on apples and boot a soccer ball around as I walk past. Perhaps the look on my face said all that needed to be said.

The Coming Fall of Firefly

2009-06-12T00:00:00.004-04:00

President Firefly is making "liberal" a bad word again. He now wants military personell to give Miranda warnings to terroists and enemy combatants captured on the battle field. Are court appointed sharia lawyers far Behind?

This latest ridiculousness is only one of the many continuing Firefly embarrassments that display his desire to toss some spoils to the radical hate-American left in the Democratic Party. (Pelosi, Leahy, Frank, etc.) This behavior includes the constant ass-kissing to the perceptions of radical Islamo-fascists and bigoted "moderate Muslims." Firefly tries to persuade the world that the Palestinians are a put upon and persecuted minority when in fact the only minority in the Middle East are the Jews and a racist oppressive majority - Muslim Arabs - who want to destroy the Jewish state.

Several pundits have pointed out that Firefly has painted himself into a corner as far as foreign policy is concerned because Republicans are now unified in opposition and if he does not bow to the extremist left on the war, there is an electoral majority against him. And this is only the beginning.

Not many people thought, after his assumption of office that he would govern so far from the left. Not with the centrist national security apparatus he assembled. But stupidly, he has done just exactly that. To make matters worse, he rammed through extermely destructive leftist legislation paying for it by compiling more debt in 4 months than George Bush did in 8 years. And more quickly than he expected his poisonous trees are starting to bear fruit.

Nothing could have possibly united the right so quickly as his dramatically radical actions. Firefly's executive orders on stem cell research, closing Gitmo and opening the borders all helped galvanize the Republicans. To say nothing of his smug arrogance, backed up by more of the same by the human hand puppets Reid and Pelosi. In just two months Firefly's inadvertant unifying of his political opposition, will be taught for decades in PoliSci classes as the prime example of what an incompetent, self-defeating politcal strategy looks like. Firefly has surpassed even Jimmy Carter for sheer arrogance and ineptitude.

In trying to act so quckly to get his agenda through before anyone noticed in a nation set up by it's founders to thwart such radicalism, in a culture that is independent and suspicious of increasing government intrusion, Firefly has ignited a nascent political revolt. And this revolt is only going to grow as the weeks and months pass by. The State Senate of New York has just switched to Republican control, and California has rejected new tax initiatives. These are the bluest of blue states. One cannot slough this off to any sort of red state hysteria. Firefly has brought the banking system under his control, and has done nothing to address its problems. He has also made GM and Chrysler wards of the state with himself as warden. Not a bright future for those companies, I'm afraid. And his next hoped for aquisition is the health care industry.

China now fears the debt we have accumulated, and is floating trial balloons to the effect that our borrowing days are numbered. Firefly can't print enough money to paper over that problem.

The war in Pakistan and the coming one in Israel with the Palestinians are beyond his control. Israel will not be bullied into suicide.

In the European Union the Left just got a big ass-kicking. Gordon Brown's socialist government in the UK will fall soon. Will Firefly's be far behind?

Welcome James J. Benoit!

2009-06-11T16:08:00.003-04:00

Sherman's March is very happy to welcome James J. Benoit (Jamesb to his friends) as a contributing author on our site. He is currently in Europe pursuing some academic interests with some travelling around the continent to follow. We're all looking forward to hearing about his exploits. His first post is below. Welcome James, and enjoy your trip and stay safe!

DATELINE:PARIS

2009-06-11T12:42:00.003-04:00

Welcome from Paris! I'm Jamesb and circumstance has led me to Europe...my school, the University of Texas El Paso teaches a Roman history class in Rome each summer so that seemed like a good enough excuse to take a Roman history class...been in Europe for the first time for just over two weeks now, I'm getting used to the Euro's refusing to serve soft drinks with ice, why I don't know...Rome was beautiful, a bit strange, but very nice. Traffic is down right funny to watch, bear in mind this Texan who has driven in New York City. The scooter jockeys are down right crazy; the late, great Evil Kenevil would be proud. In New York City six inches of room means "ya, go ahead, drive right in there you frigging jerk!", in Rome a millimeter (whatever that exactly is...) means that's enough room to GO FOR IT! Watching from the bus is downright entertaining, dodging flying scooters and micro cars at street level is downright scary. The Roman ruins are worth the look if your into that kind of stuff, and I am, but I'm really looking forward to visiting Omaha beach next week. It'll remind me how many young American gave their lives for the freedom of other countries, without hesitation and with honor and valor."We came as liberators not conquerors" as the Marine officer in the Military Channel promo so accurately says. Speaking of Rome traffic, Paris traffic is almost a wild. Apparently the entire system was designed by a guy named Clustier A. Fuque', but they do haul azz and do get around. There's more of a sense of urgency in France, Italians just don't seem to give a rats azz. Try to hurry an Italian and they just get slower, the French seem to "get it" and customer service isn't a suggestion it's actual concept, and I like that. Well, off to do the tourist thang...dodging African street vendors and other oddball shady characters...By the way, you'all remember the old Motely Crue song "Girls,Girls, Girls"? Vocalist Vince Neil reels off the names of a bunch of famous strip clubs including "...Crazy Horse, Paris France...forgot the names, remember romance..." well when in Paris do like the Crue would do, and it's right down the street...gonna be there tomorrow night...costing me an arm, a leg, and ...dammit, I don't care...it's goona be a blast! Talk to you soon...and as the King would say "Uh thank ya,thankya very much"...

Our Historically Challenged President

2009-06-11T08:26:00.003-04:00

The other day I posted -verbatim- an article by Jeffery Lord of The American Spectator. I don't want to make a habit of posting work that can be found at other websites, but I'm going to do it again today with an article by the great Victor Davis Hanson over at National Review Online. Sometimes there are things that must be given the widest audience possible.

Our Historically Challenged President
A list of distortions.

By Victor Davis Hanson

In his speech last week in Cairo, President Obama proclaimed he was a “student of history.” But despite Barack Obama’s image as an Ivy League-educated intellectual, he lacks historical competency, in areas of both facts and interpretation.

This first became apparent during the presidential campaign. Candidate Obama proclaimed then that during World War II his great-uncle had helped liberate Auschwitz, and that his grandfather knew fellow American troops that had entered Auschwitz and Treblinka.

Both are impossible. The Americans didn’t free either Nazi death camp. (Regarding Obama’s great uncle’s war experience, the Obama team later said he’d meant the camp at Buchenwald.)

Much of what Obama said to thousands of Germans during his Victory Column speech in Berlin last summer was also ahistorical. He began, “I know that I don’t look like the Americans who’ve previously spoken in this great city.” He apparently forgot that for the prior eight years, the official faces of American foreign policy in Germany were Secretaries of State Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice — both African-Americans.

In the same speech, Obama seemed to suggest that the world had come to together to save Berlin during the Airlift. In fact, it was almost an entirely American and British effort — written off by most observers as hopeless and joined by a handful of Western allies only when the lift looked like it might succeed.

In the recent Cairo speech, Obama’s historical allusions were even more suspect. Almost every one of his references was either misleading or incomplete. He suggested that today’s Middle East tension was fed by the legacy of European colonialism and the Cold War that had reduced nations to proxies.

But the great colonizers of the Middle East were the Ottoman Muslims, who for centuries ruled with an iron fist. The 20th-century movements of Baathism, Pan-Arabism, and Nasserism — largely homegrown totalitarian ideologies — did far more damage over the last half-century to the Middle East than did the legacy of European colonialism.

Obama also claimed that “Islam . . . carried the light of learning through so many centuries, paving the way for Europe’s Renaissance and Enlightenment.” While medieval Islamic culture was impressive and ensured the survival of a few classical texts — often through the agency of Arabic-speaking Christians — it had little to do with the European rediscovery of classical Greek and Latin values. Europeans, Chinese, and Hindus, not Muslims, invented most of the breakthroughs Obama credited to Islamic innovation.

Much of the Renaissance, in fact, was more predicated on the centuries-long flight of Greek-speaking Byzantine scholars from Constantinople to Western Europe to escape the aggression of Islamic Turks. Many romantic thinkers of the Enlightenment sought to extend freedom to oppressed subjects of Muslim fundamentalist rule in eastern and southern Europe.

Obama also insisted that “Islam has a proud tradition of tolerance. We see it in the history of Andalusia and Cordoba during the Inquisition.” Yet the Spanish Inquisition began in 1478; by then Cordoba had long been re-conquered by Spanish Christians, and was governed as a staunchly Christian city.

In reference to Iraq, President Obama promised that “no system of government can or should be imposed upon one nation by any other.” Is he unaware that the United States imposed democracies after World War II?

After the defeat of German Nazism, Italian fascism, and Japanese militarism, Americans — by force — insisted that these nations adopt democratic governments, for both their own sakes and the world’s. Indeed, it is hard to think of too many democratic governments that did not emerge from violence — including our own.

Obama also stated: “For centuries, black people in America suffered the lash of the whip as slaves and the humiliation of segregation. But it was not violence that won full and equal rights.”

With all due respect to our president, this assertion is again not fully accurate. The only thing that ended slavery in the United States was the Civil War, which saw some 600,000 Americans — the vast majority of them white — lost in a violent struggle to ensure that nearly half the country would not remain a slave-owning society. Also, the massive urban riots of the 1960s and 1970s were certainly violent.

This list of distortions could be easily expanded. President Obama, in elegant fashion, may casually invoke the means of politically correct history for the higher ends of contemporary reconciliation. But it is a bad habit. Eloquence and good intentions exempt no one from the truth of the past — President Obama included.

Gay Marriage - Why Should They Be Happy?

2009-06-11T00:11:00.002-04:00

“In the State of (state name here) marriage shall be defined as a permanent union of two people for the purpose of establishing a shared household. Marriages performed during ceremonies administered by civil authority shall have the same rights and privileges as those performed by recognized religious authority.”

That is my all-purpose proposed wording for a marriage statute free for use by any state legislature. I read as many arguments, pro and con, regarding gay marriage and really haven’t found one that I find persuasive. So I quit. I say let homosexuals marry if they so choose. After all, why should they be happy?

Seriously, I can no longer understand why any two people should not have the opportunity to try to create a life together and share their material gains. Homosexuals will have no more success at this endeavor than the rest of us. In fact, they will probably have less success. The homosexual culture is one that has promoted promiscuity forever. And that aspect of the culture will win out over monogamous relationships. If monogamy has lost out to promiscuity among heterosexuals (and it has), even with several millennia worth of teaching to the contrary, how can it be expected to overcome a culture of gay baths and other promiscuous practices the homosexual community sees as it’s own unique virtues?

You may ask, what about the children? Our society has failed it’s children on so many levels, one more failure won’t make a difference. The easing of divorce laws has done more to damage our children than homosexual marriage ever will. People who vehemently oppose homosexual marriage now should ask themselves where they were when divorce was made no more difficult than obtaining a building permit. Hell, nowadays getting a building permit is more difficult than breaking up a family. My two daughters (9 & 5) are never going to learn what is properly to be expected from a man when they are older, because they have no everyday example to show them.

The decay we as a society have infused into our society for the last forty years has rotted out the foundations beyond the point of repair, at least in my opinion. Our children are growing up in a culture that desires only it’s own short term pleasure and constant, instant gratification. If I knew then, what I know now, I would’ve left my ex-wife at the table in the restaurant where we had our first date.

Homosexuals will come to learn soon enough that the rights and privileges of marriage that they so desired, aren’t worth the paper they are written on. Personally I can’t wait to see a few homocelebrities wading through and wailing about their impending divorces. I try not to engage in schadenfreud, but I will relish this when it comes about. And after 5 years or so, homosexual marriage will be seen to have been just a fad. So I encourage the defenders of marriage to cease your objections, we conservatives have bigger fish to fry.

Martin Luther King, Rush Limbaugh & Sotomayor

2009-06-09T23:43:00.003-04:00

This is an article written by Jeffery Lord at The American Spectator. If you really believe in the truth of Dr. King's "content of one's character" argument, this article is definitely worth taking the time to read.

"We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured."-- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. writing on racism in Letter from a Birmingham Jail

"I care about whether she's qualified, and I think she's disqualified herself. Not only does she lack the often-discussed appropriate judicial temperament, it's worse than that. She brings a form of bigotry or racism to the court. I don't care -- we're not supposed to say it, we're supposed to pretend it didn't happen, we're supposed to look at other things, but it's the elephant in the room."-- Rush Limbaugh speaking on racism and Judge Sonia Sotomayor on his radio show
Separated at Birth? Dr. Martin Luther King and Rush Limbaugh?

Let's start here with one of the famous documents of modern American history.

While Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was sitting in a Birmingham, Alabama jail cell in April 1963, arrested for protesting what would today be called identity politics (in 1963 this meant keeping blacks out of public facilities as part of the drive to preserve the white identity), objection was raised to Dr. King about his tactics. This objection did not, however, come from the Bull Connors of the day -- they were so ferocious in their opposition no one could mistake what they thought. To this day the images of the snarling Birmingham police dogs and fire hoses unleashed against blacks by Connor in his role as the local Safety Commissioner are frozen in time.

No, Dr. King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail was in fact a response to a protest from the moderates of the day. Specifically eight moderate Alabama ministers had written a statement they termed "A Call for Unity," running it as an ad in the local paper. They made it plain they were not happy with Dr. King. The moderates characterized Dr. King as an "outside agitator" whose vivid protests against racism were "unwise and untimely." King, they said, was not pursuing his goals through the "proper channels."

Dr. King, sitting in jail, thought over his response carefully. With exasperation he realized that as bad as the Bull Connors of the world were, they really weren't the problem. The problem was with those he would term the "white moderates." Indeed, he had come to believe, moderation when it came to closing one's eyes to racism was inexcusable.

So Dr. King took the only paper he had available to him -- scraps of toilet paper and the margins of a newspaper -- and scribbled out his thoughts, addressing his letter to the self-declared moderates in the clergy at large who were upset with his direct confrontation of racism. It was a message intended as well for all Americans who saw themselves as political moderates. King said this about the moderates of the day:

"I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action."

Citing complaints that he was raising tensions with his language and actions, King went on:

But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word "tension." I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.

Five months after speaking of the importance of confronting racism (which he called an ugly "boil" and Limbaugh today calls "the elephant in the room") King would stand on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and deliver these famous lines from his speech to the March on Washington. Speaking on his radio show in 2009, Rush Limbaugh would concur.

Dr. King, 1963: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."

Rush Limbaugh, 2009: "Whatever happened to the content of one's character as the basis of judging people?"

In other words, amid the tumult of 1963, Dr. King went out of his way to put himself on record as supporting a core belief, a belief Limbaugh has repeatedly endorsed -- the idea of a colorblind America.

Dr. King also learned along the way that the "great stumbling block" to creating a colorblind America always seemed to be someone who was constantly saying, "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action."

This mantra, of course, is exactly the thought behind the moderates who have laced into Rush Limbaugh (and Newt Gingrich) in recent days. In fact, the similarity between the sentiments of Dr. King and Rush Limbaugh when it comes to moderates is striking. Here they are, side-by-side:

Here's Dr. King: "I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate…who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action."

And here's Rush: "There's truly something not right about people who claim to be standing with us on our side, who find it impossible to be critical of people who deserve to be called on their actions and their words. There is something self-destructive, perhaps self-loathing about some of them."

Identity politics -- appearing in the form of segregation in 1963 -- is the politics that forced Dr. King into that Birmingham jail in the first place. And segregation, in turn, was alive and well in 1963 because of Supreme Court decisions (Civil Rights Cases in 1883 and Plessy v. Feguson in 1896 ) that specifically gave a thumbs up to racism by overturning the Civil Rights Act of 1875 and denying the plain intent of the 14th Amendment, not to mention giving short shrift to the 13th and 15th amendments that ended slavery and gave voting rights to blacks. It is, as a growing body of evidence makes clear, exactly the politics that is at the core of Sonia Sotomayor's beliefs about just about everything. It is the politics-made-law that led this country to disaster and that President Obama wishes to restore to the Supreme Court

THE WASHINGTON POST in a recent story said Sotomayor attributed her year-long delay in being confirmed as a Clinton nominee to the Second Court of Appeals to "Republican ethnic stereotypes of her." Yet the real reason for the delay had nothing to do with ethnic stereotyping. Excessive delays of judicial confirmation hearings was a tactic invented by (according to his own later admission) Senator Ted Kennedy during the Bork nomination to the Supreme Court. The delay went from a routine 14 days after a nomination to 77 days and got worse, much worse, after that. It had nothing to do with race, and has been used as a tactic by both sides ever since. If Sotomayor has a complaint on this -- or on the trial by fire she is about to undergo -- she has Senator Kennedy and Vice President Biden (who helped his friend Teddy delay the Bork hearings) to thank for it. But instead of checking her facts, she played the race card. Instinctively, it seems, which is exactly the problem with her nomination.

Over the weekend the New York Times revealed that in her now famous handling of the New Haven firefighters case the Judge had what the Times described as an "unusually charged" discussion with the firefighter's attorney -- a woman, it should be said. Said the Times of Sotomayor's actions on a racial case that the paper said was "bristling" with important implications: "The appeals court's cursory treatment suggested that the case was routine and unworthy of careful scrutiny. Yet the case turned out to be important enough to warrant review by the Supreme Court, which heard arguments in April and is likely to issue a decision this month."

When the firefighters' attorney protested that it was not a good idea to be hiring unqualified firefighters when even qualified firefighters "die every week," an irritated Sotomayor snapped: "Counsel, we're not suggesting that unqualified people be hired. The city's not suggesting that. All right?" Yet that was precisely the result Sotomayor was trying to suggest -- and in fact tried to force through her decision. Not for her Dr. King's belief that one should be "judged by the content of their character" or, in this case, impartial test results. The "wise Latina" was injecting her racial beliefs into a deeply serious legal issue, ruling against white firefighters in favor of what she likes to call "people of color." The ultimate well-being of some poor New Haven soul in need of emergency help from a qualified firefighter be damned.

Sotomayor, as gathered from her own words and actions, is wedded to bringing her racial identity politics to her job -- in this case the US Supreme Court. In precisely putting his finger on this issue, in bluntly calling her use of racial politics for what they are, Rush Limbaugh -- just as was true with Dr. King - is being scolded by so-called "moderates" for explicitly speaking the truth.

Dr. King defended his actions by saying of Birmingham's obsession with race that he had "brought it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with." Likewise, Limbaugh has opened up the philosophy behind Sotomayor's beliefs as repeatedly expressed in her speeches, her complaint about the judicial confirmation process, and her ruling in the New Haven firemen's case. He has, just as Dr. King advocated, exposed racism or what King called the "ugliness" and a "boil" to, in King's phrase, "the air of national opinion" -- which is to say the 20 million Americans a week who listen to The Rush Limbaugh Show.

And just as with Dr. King, sure enough the moderates flocked to take Rush to task.

Republican Senator John Cornyn of Texas and Republican National Chairman Michael Steele have mimicked the same instinctive flinching reaction as those moderate ministers of 1963. As King said of the moderates of his day, these present-day Republican leaders (and other moderates) are petrified of what King called "tension," preferring a "negative peace" to a "positive justice." In saying these things the moderate Senator and moderate party chairman view Limbaugh exactly as the moderate ministers viewed Dr. King.

They see Rush as an "outside agitator" (as King was called) with no standing, while Republican Senators are cast in the role of the reasonable "local Negro leadership" -- which is to say, presumably more reasonable because they are more susceptible to pressure. For the local Negro leadership of Birmingham, this meant, first, the physical safety of their families' lives, followed by jobs and economic security. For Republican Senators, this means winning an election.

Cornyn, Steele, and some others have surrendered instantly to the terms of the debate as insisted upon by the left -- when in fact they should be challenging them. This is not a debate about putting a Hispanic on the Court, or Miguel Estrada would be sitting there now. The first Mexican-American Attorney General of the United States, George W. Bush appointee Alberto Gonzales, would have served out his term as a colorblind AG instead of being railroaded by a white Democrat Senator from Vermont -- who not so coincidentally thinks this Hispanic is just dandy. No, this fight is about liberalism -- extreme left-wingism -- using race to get on the Court (or in Estrada's case to keep someone off the Court.) Once there the idea is then to run the Court using the politics of race, and at the next available opening add another Justice -- and another and another -- who identifies with racial politics. This is a place both the Court and the country have already been -- to the detriment of both. One need only mention court cases such as Dred Scott or Plessy v. Ferguson to know how badly all of this will end. This is the merger of left-wing politics with a long and sordid history of a party soaked in racial politics. Were this nomination a Hollywood script it would be pitched as Birth of a Nation meets the Weather Underground.

TO READ THE COMPLAINT of the moderates that provoked King to write his Letter is to hear the handwringing tone moderates have used against Limbaugh or Gingrich. In a tone worthy of Cornyn, Steele, Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan or even the estimable Wendy Long over at NRO (who lamented that "Somehow, this important debate is turning into an argument about race and identity politics"), the moderate ministers claimed that King's focus on the racism of Birmingham had not "contributed to the resolution" of the issue. They saw King as "extreme." While the ministers saw themselves proceeding in a "calm manner" they believed that it was necessary for King and his supporters to "show restraint" in dealing with the issue of racism, something they believed King was not doing. The moderate ministers said it was time for the black community to "withdraw support" from Dr. King and show "common sense."

Echoing the views of the ministers in dealing with race, Cornyn sees Limbaugh's King-style calling-out of racial politics as "terrible." Just as the moderate ministers wanted to silence King and leave things to their own "calm manner," Cornyn says: "This is not the kind of tone any of us want to set." Steele's version of the "calm manner" remark from 1963 is to castigate what he calls the "slammin' and rammin'" of Sotomayor. As the ministers insisted the Atlanta-based King was an "outsider" and an "agitator" who had no right to intrude in the Birmingham controversy, so Cornyn insists "neither one of these men" (meaning Limbaugh and Gingrich) should be seriously involved in the discussion of Sotomayor's record because they are not sitting U.S. Senators. As if her decisions on the Supreme Court would be limited to the 100 members of the Senate.

Steele even goes so far as to say that calling out racist politics means "we get painted as a party that's against the first Hispanic woman" Supreme Court nominee. In and of itself this remark troubles, indicating Steele himself buys into the left's phony template of the GOP on race and, even worse, the left's obsessive penchant for racial politics. If so, this is an incredible reaction from the chairman of the Party of Lincoln, particularly after having Oreo cookies thrown at him by left-wingers during his Senate run.

Once again, the similarity between Dr. King and Rush Limbaugh manifests itself. King, who was begged to leave Birmingham alone, said the issue was about racism in America -- not just about Birmingham. This was a national issue, not just a local one. Hence he had no intention of doing anything other than turning up the heat on Birmingham to keep turning up the heat on all of America, moderates be damned. Again, here is Dr. King, and then Rush Limbaugh today:

Dr. King: He was "in reality standing up for what is best in the American dream and for the most sacred values of our Judaeo-Christian values."

Rush Limbaugh: "We look at people as individuals. I don't care what race she is. I don't care what gender she is."

Said Mrs. King later of the point of her husband's words, they were designed to "radiate" outward from Birmingham, "cracking the whole edifice of discrimination" in America.

So too do Rush Limbaugh's words now radiate outward, correctly changing this debate from simply focusing on the role of a judge to the tragic and bitter role of racial politics in American life. As with King, Limbaugh's words are dangerous because if enough people listened they could eventually "crack the whole edifice" of the latest version of discrimination in America -- identity politics. Ironically, Rush Limbaugh has created the meaningful conversation on race that Bill Clinton said he wanted but never achieved. More to the current point, he has shown up President Obama, the man who campaigned to be America's first "post-racial president." Limbaugh is shining a spotlight on Obama's troubling endorsement of the kind of the racial politics so flagrantly displayed by Obama's own one-time minister, the race-baiting Reverend Jeremiah Wright.

For reasons that baffle, Steele is also worried that calling out racist politics means "MSNBC will rip everything we have to say up into shreds." Putting aside that MSNBC's ratings are lower than a snake's belly, perhaps it should be said that if race is the game, MSNBC is in no place to play that game. Of the four shows it puts on in prime time? You might call them "Three White Guys and that Nice Jewish Girl." Not to mention the opening fare of the day, "Morning Joe," which perhaps could be re-titled as "White Joe in the Morning" since it stars two white boys and the Nice Polish White Girl. There's not a young Latina or even a Latino, heaven forbid a black or Asian -- male, female, gay, straight, wise or otherwise -- in the bunch. The last opening they had in their line-up they promptly gave to a white guy from North Dakota. Perhaps they could at least find a young Latino or Latina to replace the older, white and Irish Nora O'Donnell, MSNBC's chief Washington correspondent. O'Donnell has expressed concern on-air in support of appointing Supreme Court Justices by gender, saying she believes in "affirmative action." Which begs the question. What is she doing there when there are surely all manner of younger "people of color" who could do the job as well if not better? Ms. O'Donnell presumably has nothing to worry about in this area from the brass. There are more white guys running NBC and General Electric than are left in the Klan.

Said Dr. King in response to the Cornyn's and Steele's of his day: "Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection." He added that he was disturbed to find his direct and highly pointed dissent about race, which he viewed as "normal and healthy discontent," portrayed by moderates as "extremist." King turned the table on the "extremist" label by adding that he had hoped moderates would see that "the nation, and the world are in dire need of creative extremists" Indeed. Ditto, Republicans.

Where do Republicans and conservatives expect to find themselves at the end of this process? If it isn't still carrying the flag as the colorblind party of Lincoln and Reagan, then they will be in trouble and deservedly so. Newsflash: all Hispanics do not think alike. The thought itself is the very epitome of what's wrong in this debate.

As more and more of Judge Sotomayor's thinking has become public it is increasingly clear just how correct Rush Limbaugh has been on this issue of racism. Just as Dr. King was met with prim resistance from the moderates of his day, insisting that King was an "extremist" and must be dismissed as an "outside agitator" -- so now are these very same charges being hurled by today's moderates against the colorblind advocacy of Mr. Limbaugh. For, it must be said, the very same reason. They just want to be nice. They do not care about justice, as Dr. King said, they care about order. And Rush, very much in the style of Dr. King, has disrupted their orderly parade.

There is nothing nice about racism, whether it appears in the form of fire hoses and police dogs or a curt dismissal from a judge on the Second Court of Appeals. Judge Sotomayor may well have an appealing personality, but it is her racial beliefs that are at issue -- and as Dr. King went to some length to point out, even nice people can be racists. Indeed, Dr. King responded to another moderate criticism about his rejection of the then-newly elected Mayor of Birmingham by astutely pointing out that just because the new mayor was a much more gentle person than Mr. Connor, they are both segregationists, dedicated to maintenance of the status quo."

Exactly. Make no mistake: Judge Sotomayor is diametrically opposed to a colorblind nation. She is a passionate believer in what has long been the Democrats' status quo -- judging people by race.

And Rush Limbaugh, to his considerable credit, has called her on it. More to the point, in focusing on "the elephant in the room" he has, just like Dr. King, put the feet of moderates to the fire. Isn't it interesting that the national holiday signed into law by President Reagan honored Dr. King -- and not a group of moderates?

There was a reason.

The Firefly Lies

2009-06-09T00:19:00.003-04:00

President Firefly is the most un-truthful man ever to hold the office. And to attain that position in post-Clinton America in less than six months is breathtaking. This man has absolutely no desire to tell the truth or to know the truth. Be it broken promises, setting up straw men or outright lies, he uses every sort of mendacious device known with equal aplomb. And of course the state-sponsored media never calls him on his falsehoods or points them out to their ever dwindling audiences. Forgetting about the lies he told us about his childhood, education, professional and political careers, here are just some of his lies made since January 20, 2009;

* Firefly promised every spending bill would be displayed online for five days before he acted on it. Yeah right. The stimulus bill never saw the light of day on the Internet and wasn’t even read by the President.

* “not because I believe in bigger government — I don’t — not because I’m not mindful of the massive debt we’ve inherited — I am.” Firefly to Congress February 24, 2009 Anyone believe this?

* Firefly promised to end the Income Tax for seniors making less than $50,000 annually. Complete lie. Ain’t going to happen.

* “And that is why I have ordered the closing of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay and will seek swift and certain justice for captured terrorists…” Firefly to Congress, February 24, 2009 We now know this is false. Gitmo is not going to close, and for good measure Firefly has retained several other Bush policies regarding captured terrorists that he promised he would eliminate.

* “My administration has also begun to go line by line through the federal budget in order to eliminate wasteful and ineffective programs.” The man knows full well that there is no line item veto. This guy really thinks Americans are stupid. And I guess there are about 53% of the electorate that are.

* Firefly promised to create a $3,000 tax credit for companies who add jobs. Total smoke and mirrors. Nowhere to be found.

* “My immediate task is making sure that the second half of that money, (TARP) $350 billion, is spent properly. That’s my first job.” Firefly press conference February 9, 2009. What did Joe Biden say last week? Something to the effect that “some people were already being scammed” ?

* Firefly promised penalty free withdrawals from retirement accounts for 2008 & 2009. I had to kill my IRA to pay my medical bills in 2008 and paid taxes on every penny of the money.

* “Second is recognition of the limits of the judicial role, an understanding that a judge’s job is to interpret, not make law, to approach decisions without any particular ideology or agenda, but rather a commitment to impartial justice…” OK, in light of everything we are learning about Firefly’s wise Latina woman, can anyone argue that this statement is anything other than a lie?

* Firefly promised complete recognition of the genocide perpetrated on the Armenians by the Turks early in the 20th century. He hasn’t said a word about it, and doesn’t intend to.

* “It’s not just enough to change the players. We’ve gotta change the game.” He has appointed lobbyists and more than 100 former Clintonites to his administration.

* Firefly has completely backed off his promise to end “don’t ask – don’t tell.” Gay people, how do you like him now?

*”I opposed the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996. It should be repealed and I will vote for its repeal on the Senate floor. I will also oppose any proposal to amend the U.S. Constitution to ban gays and lesbians from marrying.” How does he square this with his oft-repeated position that marriage should be defined as being only between a man and a woman.

And this list is not inclusive. Every time you hear Firefly say “There are those…” (and he says it often) you know he is setting up some fallacious straw man just so he can make himself look good knocking it down.

After Clinton left office I really thought that America would never be taken in again by a man so quickly given to transparent lying. At least not in my lifetime. But I was very, very wrong. “No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people.” Henry Louis Mencken was very, very right.

A Capitalist’s Life for me …………

2009-06-07T23:49:00.007-04:00

By Individualist
“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

Hello Boys and Girls today the topic is one that is of great relevance to liberals of St Arrrgustine, Florida. A calamity of such epic proportions is brewing, that it’s like has only been documented by the great Roman scholar and poet Juvenal in the 1st century BC in the Sixteen Satires.

Recently the Folio Magazine did a Hit piece on people in the Oldest City in America for assuming that the history of Spanish Colonial Florida had room for shows about pirates and privateers. Let me take you through the loops of circular liberal logic in the article shown below to explain why Pirates are no longer Politically Correct. Let me explain below:

http://www.folioweekly.com/documents/main0602.pdf

I am of course referring to the people who dress up as pirates and privateers to reenact great naval battles, study the events of famous swashbucklers and learn of the history of Pirates and Privateering and of course imbibe in libations. It seems the tourists of St. Arrgustine Florida have been allowing themselves to be entertained by people adorning themselves as Pirates without knowing that since some Pirates in the Gulf Aden almost embarrassed the One that such mannerisms have been deemed Politically Incorrect. Beyond that, these people are actually profiting from their predatory bourgeoisie activities. For you Mouth Breathing, Tea-bagging Conservatives out there who have not yet learned to speak “Socialism” this translates roughly into plain economic English as “making a living”.

The Folio weekly a local rag that gives out its paper for free that is picked up by readers primarily for the advertisements but has strewn within it the typical marxofascist rhetoric that is being brought to reality by the current administration today. The Folio is like many weekly free papers that attempt to delineate themselves from the ones you actually have to pay for by being “edgy” and fill themselves with obscure liberal political cartoons attacking “conservative” thought which is so set in zeitgeist of socialist dogma that they are incomprehensible to someone that lives in the real world. Typically one picks up the paper only to look through the various advertisements and notices to find out if any interesting is playing at the local theatres. They try to be relevant by including exposes on local issues that the main Northeast paper the Florida Times Union may have missed.

St. Augustine itself is known as the Ancient City and can boast that it is the oldest incorporated city in the USA. It has many historic landmarks including the Castillo de San Marcos and Fort Matanzas built by the Spanish in the 1600 to 1700’s. It houses Flagler College and the Lightner museum. The tourist district of Old Town has restored cobblestone streets and buildings set in the Adobe style of the Conquistadors and a decided Spanish colonial faire. The city has several shops, restaurants and parks that make a day there very enjoyable. They have the Ghost Tours and Train rides that are fun. They also house “Ripley’s Believe It or Not” museum. There are the typical Florida tourist shops selling everything from Sand Dollars to plastic beer mugs.

In the June 2-8, 2009 the article “Pirates Attack” by someone named Karen Pound featured an expose on the popularity among the tourists and locals of Old Town St. Augustine of “Pirate” themes including enthusiasts that like to dress up as pirates and privateers and hold reenactments of famous sea battles, tourist shops with “Pirate” themes that sell Pirate paraphernalia and the piѐce de rѐsistance evidently is the Black Raven, which according to the article is a 72’ Spanish Galleon converted into a diesel powered cruise ship that offers short Pirate themed day cruises filled with singing, magic tricks and a little history of the Privateers of St Augustine. Principle players interviewed include Ollie Mackerel, William Mayhem and Blackbeard of the Black Raven, Scott and Mia Brewer of the A1A Aleworks who dress in Pirate garb shown in the opening picture of the article and Tiger Lee, another entrepreneur dressing as an Oriental pirate. All people that make their livings off the tourist trade in St Augustine.

The author of the article to be known in Short Hand as KP evidently is upset that these people are polluting the cultural landscape of St. Augustine with their presence and decided to take what could have been an investigative article detailing the tension among city planners between the need to maintain the city’s historic significance and the need to generate dollars via the Tourist industry especially in these hard times, ended up being one extended ad hominem attack at times little better than the Trolls lurking at Big Hollywood that occasionally come out with their incomprehensible insults.

The article starts the insults by lamenting the tip jar aboard the Black Raven is empty, demeans the performances’ content as cliché, calls the actors second rate, explains the pirate themes are tacky and not befitting the “history” of the city and even besmirches their appearance as unattractive because “Pirates” had gaudy fashions. We note that plastic conquistador helmets and T shirts somehow do fit in with the history of Spanish colonial Florida as they are not likewise singled out for ridicule. Maybe that’s next week The timber and content of this part of the article is so crass and mean that I need to add no more to the mess of the cleanup duty done by KP.

So what have the Pirates done to the Obama administration that one of the ancillary stooges of the MSM liberal news networks’ clinger-ons had to come out to attack them? A few choice phrases are telling and I think the themes can be described as follows:

One) Pirates were Evil and they Stole so they are like Evil Stockbrokers who advised people to invest in Credit Swaps. So by default are the people who play them on TV. They are Bad I tell you!

“The fact that pirates have been romanticized in the modern era probably has less to do with their inherent marketability than a Western appetite for plunder and predatory economics (credit default swaps, anyone?).”

Now I guess old Indy should do some research on this. Wait a minute, do we remember the Corporate Raiders of the “Permanent Assurance” of Monty Python’s “A Meaning of Life”. Has the Pot shown us that KP scrapped something off the Kettle that bears interest here?

Is John Cleese behind the Nigerian Prince ”give me your bank account” fraud schemes. You have to admit that does sound like something they would dream up for a skit.

Well KP’s evidence that this is so is that the Black Raven crew have a tip jar and thus are performing authentic high seas piracy. Yes I can see it now. Capn Kidd swings from a ship’s mast unto the fore deck of a French Merchant vessel and assaults the enemy captain by holding out a tip jar because that takes real acrobatic ability, years of hard work. Oh! The Fiend!

But wait a minute didn’t KP say the tip jar was “critically” empty. Also, why pray tell does the Folio have eight advertisements alone in body of the article itself. How is that not commercial exploitation? Oh our terrible western values. Isn’t liberal logic confusing? Man, I need to self-medicate in order to understand it. Perhaps Ollie has some grog he can spare. He looks like a man you’d like to have a drink with.

As to the reason for “Piracy” being made popular is western desire for Plunder would the author of Treasure Island Agree?

“It is perhaps a more fortunate destiny to have a taste for collecting shells than to be born a millionaire.”
- Robert Louis Stevenson

“There is no duty we so much underrate as the duty of being happy. “
- Robert Louis Stevenson

2) All your corporate commercialism is ruining the historic relevance of Old Town St Augustine. How will we educate our Children. Boo Hoo Hoo.

On Pirates the article states:

“But Robert Hall, a historian, for Flagler College art professor and retired Colonial re-enactor of 30-plus years, disagrees. He maintains that St. Augustine history — including Drake and Searle — is rooted in privateering, not piracy. Not only is the current spate of dress-up pirates historically incorrect, he says, it flies in the face of what the city stood for.“They would have been in chains,” says Hall of pirates.”

To the list of Pirate who attacked St Augustine we are forgetting John Davis mentioned by John Esquemeling on pages 56 and 57 of his book The Buccaneers of America(http://home.wanadoo.nl/m.bruyneel/archive/tboa/tboa001.htm)

Ok so a Spanish colony obviously never had any Pirates on its premises because the town folk that would have lived there would have put them in chains. That is if they could have raised a militia strong enough to corner and defeat them I guess. But members of the Black Raven speak of privateers. Since St Augustine was the victim of two historical assaults by Francis Drake and Robert Searles at two separate times so the article has commented:

“Not all nations recognized the legitimacy of privateers (Spain, for one, was known for executing privateers with their letters of marquee prominently displayed on their bodies). And not all privateers limited their activity to “legitimate” attacks. But privateers have muddied the waters, historically speaking, particularly in St. Augustine.”

Ah there we have it the Spanish government did not use Letters of Marque and Reprisal then so obviously the whole thing is historically inaccurate. Must be so because a historian Art School Professor who dresses up in Spanish Colonial garb which of course is not used as exploitive of History in Old Town said it is so.

From the website (http://zeerovery.nl/history/) we note that Spain utilized an entire fleet of Privateers at one time.

“Jacques Colaert was a privateer who was active from the city of Duinkerken. He was also known under the name of Jacob Collaart. In August of 1600 he sailed as part of a fleet of ships that was commanded by the Vice-Admiral Anton of Burgundy, Lord of Wacken. The fleet was comprised of six vessels of the royal Spanish privateer fleet and six private privateers.”

The list of Duinkerken privateers is lengthy.

But somehow that may be enough to convince KP Indy, you need a source she would have to recognize as credible. Hmmm…… How about that vaunted refuse of liberal thought, the New York Times.

The Article is headlined as “Spain to Use Privateers”, dated April 24, 1898, and in it lists the decree of war upon the United States of America by the country of Spain which lists article number 4.

"Fourth - The Spanish Government, upholding its right to grant letters of marque, will at present confine itself to organizing, with the vessels of the mercantile marine, a force of auxiliary cruisers, which will co-operate with the navy, according to the needs of the campaign, and will be under naval control.”

Mind you this is significant because Spain herself signed the Treaty of Paris in 1851outlawing the use of Privateers. It is interesting to note that America has not Utilized Privateers since the War of 1812 with the exception of the Goodyear Blimp Resolute in 1942 which had a Letter of Marque to search for Japanese subs off the coast of Los Angeles despite the fact that we are not a signer to this treaty and have no law against it.

But the Spanish they did not like Privateers except of course their own. In that regard they are like Al Gore when it comes to taking care of the environment. It is hard to understand “Socialism” isn’t it. Ollie I am going to need more of that Grog.

3) This is terrible! All these people dressing as Pirates and the real Pirates are next to come I know it. Why can’t the Gubmint do something about it!

“There’s no tourism czar or someone who can say, ‘OK, you can have this attraction, but you can’t have that one because it’s not authentic.’” Lacking those restraints, the city will just have to do its best to get its message out — pirates or no.”

Ok Ollie, forget the Grog now I need a fifth of Bacardi 151 to get through this because now I am set off.

TOURISM CZAR, TOURISM CZAR – exactly who in the Sam Knicklebee’s Underworld do you think you are to expect that the White House should now have the right to decide what kind of Tourist attractions should be in place. I have spent several weekend days travelling to St Augustine’s Old Town to enjoy the attractions and eat at the premium restaurants that are there. I have seen a few shops selling Pirate clothing and there are a few “Pirate” themed attractions but trust me the influence of colonial Spanish architecture still prevail, the Old Fort still stands and only someone nit picking every minor detail could think that the city has abandoned its historical roots.

The Pirate themes are relevant to the history of a city that existed in the 1600’s in the Caribbean whether some liberal activists in the City of St. Augustine like it or not. The shops do not detract anymore than the people selling beach paraphernalia or joke post cards of 500 lb women in Bikinis.

But none of this is relevant KP. What is relevant is that I as a paying customer will decide what I think is the entertainment I like and not you, not Glenn Hastings, executive director of the Tourist Development Council, not some glee club of 40 something liberal activist housewives who married wealthy and have not had to work a day in their life. I cannot express the level to which as a libertarian economic conservative that this statement offends me.

In Conclusion, It’s the Freedom, Stupid!

I am the Individual and it is My Choice so Society can go Pound Sand for all I care. It’s called Freedom. It is what this country is founded on. The one thing that I have to myself in this life is the free time away from work and responsibilities. The last thing I want is for that to be subjected to the whims of a political bureaucrat. Again the author of Treasure Island had something to say on this subject.

“Politics is perhaps the only profession for which no preparation is thought necessary. “
- Robert Louis Stevenson

Wow, he foresaw Tim Giethner’s appointment way back then. Taxes are Hard, let me run the Treasury………………….

I do not know the politics of Tiger Lee, Scott and Mia Brewer, Ollie Mackerel, William Mayhem or Blackbeard and I don’t need to. They do something I can respect and feel should be protected despite their politics. They are entrepreneurs. They have come to St. Augustine, set up shop, taken the risks of their time, sweat and limited capital in order to provide services that are of value to us all. Sure its singing and magic tricks and goofy T shirts with tawdry jokes but that is what it is meant to be. In a period of time when our country may be looking at a 10% unemployment rate forever, they are bringing us the one thing that is most beneficial to the time we have to spend on this blue ball, FUN! So if they can make a living doing that then Great. If they can hire someone to help them out, Better. It beats a dreary bread line doesn’t it!

I think in the end this is why “Piracy” is such a problem to the Marxofascists. It is not the plunder or the bad deeds that we romanticize KP. It is the Freedom by which they led their lives. Pirates truly were democratic. Each man owned a share of the ship and ship’s bounty. They made their own decisions on how to lead their lives free of nattering bureaucrats deciding what is best for everyone else. We don’t need lectures on their wrongs we all reject that. The pirates we romanticize are the same “Merry Men” romanticized in Robin Hood. Realistic, No!, a good Morality tale for Children, Yes!. This then is what the “progressive” Plato’s Chosen guardians of the progressive movement despise. Big Brother can’t tolerate Thought Crimes against the State. It is the statist and not the individual that they think should decide!

As for Ol’ Indy,

Yo Ho, Ho, Ho, It’s a Capitalist’s Life for Me!…………….

Bye Bye GM

2009-06-05T00:14:00.004-04:00

General Motors is gone, and I just cannot believe it. I don’t believe President Firefly when he says that he doesn’t want the government running a car company. I don’t believe him when he says that the goal is to get GM back as a privately owned company as soon as possible. I don’t believe this for one second. And anybody who does is a blithering idiot. Amtrak and the United States Postal Service were also supposed to become privately owned companies following a “limited” federal intervention. How did that work out these past 35-40 years? Who would want to buy either of those basket cases? Neither GM or Chrysler will ever see the light of day as private companies again. I have pity for the management and debt holders of Ford too. They see what’s coming. Labor unions once served a good purpose in the United States. But that has not been true for decades. Now they have what they always wanted but never deserved – workers controlling the means of production – as basic a tenet of socialism as monotheism is to Judaism. The UAW never risked any of their own money to start a company, never created a single new job, except by blackmail and extortion. Labor unions screw up every industry they are associated with. Teachers unions have ruined the public school system. Players unions cause more fans to abandon professional sports watching than not. Now they have ruined the biggest part of our countries manufacturing industry. Ronald Reagan did many great things as president. Firing the air traffic controllers and busting the PATCO union is my favorite.

The environmentalists and their lobbyists come in for a lot of blame here too. These tree hugging charlatans are compliant in getting the US Congress (both R & D) to impose ridiculously unrealistic mileage and emissions standards which drove the price of American automobiles beyond what the market would pay. I rue the day I first heard the word “ecology.” What a massive amount manure these people have foisted on the dim witted among us. Even when their so called science and hysterical warnings have been exposed as complete falsehoods they can always find some agenda driven media outlet to keep propagating the exposed lies and to be ready to promote their next hysterical rantings. How did America become so stupid? How can a parent feel good about letting this blatantly false drivel be pushed onto their children?

How many lies must be exposed before people stop listening to these fools? Anthropogenic global warming, a new ice age, the population bomb, second hand smoke, dangerous nuclear power. All environmental catastrophes in waiting that never happened. How stupid is the idea of recycling? Please tell me any material that is now required to be recycled that takes less energy to recycle than to produce new? Don’t bother it doesn’t exist. Nothing has done more to hold back improvements in the American standard of living than the environmentalist movement. And boy do they like to regulate who and what kind of fun people can have. If there was ever a bigger bunch of self-satisfied, sanctimonious weenies dedicated to controlling as much of the lives of others as these crapweasels, I’ve not seen them.

For 49 years my Dad owned a small trucking company. It wasn’t until December 1963 before he could afford his first factory-new truck chassis. It was a GMC. And every truck he ever bought from then on was also a GMC. I’ve owned 2 cars, both Chevy’s and 8 pick-ups or SUV’s, all GMC’s. Trucks have been the best product GM has been making for a long time. But that’s all over now. I won’t participate in a socialistic enterprise. I will not buy a GM or Chrysler product until one or both of those companies is once again a privately owned company that builds vehicles the market wants. Right now I own a 2008 GMC Canyon, so I shouldn’t be needing to replace it for about 9 more years. But when the time comes, if things aren’t right with GM, I will, so help me God, buy a Ford.

Killing PC - Handicapped

2009-06-03T00:29:00.003-04:00

Last week I began a series about killing political correctness one word at a time. The idea is to present the actual definition of certain words and show why there is no reason to shy away from using them. I started the series examining the word ‘queer.’ I believe it was one of the first words to have the PC taboo attached to it. Another word that was chosen early on by the PC crowd to be removed from everyday use and replaced with syrupy sounding euphemisms is ‘handicapped.’

Here is the dictionary’s definition;

handicapped /hændikæpt/ [han-dee-kapt]
–adjective
1. physically or mentally disabled.
2. (of a contestant) marked by, being under, or having a handicap

Like so many attacks from the Left on the standards and norms of traditional society, PC came to us with sympathetic reasons. Why should a person with a physical or mental disability be further ostracized by society by labeling them as less capable than the healthy people all around them? That may sound like a nice sentiment but what it really is a condescending and often counter-productive attitude towards people who really need and deserve more consideration from the healthy people around them. They don’t need to be treated like everyone else, they need to be treated better. The PC crowd has done much harm to folks who are handicapped by trying to get society to perceive them as just “differently abled.”

Four years ago I became handicapped. I tore a ligament in my right sacro-illiac joint. When it occurred, the injury was extremely painful. And it went un-diagnosed for 4 ½ years. Over 40 doctors – orthopaedists, neurologists, neurosurgeons, physiatrists, urologists, GP’s and others could not find the source of my pain. Pain that grew to be so gruesome that I was not able to remain seated for more than 5 minutes at a stretch. Walking was more than labored, with a pronounced limp. I lost three jobs due to my inability to work an 8 hour day. I was handicapped, and in no way ashamed or diminished by it.

What drove me crazy though was the attitude of people all around me. Any sort of locomotion was a slow and painful struggle. Many things that fully ambulatory people take for granted were major struggles for me. But most of the people around me were totally indifferent to showing a little common courtesy. I began to assume that most people felt I preferred not to have their help. My assumption was based on a small event. I was entering a pre-ADA building without any sort of automatic door. As I approached the door in full limp mode, a boy about 10 years old I guess, passed ahead of me and opened the door, holding it as I passed through. I said ‘thank you’ and was close enough to overhear as his mother caught up to him. She told him, ‘That was nice Brian, but people like that would rather do things like opening doors for themselves. They don’t want to feel like they are crippled.”

This woman is a complete moron. I wanted, I needed all the help I could get, not sympathy, just help. The old milk of human kindness thing. I knew I was crippled, and I knew that there were situations when I needed the assistance of others. But the PC crowd is so obtuse in their understanding of what handicapped people actually need, they salve their own consciences by making a few words they find uncomfortable, unacceptable to speak. These nimrods actually think this helps. What actually helps is for people to understand that handicapped people are ‘physically or mentally disabled.’ We know it and are not uncomfortable with it. That’s just the way it is. We don’t want or need anyone’s pity or sympathy. But I’d rather you offer me a helping hand up a flight of steps than adjust your language just to make yourself feel less awkward.

Eliminating handicapped from common usage has had a big impact on the spread and acceptance of PC, because once this word fell into disfavor anything that was considered to be an actual handicap also had to be euphemism-ified. Blind became vision-impaired, deaf became aurally challenged, etc., etc. To me this manipulation of the language is the same thing as when a person would avert his eyes when I limped by. My handicap is not permanent, thankfully. But because of what I’ve come to learn about PC through my handicap, my participation in a crusade to kill it will be.

The Chalk Talk - Football,Hockey & LYSA

2009-06-02T00:13:00.003-04:00

Brett Favre is really getting on my nerves. The last I heard he’s still not made up his mind about getting surgery to release a tendon in his throwing arm as opposed to letting the tendon fully rupture on its own. So the Hamlet-of-Hattiesburg continues to string the Minnesota Vikings along and the Vikings continue to let him. And NFL Network has re-launched that hit melodrama from last spring ‘Farve Watch.’ For a guy who’s been making split second decisions for more than 15 years, he’s being ridiculously slow about a very simple question. Does he want to play or not? It’s not like he’s going out on top. He missed his chance when he decided to come back with the Jets after leading the Packers to the NFC Championship game after the 2007 season. Blame NY Giant cornerback Corey Webster for all this fol-de-rol. Farve’s final pass in the Packers’ loss to the Giants was an interception by Webster. I guess that and the Packers’ desire to move on without Farve in favor of Aaron Rodgers just didn’t sit well with ole Brett so he decided to show the Packers what a mistake they made. But when his arm got injured that idea went bust. Now he wants to QB the Packers’ arch rival the Vikings. He wants the chance to beat the Packers at Lambeau Field. It wasn’t pretty watching John Unitas in a Chargers uniform, or Joe Namath as a Ram. Both of those Hall of Famers wound up going out with a whimper. Farve is going to be no different. The difference is that his desire to stick it to the organization that treated him so well makes him look like a petulant child.

The Stanley Cup finals are providing a very good couple of stories. Will Sidney Crosby of the Penguins win his first Stanley Cup? Or will the Red Wings have their names engraved on Lord Stanley’s bowl again making them look like another dynasty? Either way, it is exciting.

People talk a lot these days about disrespect for the flag, a kind of general lack of respect for national icons and the like. Last week at the Lakers playoff game, the celebrity singer (name escapes me) decided to alter a few words of the Star Spangled Banner in favor of the Lakers. And of course the LA crowd roared. But it was unseemly. It is a big contrast to the goings on at a NASCAR event. Everybody – fans, drivers, crews stand quiet and respectful. Nice to see.

Congratulations to Lucy. She made the ‘Select” soccer team from her hometown. The “Select” team is a sort of all star team drawn from the town’s youth soccer league. They travel to neighboring towns to play the all-star teams of those towns. Lucy works hard at playing well. This is a big achievement. Everyone here at Sherman’s March is very proud, especially her Dad who will just not stop talking about it.

Obama & Marx (Groucho that is)

2009-06-02T00:06:00.001-04:00

It is strictly coincidence that I saw Duck Soup (my favorite Marx Brothers film) today, the same week I put Groucho’s face and one of his quotes on the SM banner. But watching the film I caught this number where Groucho, as Rufus T. Firefly the new leader of the nation of Freedonia outlines the high points of his incoming administration.The similarity between Groucho’s comedy and today’s reality is creepy, right down to blaming his predecessor. Here’s a transcript for those who may find it difficult to follow Groucho’s rapid fire delivery.

FIREFLY: These are the laws of my administration,

No one’s allowed to smoke, or tell a dirty joke,
And whistling is forbidden.

If chewing gum is chewed, the chewer is pursued,
And in the hossegow hidden.

If any form of pleasure is exhibited,
Report to me and it will be prohibited.

I’ll put my foot down, so it shall be,
This is the land of the free.

The last man nearly ruined this place,
He didn’t know what to do with it,
If you think this country’s bad off now,
Just wait ‘til I get through with it.

The country’s taxes must be fixed,
And I know what to do with it,
If you think you’re paying too much now,
Just wait ‘til I get through with it.

I will not stand for anything that’s crooked or unfair,
I’m strictly on the up and up, so everyone beware.
If anyone’s caught taking graft and I don’t get my share,
We stand him up against the wall and POP goes the weasel.

If any man should come between a husband and his bride,
We find out which one she prefers by letting her decide,
If she prefers the other man, the husband steps outside,
We stand him up against the wall and POP goes the weasel.

When Obama was elected I mentioned to a friend that I wanted to stop using initials and didn’t want to type out “President Obama” everytime I referred to him. I said I needed to find a shortcut I liked. It may not actually be shorter but President Firefly will do just fine. I found a video that contains the number here. The number starts at about 6:05 of the video.

The Murder of Dr. Tiller

2009-06-01T11:51:00.007-04:00

Everyone's going to talking today about yesterday's murder of Dr.George Tiller, an abortionist. Robert George over at National Review on line has said it best, I think. Read his post here:

Stupidity & Immaturity - Sweet Mystery of Life

2009-06-01T00:10:00.007-04:00

Call me a crank, but I’m middle aged and that means just about everything pisses me off. But what I’ve got in my craw today has been simmering for a long time. It is the rank stupidity and downright dangerous behavior of pedestrians at or in crosswalks. Crosswalks painted on the pavement are a good idea. They provide a clearly marked zone for drivers and pedestrians to allow pedestrians to cross streets at the appropriate times when those streets are either free of traffic, or when traffic in both directions has come to a stop. But the painted stripes on the asphalt do not provide a protective force field. Just because you step out into a crosswalk, that does not mean you do not have to be alert to the danger of unaware or impatient drivers. Of course the driver is to blame when a pedestrian is injured inside a crosswalk. But time after time after time, I watch pedestrians step into a crosswalk and become intentionally oblivious to the traffic conditions around them. It is smug, dangerous behavior. What really drives me up the wall is when a parent pushing a stroller behaves this way. When my girls were stroller bound, my head was on a swivel walking down the driveway and I was in full threat detection mode when it came to the public roads. I see too many people just displaying this “my safety is protected by these painted stripes so it’s up to you Mr. Driver not to hurt me” attitude. Years ago there were many ‘Drive Defensively” ad campaigns to get drivers to try and recognize potential dangerous situations on the road and drive in such a way as to avoid putting oneself in such a position. We need a “Walk Defensively” campaign for these idiots who abandon their safety to painted lines and the awareness of others.

Cousin to these pedestrian morons are the drivers who have the right of way approaching a crosswalk and come to an abrupt halt when they see a pedestrian step off the curb. These people put everyone in danger. They risk being rear ended by a driver behind them who sees a green light at the approaching intersection and is not expecting the car in front of him to stop short. When the pedestrian now begins walking (actually j-walking) the first vehicle in the oncoming lane is forced to do a similar short stop putting drivers behind him on the spot. A bad situation all around. Courtesy is fine, and it’s nice to see it on the road. But giving up the right-of-way at the wrong time is stupid and dangerous.

A friend of mine, call him Jack, is going through a painful divorce. Painful because he knows he’s going to be mostly taken out of his children’s lives. His STBX, Jill we will call her, is a real piece of work. I met her in better times and couldn’t believe that a person could reach forty years old, yet have the maturity of an adolescent. And I’m over-estimating here. Anyway Jack and Jill, as part of the process had to meet with a judge to work out a plan for sharing the parenting of their children. Wait'll you read this, this is a good one.

Jack told me recently, “When we got to the discussion of the Christmas holiday, I explained to the judge that ever since Jill and I were dating, we agreed to alternate where we’d spend Christmas. One year with her family here in Ohio, and the next with my family back east.” “I told the judge that since this upcoming Christmas was my year there wasn’t any good reason for me not to be able to spend Christmas week with the kids, back east with my family.” “Then Jill blurts out, “And of course I’m not invited.” completely offended at this snub.”

Do you believe that one? Can a person be so dim as to not recognize why someone wouldn’t invite her to a family holiday celebration when she is divorcing a member of said family? How can a person be so convinced of her own wonderfulness? Stupefying how people can go through life thinking so much of themselves. Whatever do these people see when they look in a mirror? Or do they even bother to look?

UPDATE:

People who insist on getting their coffee just exactly perfect make me want to strangle them at the counter. I just came back from Dunkin' Donuts where I watched a picayune prig of a woman make the server re-pour her iced coffee THREE TIMES because each time this witch said it was "too light." And when the server finally got this self-important crone's order right, the crone said, "Just so you know, when you add cream you need to use less than when you use milk." What a snotty bitch. It's a $2.00 cup of coffee for crying out loud, not a $50.00 steak. I'm an Oscar Madison, and the Felix Unger's of the world really make me crazy. If I had been the server this woman would've wound up wearing her iced coffee. Grow up America. If a cup of coffee with a bit too much cream causes you a crisis, then what is wrong with you is no small thing.

Sotomayor and the Transcendental Obama

2009-05-31T18:22:00.007-04:00

By Individualist
“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

Everyone has been buzzing about comments made by Mrs. Sotomayor that are exclusionary. Some have called them racist but the problem with that is it assumes that being “Latin” means one is of a particular race. Anyone that has been to South America as I have would understand the ridiculousness of that statement. South America is as racially diverse as North America. However what struck me as the real problem with the statement was not “racism” but “religious” bigotry. Not the bigotry for one Religion as a whole but of Religious idea……….. Reincarnation.

That’s right Mrs. Sotomayor how do you know the past lives I have lived!

After all could not I have been a noble warrior riding with Sitting Bull in the Little Big Horn, a slave in chains, a roman centurion, a peasant in imperial Japan. Could you not come from a long secession of past lives of privilege Mrs. Sotomayor. I demand to know when will I get reparations from those who have bullied and victimized me in a past life. After all the sum total of my past lives is probably much longer a span that the pitiful 40 years or so I have lived in my current incarnation. Lady, Who are you to so assume what lives I have lived. Now that’s discrimination for you.

I know there are those naysayers out there that will say Indy, every time you want to win a class argument you cannot just assume that you were in a past life in a situation where you were more of a victim. It does not work that way and even then the eastern religions state that who you are in this life is dependent upon the accumulation of Karma in the past.

Ah but then would this not prove my argument. If I am a privileged rich white male in this life with advantages that I don’t deserve because I have not earned them through the experience of being poor earlier in my life, than does it not logically follow that the universe has granted me this exalted position by the accumulation of good Karma by being a victim in my past lives. See by the power of liberal circular logic either way I win.

Besides this Karma notion assumes that there is a Buddha, a Vishnu or a Celestial Heaven that guides the universe and that is the same thing as God. That is religious concept that the PC (Plato’s Chosen) Guardians who approve society’s proper ideas in the transcendental realm of political existence have deemed blasphemy and not to be considered by the politically enlightened.

Richard Dawkins tells us there is no God and therefore there can be no bank of Karma to make “Fair” the successive lives we will be granted. The Maharishi Mahesh Yogi tells us that we must live through successive planes of existence until like him we reach the seventh plane of enlightenment. Reaching the vaunted seventh plane of political enlightenment comes with a Yacht in the Mediterranean as he had, just ask Al Gore. It’s one of the perks for being correct on Global Warming. Since they are both pop culture liberal gurus it must be so.

Based upon this there is an inherent unfairness to the Universe that even the utopian ideas of our grand and glorious Obamasaviour cannot rectify. The Horror!

Don’t worry even as we speak the realm of greedy little goblins who work for Rahm Emmanuel in the underground complex of the white house are figuring out a way to take this injustice and turn it into a tax. Once the details are ironed out I am sure that a Justice Sotomayor will approve this policy. I will try to explain it to everyone below.

The private sector already has the answer in the Reincarnation Bank and it only follows that by writing draconian laws our Obamasaviour’s Nephilim (the democratic led US Congress) to bankrupt them. Then the Obamasaviour can give them a bailout and the government will own it. (According to sources at the Northwest Creation Network the root word for Nephilim comes from Nephel which means: "untimely birth, abortion, miscarriage". Thus this is a good name for the US congress. It is even backed up by Hindu thought. In the Hindu text Garuda Purana 5 it states that the destroyer of embryos becomes a savage full of diseases. Look at Barney Frank, I rest my case.)

What is the reincarnation bank you ask? It is this ingenious plan made by people, obviously relations of Bernie Madoff, where you can wire money to this Swiss Bank account and they will invest the money and see to it that you get it in your next incarnation. (No joke this website gives an IBAN number and instructions to make deposits which I won’t post here). So now can you see the potential benefits to the neofascist progressives that currently control the White House. We will have a tax like social security where the government takes all our money and promises to pay it back to us out in our next life. This will also eliminate the conservative argument about indebting our children since they will be us anyways. Thus we can have Utopia for all our existences and not just right now.

Ah but you ask how they know who we were in our past life. Well one can research this through past life regression. This is where by hypnosis you “remember” your past lives. Now I know you science types out there will point to studies that say that past life regression memories were found to be problematic because while the individuals remembered the minutiae of their lives as a Japanese fighter pilot they somehow could not remember the name of the Japanese Emperor in 1940 despite the fact that a Japanese Fighter pilot at the time would have considered him to be a living god. You would also point out that in these sessions the individuals remembered events occurring at times that do not coincide with actual history. Well you science guys I watch Michio Kaku as well and I know that according to string theory there can be “alternative” universes so if someone is remembering the wrong facts of history it can only be because the past life was in another parallel universe. At least until Barney Frank and Chuck Schumer decide it is not.

Thus we can have the government set up a new division of the Census called the Bureau of Past Life Regression where the extant of past lives can be evaluated and the appropriate good people shall be compensated. After all should not Karma be decided by the Obamasavior and not some silly religious construct.

We heard that Tim Geithner was very excited by this plan. When asked how it might work he stated that while the administration did not have any details we do know that it is crucial to save our economy.

Ca-Ching!

Indy’s Corner

2009-05-31T02:15:00.009-04:00

By Individualist
“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

From time to time I invade the Peoples Republic of YouTube and wade through the plethora of paid liberal media matters advertisements to see if there are any sparks of liberty left in this land. When I find someone that is supporting Freedom’s Cause, I will highlight them right here in Indy’s Corner.

The first rough diamond that I have found that has emerged from the volcanic melting pot of the You Tube Vlogosphere is the LatinaFreedomFighter. She has been doing great work there with very insightful videos in support of the Reagan Revolution. That’s right Chuck Schumer the principles of Liberty cannot be destroyed by a government stimulus bill. I encourage everyone to go onto You Tube and check out her videos. Her channel is the LatinaFreedomFighter. Help her in the fight. You can start by subscribing to her channel.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0emp1xBdV0

Quick Hits Of The Week

2009-05-30T00:01:00.003-04:00

The White House is now in retreat regarding SCOTUS nominee Sonia Sotomayor and her quote regarding the relative wisdom of a Latina woman vs. a white man. Is she a racist? Probably not, but her membership in an organization called “La Raza” (The Race) raises eyebrows. But I’d say she’s just a full player in the Left’s favorite game of identity politics. Is she a good justice? Clearly not. Her reversal rate is 60%. If she had that rate of failure hitting a baseball in the major leagues, she’d be in the Hall of Fame. But for a jurist it is quite dismal. It displays either an elemental misunderstanding of the law and how to apply it, or a willingness to ignore the law. And from her ideas about where policy is made (in appeals courts) I’d say it’s the latter. Although she’s just one liberal replacing another on the Court, it’s disappointing to see another un-qualified candidate for a governmental position get a promotion. Elections have consequences.

North Korea test fired another missile today. Not a long range type like they tested the day after Obama announced cuts in missile defense systems a few weeks ago. This time it was a short range missile. The kind that could be used to obliterate, oh say Seoul. Another finger in the eye of our internationally beloved and respected president.

The French are amazing. For the upcoming 65th anniversary of the Allied D-Day invasion of the Normandy coast, they’ve decided not to invite Queen Elizabeth II. No matter that the queen actually served during the war, or the fact that she is head of state of the country whose men attacked 2 of the 5 Normandy beaches on their own and attacked a third with Canadian soldiers as partners. The French owe so much to Great Britain for their liberation, this snub is just disgusting. Had it not been for England remaining defiant in the face of Nazi air bombardment and the attempt to strangle them with U-Boat attacks on supply shipping, America could’ve never turned the British Isles into the world’s largest military base, and who knows how long the liberation of Europe would’ve been delayed. The Sarkozy government is small, petty and just wrong in this. In other words, typically French.

The Mets are not in the best of situations right now. And if GM Omar Minaya doesn’t get busy quickly the situations doesn’t figure to get better anytime soon. They're in first, but players seem to dropping faster than French rifles in 1940.

Former NY Giants wide receiver Plaxico Burress had the chance to plead guilty to a three month sentence plus 1000 hours of community service for violating NYC gun laws back in November. He turned it down. He’s scared of life on Riker’s Island. He’s got the same lawyer as Puffy Combs, and believes that he’ll get the same result (not guilty) as Puffy at trial. Two things that Puffy didn’t have that Plax does, the entry wound scar and the exit wound scar. And if Plax had taken the deal, he’d already be out.

Enjoy the weekend.

Killing PC - One Word At A Time

2009-05-29T00:15:00.004-04:00

A couple of weeks ago, James Hudnall posted an article at Andrew Breitbart’s Big Hollywood, actually two articles on the need to kill Political Correctness and five actions that needed to be implemented to do it. My contribution to this very worthy effort is to take words that have been banished by PC and re-introduce them into the lexicon. I am going to examine several words, one word at a time, and I’m going to begin with the word I feel was one of the first to be branded taboo before PC even had a name. The word is “queer.”

The dictionary has this entry for “queer”;

queer /kwɪər/ [kweer] -er, -est, verb, noun –adjective
1. strange or odd from a conventional viewpoint; unusually different; singular: a queer notion of justice.

2. of a questionable nature or character; suspicious; shady: Something queer about the language of the prospectus kept investors away.

3. not feeling physically right or well; giddy, faint, or qualmish: to feel queer.

4. mentally unbalanced or deranged.

5. Slang: Disparaging and Offensive
a. homosexual.
b. effeminate; unmanly.

6. Slang. bad, worthless, or counterfeit.

Clearly the reason the nascent PC crowd took aim at this word was because of definition #5. PC is all about protecting the sensibilities of those they deem to be victims or need protection from a cruel insensitive world. A noble thought, but nobody is going to think an “iron-age earthwork implement” is anything but a spade. Regardless of what words they use. So why not tell the truth in the simplest and most accurate way possible?

This is not meant to be a camouflaged screed against homosexuals. But in the media today, many of the familiar faces of “gay” are pretty queer characters. And the most notable example of what I’m talking about, all over the news recently is Perez Hilton. This guy is enough to keep gay men in the closet if they think people will have any idea that he (Hilton) is the model for what they are. No matter what Perez Hilton’s sexual proclivities are he is a very queer man.

His given name is Mario Lavandiera, but changed it to Perez Hilton as his way of gaining recognition by dint of association with Paris Hilton. Ms. Hilton could also be said to be queer. So wouldn’t it be "strange or odd from a conventional viewpoint", for a man to adopt the name of a very strange woman? Easier to say it’s queer. Much the same could be said of Marilyn Manson, now tell me he’s not queer.

Now the reason Perez Hilton is in the news so much lately, is the way he sandbagged Carrie Prejean – Miss California – at this year’s Miss USA pageant with a question about her views on same sex marriage. It was an underhanded dirty trick meant to paint Miss Prejean in a disparaging light. His tactic was "of a questionable nature or character; suspicious; shady." Again, isn’t it easier just to say “queer”?

When Hilton began receiving much deserved criticism for his ploy he went off on a number of angry obscenity laced diatribes against Miss Prejean and his increasing number of critics. And a number of his critics researched his past blogging activity and learned that he is given to all sorts detached rages against any number of targets. A lot of his writings could fairly be described as "mentally unbalanced or deranged." For the sake of brevity, can’t we just say “queer”?

Most decent people don’t like to cast aspersions at people who are different from themselves. But one look at Perez Hilton and after hearing a few sentences from his mouth I would describe him as "effeminate; unmanly." Queer. I don’t mean it as derogatory, but it is an accurate assessment.

Queer is a very flexible adjective. It is not an epithet. Gay men love to use it when they want to get in-your-face with those they see as being opposed to their political agenda. “We’re here, We’re queer!”

I can’t see a good reason not to bring “queer” back into common use even when directed at people whose behavior or personal presentation is just that. If they are uncomfortable with that description that’s hard cheese. It’s always been that way for anyone outside the mainstream. And it doesn’t matter who they sleep with. Get used to it.

Welcome to The Individualist!

2009-05-28T08:07:00.002-04:00

Sherman's March welcomes the writing and commentary of The Individualist to the website! He has much to say about much that it on his mind. And he's not shy about saying it. Everyone will enjoy reading his well thought out postings. Ciao paisano!

Washington Imitates Hollywood’s Art, National Security Suffers

2009-05-28T02:54:00.005-04:00

By Individualist
“The Purpose of government is to limit the needs of its citizens from the involvement of the government.”

In the news we have North Korea exploding an Atom Bomb, Again! So our Chosen Guardian of our Republic, President Barack Hussein Obama let’s Kim Yong Il know in no uncertain terms that we will defend South Korea. The North Koreans counter this verbal joust by sending two missiles into their airspace. When you look closely at Kim Yong Il does his hairstyle not remind you of a Nausicaan from Star Trek. Well at least he acts like one……….

I mention this because the recent events reminded me of the “moral” of “Moral Relativism” in an episode of the Star Trek Enterprise series with Scott Bakula that aired in November of 2001 called Fortunate Son. It should have been called Unfortunate Son and was in my mind one of the worst of this series. Partially because I think the writers and producers were attempting to influence public opinion with a liberal morality tale and in the end forgot to make the story believable.

The Story involves a freighter that is being constantly attacked by Nausicaan Pirates who raid and steal the cargo. They leave only to raid again another day or however Nausicaans keep time in the depths of deep space. After a great deal of build up to show how the freighters are at the mercy of these guys losing life and limb to their piracy, the first mate of the freighter breaks away, attacking the Enterprise so that they can track the rogues down so intent are they on revenge. In typical politically correct fashion, Archer the Enterprises’ captain uses the opportunity to give a rousing speech on how retaliation just brings more retaliation. We must break the vicious circle don’t you see.

I have never liked Star Trek episodes that turn the captain from a military commander into Doctor Phil. There is something about someone ordering me how to feel about something that I find creepy. So naturally our good Captain Archer and Crew have to track down the freighter before its boomer crew does something rash, like angering the pirates. Like the proverbial cavalry they arrive just in time to save the day with more speeches. The freighter has found the secret Nausicaan Pirate base but has been duped into a trap. Four Nausicaan vessels have beset the revenge-blind freighter crew. The Nausicaan Pirates of course are only concerned about their missing crew man that they somehow left “Home Alone” aboard the same freighter on their last Pirate raid. Nausicaans lose so many pirates that way.

Not to fear as the crew of the Enterprise rejuvenate the real captain of the freighter who wisely allows the Nausicaan prisoner to be returned just in time for several more speeches on the need not to enter into an eternal cycle of violence.

The most laughable part of this story is that the Enterprise Captain who is at the Nausicaan Raiders pirate base with a vessel that out classes them all in such a way that the four enemy vessels need only scan it to see its grandeur. Knowing their pirating days are at its end, he leaves them there stating get a good look at this ship it’s a NX class vessel.

Gee I have been a greedy pirate all my life Captain Archer. I have killed, have raped, have pillaged and have done really bad things like pollute space with CO2 emissions. But just knowing that out there in the endless expanse of the abyss you have such a cooler ship than mine I guess I’ll have to go sell insurance instead. At least until I can upgrade our firepower that is.

I think that as bad as the plot of this show is and as unrealistic as the actions of everyone involved it is still an allegory for what the far left mindset considers the art of diplomacy. If you believe you can talk to Ahmadinejad or negotiate with Kim Yong Il without the threat of retaliation to keep them in line then naturally you think that after finally finding the secret pirate base of the evil Nausicaan pirates you can just leave them there with the equivalent of a cop issuing a warning. If you believe that attacking terrorists will only put you deeper into a quagmire you then must think that defending yourself from attack will somehow only encourage it to continue.

Our President may have bought into this line of thinking but I believe he is beginning to get an education in what really happens when you let the bad guys off with a warning. Our president talked incessantly about the wrong war in Iraq and the need for peace and asked why are we not attacking Pakistan. I’ll go in there and get Osama, he said. What happened in Mumbai after his election? By increasing tensions between India and Pakistan the terrorists think to distract the Pakistani government and make more converts to their cause in the uncontrolled regions. Despite the President’s pledge to increase our presence in Northern Pakistan the Taliban has come within 70 miles of the Pakistani capital. His rhetoric that we should go after Pakistan is not helpful to our effort since Pakistan is our ally and we have assisted in helping democratic leaders take charge there. Our president bombs the country and then apologizes for deaths caused by the terrorists without consulting the military men who planned the operation. Perhaps Bush was not publicizing the Afghan war and Pakistan’s involvement for a reason.

Obama is seen as weak by our enemies because he follows the same mind set as the writer of Fortunate Son. I heard a cop give a speech where he stated “if you give a thief enough rope he does not hang himself, instead he beats you with the rope, ties you up and steals you blind, because that is what a thief does”. I think the same thing applies to dictators like Kim Yong Il. Talking to one does not make him more democratic in his outlook. If he wanted to be democratic he would never have sought to be a dictator.

I favor the words of Montgomery Scott in the original Star Trek series. Let us repeat it softly:

“The best diplomat I know is a fully loaded Phazer bank.”

The 24th century's answer to the Big Stick.

We’re Norks! We’re Nuke! Get Used To It!

2009-05-28T00:08:00.003-04:00

OK, so North Korea is a nuclear power. We’re Norks! We’re Nuke! Get Used To It! The Norks also have ballistic missiles and will shortly learn how to put their weapons on top of their missiles. What’s a POTUS to do? ? Is calling on China to put pressure on their recalcitrant neighbor an option? Are you kidding? The PRC is loving every minute of this. They’ve got their own designs on gaining hegemony in the region and any trouble that comes to the US just plays into their hands.

Is the option of a pre-emptive strike on the Nork facilites viable? Well not to this president. Just the phrase “pre-emptive strike” will send Obama’s party and “netroots” supporters fleeing faster than a Frenchman hearing the word “hossenfeffer.” So that’s out. Will we urge South Korea to make the strike and absorb a probable large conventional counter-strike igniting a new war? Nah. The South is much more interested in appeasing their insane northern kin. So it looks like Obama’s stuck. Add all this to the fact that the Norks are holding hostage two American journalists and it is not a tremendous leap to imagine Obama getting bent over a barrel by the Norks. I don’t believe this president has anything in mind to actually stop the Norks. He’s signaled his willingness to accept a nuclear Iran, and now North Korea has grabbed its membership card in the nuclear power club, and Obama’s not going to do much more than express his “grave concern.”

But there is one thing the United States can push for that could cause another alteration to that region’s balance of power in favor of regional stability and nuclear deterrence. Japan should go nuclear. Yes peaceful, defense-only Japan, the only victim of two nuclear attacks, should announce to the world that they have gone nuclear. The Japanese are eminently pragmatic, and highly secretive when it comes to their own national interest. I really do not doubt that they have all the necessary technology and fissile material already developed, just waiting to be assembled. They could have a deliverable weapon ready in 48 hours. And such an announcement would be in the best interest of Japan’s defense. It is also conceivable that the Japanese have already done this, and are just remaining silent. Perhaps if Obama who is so adored on the international scene, could actually persuade another country (Japan) to help the US constrain North Korea, people may actually start having some confidence that he is more than a rhetorical gasbag.

One final thought. Now that the war in Iraq is a more positive situation than a negative one, the three largest problems facing US foreign policy are Iran, Afghanistan and North Korea. And guess what former US President stands front and center at the heart of each one. Jimmy Carter. Mr Carter’s impotent fecklessness 30 years ago, in dealing with the Iranian Revolution, his non-reaction to the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, and his outright stupid dealings with the Norks during the Clinton administration gave each of these events the time and space to fester and become the dangerous problems we now live with. Mr. Carter has been nothing but incompetent meddler in international affairs both during and after his term in office.

Sotomayor and The Oath

2009-05-27T13:00:00.002-04:00

The terrific Jonah Goldberg begins his latest column by displaying the oath that Sonia Sotomayor will take if she is confirmed as a Justice of The Supreme Court, and pointing out how she really has no intention of keeping it.Why is this so? What has happened to the state of honor in the human soul that the solemn promises a person swears to keep bear so lightly, if at all when the time comes to live up to that oath. I know, I know, we have had liars and other dishonest sorts among us since man was created. There is a quote that goes;

“A liar freely gives his oath.”

These are not the people I’m talking about. At least I hope not. I hope that society has not become so strewn with dishonesty that the honest, honorable people among us are being choked out. I’m wondering about people who hold positions responsibility, like a judge, or even a President and regular folks like bosses and spouses who easily cast aside their oaths in order to serve their short term goals.

And the President I was referring to is not Mr. Obama. George W. Bush, upon signing the McCain-Feingold campaign finance act, acknowledged at the time of the signing that the law he signed was unconstitutional. He knowingly broke his presidential oath to protect and defend The Constitution hoping that the Supreme Court would knock the law down. To his surprise it did not. And our Fist Amendment rights of free speech have been narrowed. Because when the time came for Mr. Bush to uphold his oath, he chose to mollify the electorate and seek political cover. If the Left truly wanted to impeach Mr. Bush they missed their chance.

The ease with which an unhappy spouse can obtain a divorce is another example of the deteriorating ability and desire within people to fulfill a sworn promise. There are cases where divorce is the best, but often sad option. Physical abuse certainly qualifies. Marital infidelity often cannot be overcome. But abandoning a marriage because a spouse has taken ill or money is too tight or one spouse is just plain unhappy is sad commentary on the way people who wreak this kind of havoc on their spouses and children were taught by their parents.

As a country, America has become a place where the stigma of dishonorable behavior has been fairly well eradicated. Oaths, vows and pledges have become quaint vignettes within elaborate ceremonies. Breaking one’s oath no longer brings any type of shame or opprobrium on the transgressor. The miscreant just makes an insincere apology, claims victimhood and resumes collecting his paycheck. Maybe even writes a book or goes on Oprah and makes a profit off his dishonor.

America does not need a draft to bring our youth into a culture of honor and loyalty. By 18 years old it is way to late for most kids to learn this type of behavior. No, what America needs for its youth are parents willing to instill the idea that honor is a virtue worth having. And second if Obama is serious about his “youth corps” or whatever he calls it, we already have two organization that teach young boys and girls about honor, duty and loyalty. They are called the Boy Scouts of America, and Girl Scouts of America. And both of their oaths begin with:

“On my honor…”

Burt Prelutsky on Heroism

2009-05-25T12:14:00.001-04:00

Go over to Big Hollywood and check out Burt Prelutsky's take on the fall of the word "hero." The atricle can be found here.And here is the rest of it.

Obama & North Korea

2009-05-25T09:41:00.004-04:00

The Obama administration released a statement this morning at 2:10 AM, not quite 3:00 AM sayng it has "grave concern" regarding Monday's underground test of a nuclear weapon by North Korea. Watch closely how Obama gets bent over by the Norks when they use the two detained US journalists as leverage to get the administration to back off. The President and Secretary of State have had a couple of months to bring pressure on the Norks to release these women but have done nothing. Soft diplomacy? More like limp diplomacy.And here is the rest of it.

Friendship - Part 3

2009-05-24T00:41:00.001-04:00

Why is friendship important? Because friendships are the relationships we initiate by our own choice, and it is our own decision to pursue the relationship or not. Family ties are pre-ordained. As growing children we are taught to love Mommy, taught to love Daddy, taught to love sisters and brothers and so on. And this is a good thing. Our never ending education about love and relationships starts here. We also begin choosing our friends very early on. Any parent can tell about the satisfaction in seeing their toddler choosing who they prefer playing with. It is a joy to watch a child making her/his own choices. Making friends is probably the most important part of their early socialization outside the home. Most of what we learn about honor, loyalty, and sharing comes from the continuous making and breaking of friendships in our youth. The things we learn about love, trust, compassion and selflessness are shaped in the home, but their widest application comes in our friendships.

Another one of the most important things we gain from friendships is the ability to live with and love people who are not just like us. In a typical family unit, including the extended family there is a large, shared commonality. Of course there can be a divergence of opinion about big things like religion, politics, dietary choices, anything really, within the family group. But the ties that bind, cultural mores, ethnic sensibilities, blood ties and family hierarchy are much stronger. Many times the latter things overwhelm the former and can cause people to suppress the expression of any divergent opinions they may have. It can be stifling.

When we have friends who are different from us we get to learn firsthand about other cultures, other ethnicities, other religions etc. What is better, to learn what a Passover seder is during a lesson at school, or be invited to eat the meal at a Jewish friend’s home on the holy night? I use this example because I was blessed to have been able to do exactly that. And because I happened to be the youngest male at the table, I had to ask the ‘four questions’, in Hebrew. Don’t know what they are? Ask one of your Jewish friends. I felt honored, and the Passover story became much more meaningful to me. I doubt there is anyone who is not Jewish, who can tell me a whole lot about Judaism that I don’t already know. Knowledge gained from experience, not books. All because of having a friend different from myself. And I have shared my Christian holidays, my Italian and Norwegian family traditions with friends of mine who aren’t any of those things. And they have shared their way of life with me. And I must say that it was only by the example and encouragement of my parents that I learned to take the opportunity to make friends outside my large extended family, and even larger ethnically homogenous neighborhood. Both my parents always had many friends of different religions, skin color, ethnic origins, etc. Their example made it more or less natural for both my sister and I to have many friends that comprise a wide cross section of humanity.

We learn how to live with and love our neighbor through our friendships. Jesus said that after loving God with all our being, the next most important thing was to “love thy neighbor as thyself.” Jesus clearly intends that each of treat every person we meet as our neighbor. We cannot love our neighbor or anybody else, until we know who they are. And sometimes our neighbor will be a person who’s name we do not even know. But we do know this singular thing, that this other person is also a child of God. And this is knowledge enough to show him/her love. But outside of these brief encounters, knowing your neighbor means putting forth the effort to learn about each other. This means knowledge much deeper than the clinical name, rank and serial number stuff. We only let this type of knowledge be known to those who share the same with us. Friendship is the only method to establish the channel through which this knowledge will flow. So we carry out God’s most important human-to-human command through friendship. Can you dig it? I knew that you could.

Allright. The first three questions have been answered. So who are our friends? This answer has several parts. Let us talk first about family relationships. Parents and children. Someday I hope both my daughters are friends of mine. At their present age (9 & 5) they are definitely not my friends. I am their father and along with their mother we have many un-friendly duties to carry out for their benefit, and the benefit of greater society. We make the decisions regarding their diet, their appearance, their behavior, their morality, their safety and much more, then we impose our will upon them. This imposition of our will, is not the act of a friend. Our duty as parents is to be their first teachers. And the first lesson to be learned is all about respect for authority. The role of who is the parent and who is the child and the relative authority of both has to be learned first and foremost. As they grow and mature we place more and more decisions and responsibility into their hands. When the children see the parents respect their decisions, is when they begin to become friends with their parents. I don’t want my girls to be my friends right now. More important things need to happen before that day comes.

On siblings. Brothers and sisters are great things to have. The idea of an only child saddens me. Besides not having a live-in playmate growing up, an only child misses out on much more. When she was three, I saw my daughter Lucy looking through our backyard fence at two of our neighbors sons, about the same age, playing together. Even though I couldn’t see her face, I knew she wanted to be part of the action, and also knew if she had a sibling the longing and loneliness she was feeling would never reappear. I went directly inside to my wife and told her the time had come to expand our family. She happily agreed. My girls have each other and they are better off for it. Everything that comes with shared parentage creates bonds so strong that only the strongest friendships approach. But here again our sibling relationships are also one of the first places we learn about qualities we need to build strong friendships. Think about it, who can know what buttons to push to get a reaction better than a sibling? And who is more trusted than a sibling? I think it is a very common thing that our strongest friendships come from a template we learn from our relationships with our siblings. I have only one sister. Our relationship can be tempestuous at times. But there is no one I trust more. She can piss me off like no one else, but betrayal is out of the question. She knows more hidden details about me than anyone. And of course, I love her. Those last five sentences also apply to my strongest friendships.

Not all relatives are friends, and not all friends are relatives. A common family tree does not guarantee that you will be friends with all your relatives. On my father’s side I have a large extended family. My relations with all of them are close and warm, but I am not friends with all of them. Even with the ones who are friends besides being relatives, when we have had disagreements they have been heated, bitter and deep. More intense than with any friend who is not a relative. And I really can’t explain why. There is an old expression that goes “there is nothing like the hatred between brothers.” History verifies this. Abraham, who was mentioned above, had two sons. His firstborn, Ishmael was born to his wife Sarah’s Egyptian servant Hagar. His second son Isaac was born to his wife. The Bible says nothing about the relationship between the two boys. But the descendants of Ishmael (Arab/Muslims) have hated the descendants of Isaac and his son Jacob (Jews) for at least five thousand years. Look at the hatred between the Protestant Irish and the Catholic Irish. Another brotherly hatred approaching its second millennia.

Most of us have several or more friends who are not relatives. Those folks who have no friends outside their family circle, or only one maybe two close confidants are truly to be pitied. There is a certain wonderful richness that friends of different stripes bring to a person’s life. Our friends create a beautiful tapestry of many colors and textures for us to enjoy. People with few friends never know this kind of luxury. I believe that deep inside everyone there is a desire to have friends. There is really no excuse for not having a good number of friends. The Bible shows the way, “a man who has friends, must himself be friendly.” (Prov. 18:24 pt.1) A person needs to extend the hand of friendship, and be open to more if he desires true lasting relationships. Buddies, pals, chums, all come and go from our lives with sad regularity. Friends are much more than that. The second part of Prov. 18:24 goes “But there is a friend that sticks closer than a brother.” Do you want to know who your friends are? I happen to able to answer that. Your friends are;

• those who walk in on you, when everyone else walks out on you.
• those who put your welfare ahead of their own.
• those who give and ask nothing in return.
• those who tell you when you are wrong, without judgment.
• those who know all your faults and love you still.
• those you don’t have to ask.
• those you would do all of the above for and more.

If you have a person in your life who fulfills one of these, you can be sure he will fulfill all of them. These are your friends. Can you dig it? I knew that you could.

Saturday - May 23

2009-05-23T02:38:00.002-04:00

Below is Part 2 of the three part series on Friendship that I'm re-posting. Family business has got my attention until Monday. Enjoy the weekend and remember to thank a veteran when you see one, and espescially this weekend. Happy Memorial Day. The "Read More" link to the right does not work for this post.

Friendship - Part 2

2009-05-23T02:35:00.001-04:00

What is friendship? Here’s the simple answer from the dictionary:

“a relationship between two or more people who are friends.”

This definition tells me nothing. It asks more questions than it answers. Questions like, what kind of relationship? What is a friend?
In human relations there are only two categories into which all relationships fall. There are covenant relationships, and there are contractual relationships. It is one or the other. Both of these categories have sub-categories, if you will, but there are no other capitol divisions.

Covenant relationships can be either eternally ordained and metaphysically un-breakable, or sworn agreements intended to be un-breakable, or contractual agreements which undergo a metamorphosis and become un-breakable. The eternally ordained relationships are:

• God and His children
• Parents and children
• Blood relatives

These three relationships cannot be altered. God will never stop being God, and we cannot cease being his children. I can never not be my daughter’s father, they can never not be my daughters. Can you dig it? I knew that you could.

The sworn agreements intended to be un-breakable include:

• Marriage **
• Adoptive parents

**this relationship is the only contractual relationship intended by God to be metaphysically un-breakable. “..and the two shall become one flesh”, “…what God has joined together let no man put asunder.” It is no wonder why God says He hates divorce.

Any of the contractual agreements can evolve into a covenant agreement, but for this discussion I list only one:

• Friendship

All other inter-personal relationships are of the contractual type. These relationships are based on terms agreed upon by the parties involved, whether or not they are formalized at the beginning with promises, vows, oaths or actual written conditions. Over time these relationships run their course and slip out of our lives. But not all of them, and not always. An incomplete list of contractual relationships includes;

• Employer – employee
• Teacher – student
• Coach – player
• Doctor – patient

We all have many contractual relationships over time. Most of these change frequently. Some evolve over time, and when they do the evolution progresses from the initial conditions to what most people then call friendship. It is just another small glimpse of the eminence of friendship.

Friendships begin in most cases, when two people in a common situation discover one or more shared interests and enjoy the comingling of ideas and desires and are then drawn together, or when two people who share no common interests are thrown together for the purpose of accomplishing some task and discover qualities in each other, i.e. trustworthy, honesty, integrity, to name just a few and then begin to share ideas and desires between them. All of us have had friendships that began in both these ways. For myself, many more the latter way than the former. In both cases, for a time, the two people desire to spend greater periods of time together, learning from and about each other, seeking each other’s counsel and advice and sharing with each other the things one may have and the other may lack. This is the nascent state of friendship.

It is very easy to establish friendships with people with whom a person has things in common. This commonality allows each person to more easily trust and open one’s heart to the other person. But it comes as a much bigger shock to the system when the differences between these ‘friends’ begin to surface. It is the first test of these friendships. It is precisely at these junctures that both people must choose what has the greater value. Do they value the other person more than the difference, or is the difference of greater value? In order for the friendship to survive, both must have the same response: the other person is more valuable, than what they differ on. Anything less and the friendship is over. This does not mean they are now enemies, but it does mean that the trust and intimacy that never stops growing between two friends has in fact stopped. In a true friendship the highest value is always placed on the other person. There cannot be any exception to this.

The times when people who share no common interests are thrown together for the purpose of accomplishing some task is a slower sort of process. Along the way in working toward the completion of their given task, they each come to discover the differences between them. They may discover differences in ethnicity, religion, politics, the means and methods to complete their task, or all of the above, or some combination, or other differences. Yet, because they are compelled by authority (bosses, teachers, coaches, etc) to work together, they find a way to put aside their differences and get the job done. And coming through the process they discover other admirable qualities like perseverance and the other previously mentioned qualities, that create the sense of value in each other. And it is no shock at all when other differences pop up. The mechanism for dealing with these differences is already established, and the friendship continues to grow. In my experience, the friendships that have begun like this have developed more slowly than the others, but they have also grown deeper.

Over time our friendships grow and deepen through the experiences that life brings us. We cannot be present at every consequential event in every one of our friend’s lives. And vice-versa. But there are plenty of times when we are present. And when not, we share our joys and sorrows with our friends and they with us, so that we maintain sufficient knowledge to advise and comfort our friends in the times to come. Our trust in these folks becomes unshakable. Our love for them unbreakable.

I am not sure this is the right place to talk about this, but it’s on my mind so I’ll put it down while it’s fresh in my head. We will all meet many people during our lives who want to be our friends. There are people out there who do have very highly developed abilities to read the true nature of other folks, and these folks can be sincere in wanting to establish a real friendship. But there’s not very many of them. But there are many, many people out there who make their desire known fairly quickly after making acquaintance with you, and are insincere. They make declarative statements like, “you know, you and I should be friends”, or they preface introductions with “this is my good friend”. And they are full of flattery. And they are to be dealt with very carefully. Most times they have self-serving reasons for desiring a closer relationship. They value only what they can get from you. The concepts of friendship, and putting a friend first mean nothing to them. They may think in their minds that they have many friends, but in reality they have none. When the things that test a friendship pop up, their attitude is “let me get mine, before he gets his,” I worked for such a man two different times in my life. At different times he called me his ‘protégé’, his ‘friend’, his ‘partner’, and ‘my best guy’. Never meant a word of it. When he had no further interest that I could serve he tossed me out like yesterday’s newspaper. He was completely devoid of any sense of honor. Honor is the virtue that makes possible all other virtues. Virtue is something that individual people possess out of their own willingness to be virtuous.

The final mark of true friendship is the willingness to forgive, and restore the relationship. In every relationship we have with another person, there will be times when you hurt your friend, or your friend hurts you. This hurt can come from the smallest slight all the way up to naked betrayal. Jesus commanded us, not suggested or urged, commanded us that we forgive our neighbor, of any and all transgressions. This can be a very difficult thing to do sometimes. But we are better off when we do it, and a discussion of forgiveness is another topic entirely. Yet one aspect I have not found a whole lot of Scriptural writings about, is what happens after the forgiving? Are we compelled to restore the relationship to what it previously had been? I have to say no. Although God demands that we “love your enemies”, and “pray for those who spitefully use you”, we are not told to bring them into your life as friends. But again, if we place our highest value on the person, not the deed our desire is not just to forgive but to restore our friendship to its rightful place. This is what sets friendship above all other relationships.

Friendship is a relationship between two people, based on trust and honor, where the greatest value is placed, by each person, on the other person and his best interests, before the best interests of one’s own self.

Next: Why is friendship important?

Today & The Weekend

2009-05-22T00:02:00.004-04:00

I have got some family business going on for the next three days. So to fill the void, I'm going to re-post a three part post on friendship that I did a couples of weeks ago. Since SM has gotten a bunch of new readers since the first time it appeared, it'll be fresh. To those who have seen it, just think about your friends and maybe call one up. Thanks everybody. The series starts below. BTW, the 'Read More' link to the right doesn't work for this message.

Friendship - Part 1

2009-05-21T23:46:00.002-04:00

Recent events have had me doing much thinking about friendship. A lot of my pondering was about my personal friends and recalling the episodes and events that we shared together, or experienced on our own and needed one another to pull each other through. But I started asking myself questions about friendship. Questions like, is friendship important? What is friendship? Why is it important? Who are your friends? I like to think I found some answers. Is friendship important? Yes, undeniably. I’m not going to say I did a lot of research about this in psychological writings by eminent doctors and experts in the field. I didn’t. Not a single Google query or discussion with the psychologist who treated me several years ago. The importance of friendship is made clear by none other than God Himself. If you don’t believe in God, or think that The Bible is just an outdated book of clever morality stories, then I gently and respectfully suggest you stop right here. What follows will only seem to you to be the musings of a man attempting to buttress his opinions with the authority of a non existent deity.

In both the Hebrew and Christian scriptures God uses the term “friend” sparingly and carefully. This is the first clue as to the importance God places on friendship. It is similar to God’s use of the word “hate”. In the Hebrew Scriptures there are exactly 613 laws for God’s people to use as a straightedge in determining what is and what is not proper behavior and conduct for individuals and societies. In the case of some of these laws, God also describes how He feels about a transgression of this or that particular law. Some of the terms He uses are “a great evil”, or an “abomination”, or “desperately wicked”, and He uses these terms fairly liberally. But His use of the word “hate” is reserved for only a very few things. And His specificity in using the word is a great indicator of the very special disdain He has for these transgressions. Not a disdain for those who commit these sins, disdain for the sin itself. Love the sinner, hate the sin.

As far as my reading of the Scriptures goes, I find these are the things God, from His own mouth, has said He hates:
• A proud look
• A lying tongue
• Hands that shed innocent blood
• A heart that devises wicked plans
• Feet that are swift in running to evil
• A false witness who speaks lies
• One who sows discord among the brethren
(Proverbs 6:16-19)
And there is one more:
• Divorce
(Malachi 3:16)

Just eight things, out of 613. Makes me think how important it is to avoid these particular things. Not that I was trying to make this point, but it just occurred to me that people who do try to avoid this behavior are good candidates for friends. But that’s a topic addressed later.

Another word who’s singular, one-time use by God, demonstrates the importance of what He is getting across, is the word “stupid”. Used only once, in all of Holy Scripture;

• “Whoever loves instruction loves knowledge,
But he who hates correction is stupid.”
(Proverbs 12:1)

Tells you all you need to know about what a person’s attitude toward correction should be.

So having these examples of God’s judicious and very specific uses of certain words, an examination of His use of the word friend, is valuable in trying to get an understanding of the importance of friendship.

The first person God calls ‘friend’ is the patriarch Abraham. (2Chron. 20:7) So what about this Abraham? What was special about him, to have God call him ‘friend’. Centuries after the Noah and the flood, God decided the moment had arrived to make himself known to humanity. He would reveal Himself to His creation as the One True Living God and demonstrate the difference between Himself and the gods mankind had manufactured by and for themselves. The world during these times was mainly defined by various “peoples” organized by tribal structures. So God decided to create His own people. Through this people, God would bring to humanity His Law, His prophets, and ultimately His Messiah. He would begin with one man. He chose Abram (changed to Abraham later by God) to be His starting point. God promised many great things to Abraham. And He asked many great things of the man. And Abraham was faithful. He believed God’s promises. He trusted God. And God even came to him, spoke with him face-to-face, and even allowed Abraham to question Him. His complete story is in the Book of Genesis. Even though they were Creator and creation, their relationship was one of true friendship.

The second (and last) person God calls ‘friend” in the Hebrew Scriptures is Moses. (Exodus 33:11) God chose Moses as the man who would lead His people out of bondage. (a foreshadowing of Christ leading man out of the bondage of sin) God also brought His Law to humanity through His friend Moses. God said of Moses that he spoke face-to-face with Moses, and spoke plainly not through dark sayings. Once again, going through the last four books of the Torah, the conversations between God and Moses are very intimate, and personal. Even though the hierarchy of who is God and who is man is never forgotten by Moses, these conversations are much different than any other conversations God has with any other person (except Abraham) throughout the Hebrew Scriptures. Clearly we witness two friends going at it. At turns we see anger from both, love from both, and a willingness from both to subvert their own desire for that of the other.

There are many more men in the Hebrew Scriptures that perform huge roles in God’s unfolding plan for humanity. David, Solomon, Elijah, Gideon, the other Prophets, to name a few. God says of David that he was “a man after my own heart”. God appeared to Solomon and gave him greater wisdom than any man before or since. God did not allow Elijah to taste death, but swept him directly into heaven. Yet, the greatest tasks in His plan during the times before Christ, He entrusted not to His chosen kings, or chosen messengers. For these things He called on His friends. A status He bestowed on only two men. The very rareness of the word demonstrates the very high value God places on friendship. The only status about which God is even more exclusive is that of son.

Now we come to the Christian Scriptures, specifically the four Gospels. Jesus’ ministry on Earth was very brief. Only about 3 ½ years. As He traveled through the towns and villages He attracted many people who came to hear Him. Some of these folks came to satisfy their curiosity about the new, young rabbi. Others were more intent on applying His teachings to their lives. These more ardent followers were called disciples.

disciple – somebody who believes in and follows the teachings of a leader, a philosophy, or a religion.

In Luke 6:13 we read:

“And when it was day, He called His disciples to Himself: and from these He chose twelve whom He also named apostles.”

apostle – somebody who tries to persuade others to share an idea or cause.

From His many disciples, Jesus took twelve men, and elevated them above the others. He gave them the special status and privilege to be His traveling companions, to work along side him, and to be taught by Him in a closer relationship than that of His other disciples.

Jesus’ last meal was on the first night of Passover, a traditional seder. Except for The Day of Atonement, this meal is the holiest feast of the Jewish calendar. All four Gospel give an account of the event. But in the Gospel of John the account is much longer and detailed. It is this way because what is written is written by the apostle John who ate the seder with Jesus and was an eyewitness to what was said. The complete account of the meal is in chapters 13 through 17. But beginning in chapter 14 Jesus starts a discourse about the things that are about to happen, about His mission from God, about the coming of the Holy Spirit, about love and more. He is preparing His apostles for life beyond His physical presence. In the middle of this monologue Jesus says this:

“No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all the things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you.”

So here we have Jesus with His last opportunity to prepare and encourage His closest followers, elevating them in stature once again. The highest place He could give them was that of friend. This is the third and last time God bestows the position of friend on a human being(s) in the Holy Scriptures.
Next: What is friendship?

Obama's Nat'l Security Speech

2009-05-21T12:15:00.002-04:00

I'm reading some stuff about the President's speech today at the National Archives...One thing he said about interrogation techniques, “They risk the lives of our troops by making it less likely that others will surrender to them in battle.” is amazingly dim. Who out there actually believes that Al-Qaeda bases its treatment of captured Americans on the American treatment of captured Al-Qaedists? Anybody? Al-Qaeda's methods for dealing with captives does not include any sort of humane treatment and not a drop of mercy. Just look at what we have discovered about their treatment of innocent Iraqi civilians. I hope it was not the President who put this ignorant postulation into the speech. But the President obviously let it stay, so that says something. Something not very good.

Third Term for Bush

2009-05-21T00:03:00.004-04:00

So, we find ourselves in the third term of George W. Bush. What you say? Isn’t a third term Constitutionally prohibited? Didn’t Obama win? You mean we are still a racist nation? Yes, yes, and haven’t been for decades. I am talking about the amazing continuity that has been maintained from the end of the Bush administration and the advent of the One. The Obama campaign did not win by campaigning against John McCain. The entire message was ‘we are not Bush, everything Bush has done was wrong, we are not going to do the same things, in fact we are going reverse everything Bush has done.’ So how has this all been going? As George Will is fond of saying…..Well.

The major Bush mistake-cum-crime was the War on Terror particularly in Iraq. OK, he changed the name to “overseas contingency operations”. But what’s in a name? There have been no policy changes. The date for final pullout agreed to by Bush with the Iraqi government remains the same. The policy of that date being extended if facts on the ground warrant is still there. The next loudest shrieks about Bush policy that Obama promised to end, were directed at W’s handling of captured “enemy combatants’. Whoops, I mean “detainees” the second huge Bush rollback. The remaining policies toward captured terrorists (I am in thrall to no man) including renditions and closing Guantanamo Bay have been decried by Obama as President, but changed not a whit. Candidate Obama also piled on the criticism of Bush’s national security apparatus, I never heard him say ‘Constitution shredding’, but he didn’t seem to be shy about bringing it up. And yet, since 1/20/2009 no policies regarding wiretaps, intercepts or altering the Patriot Act have been adopted or even put forward.

On the domestic front, all we heard from the Democrats as a party and Obama as a candidate was that Bush was a budget busting, deficit ballooning spendthrift who never lifted a veto pen (mostly true about the pen). Yet Obama in creating more red ink in four months than Bush did in eight years not only doesn’t seem to be reversing W’s policy, his trebling of the deficit seems to be an enthusiastic endorsement of his predecessor.

Even inside the White House the Bush template is still in use. In the family quarters the children’s areas are still occupied by two attractive young girls.

So except for a couple of semantic changes and other small alterations like the nationalization of the auto and banking industries (which may be becoming a habit) not much has been overthrown. So far when Obama looks in the mirror, I think W’s visage is staring back.

Senate Kills Money to Close GITMO

2009-05-20T12:44:00.002-04:00

I just read a headline, so I've got no details for you.But the Senate voted overwhelmingly to deny the administration the funds to close down Guantanamo Bay and relocate the terrorists to the US mainland. Is this delicious, or what? Of course a load is borne more easily with wider dispersion, so this may be the Senate's effort to allow Obama to duck criticism about failing to close the facility. I'm just sayin'

Critical Thinking vs. "Feelings"

2009-05-20T00:50:00.008-04:00

A couple of days ago over at Big Hollywood I read an article by Scott Graves . In it you’ll see this quote from Mark Twain, “we all do no end of feeling, and we mistake it for thinking”. I have been thinking of ways to get this quote actually carved in stone and sent to my 9 and 5 year olds daughters, to hang on the wall in their bedrooms. My Dad has a beautiful slab of unused granite in his garage, but I don’t have the tools to shape a couple of tablet size pieces, and then carve in this wisdom. Combined Dad and I have a formidable tool arsenal, but carving stone is beyond that. Well, I guess we do have about 50 cold chisels between us, but no one would confuse my handiness with Michelangelo's. My daughters live with their mother and spend lots of time with the maternal side of their family tree. Twain’s observation is in the DNA of the people who are my girls’ exemplars of what adult behavior should be. For an aware parent, as I hope I am, the idea that my girls will be governed by their feelings rather than critical thinking scares the bejesus out of me.

How did we become a society that prefers to make the emotional choice rather than the rational one? Was it the advent of TV and the brilliant idea to sell products by emotional visual pleas to our wants and desires? I think it could’ve started there. Before TV, ads were in print or radio. The print ads had to use words to get the message across. And though words are powerful, after a while seeing the same type of superlatives over and over, most people glaze over and turn the page. Then radio came along and the words now were infused with tone and inflection that broadcast a more emotional message. But I think it was the music, specifically the jingle that was the big improvement radio gave to advertising. Everybody knows how any little ditty can get stuck in our head and not leave for days. “I’d like to get the world to sing….” Sorry, if I just did it to you.

But when TV came along, man everything changed. The moving visual image made it so very much easier to tug at peoples’ emotions than ever before. Hell that’s what makes TV content so powerful too. Seeing all the smiling actors and pitchmen with the Pepsodent smile, and Scope breath, and Herbal Essence hair, made you feel, ‘that could be me’ Even if you were a toothless, halitosified, bald snot. Let’s face it most of the people alive today who were born before TV are in their dotage and even they, having been exposed to these daily, constant emotional heart tugs have been affected. Those of us born after the advent of TV know nothing else.

Then of course we saw the emergence of the self-help industry and its partner the pay-a-whole-lot for help industry. Both of these industries have at their core this simple question – ‘how do you feel about it?’ And the implied answer is to guide yourself by what you feel. This is not a prudent precept to live by whether it is gotten off a bookshelf, an analyst’s couch or even a confessional. Yet I’ve come to believe that it dominates our society. With these possible exceptions – the scientific community (and it seems to be making inroads here) and the military where decisions are a matter of life and death, and must be governed by reality and facts. Emotion can only be given sway after the battle.

Our entertainment also became more feeling oriented. Observers who get paid to comment on the industry sometimes use the phrase sissified. I don’t disagree. The behavior of men was judged to be out-of-touch(feeling!) and emotionally repressed. So they gave us Alan Alda. Terrific actor, nice man but forever to be saddled as the example of what a limp,feeling man should be. He doesn’t deserve it, but there you go. Thank heavens for James Bond. I really do not know how the character has survived not being turned into a feelings-before-facts squish. He acts on emotion only when and where it’s appropriate and called for.

I know that critical thinking in a simple form, is one of the first things any parent wants to teach their child. The parent had better if he wants to keep his child safe during the moments the child is out of view. My mom tells me the first word I spoke was ‘hot’. Mom has always been most fine at thinking critically. If only my daughters….. Being able to assess personal safety and make the right choice is also a continuing lesson of critical thinking that continues as we grow. Learning the scientific method is still taught in school, at least I hope it is. Hell even learning about trial and error is a way of learning about how to make a choice from what you know rather than what you feel. And everybody knows how to do that. Hold on. I am wrong about trial and error. If I wasn’t, the adage “insanity is doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result” wouldn’t exist. So there are obviously people who try something, err, and feeling they must be right about their choice,try the same thing again. Hey, did I just demonstrate that relying on feelings is insanity? Whew, talk about pleasant unintended consequences.

I think feelings are favored over critical thinking out of laziness. In a totally non-scientific study, the people I know who rely most on their feelings are the most intellectually lazy people I know. Oh, they love to think they’re deeply aware of the world and how it works. They’ll scamper to the basement to surf the Internet and learn about the human genome project when it makes the news cycle, then pronounce themselves experts around the bonfire. But ask them why they support abortion, and you get the pro-choice feelings of the mother bullshit. Or some other talking points horse manure. BTW, why is it bull-shit, but horse-manure? I guess the truth is, living by your feelings is just easier to do than actually putting real thought into your actions and the possible consequences thereof. And man oh man, isn’t a whole lot of the world all about taking the easy way out?

Feelings have their proper place. I am the most emotional person I know. I can hate deeply, but love even deeper. Expressing crushing sorrow or exhuberant joy with public tears neither embarasses me or diminishes me. Exaltation and humiliation, I hold back nothing. But when decision time comes, I go by my feelings only when I’m choosing gifts for my loved ones (or gambling -don't tell anybody) The military excels by putting thinking before feeling. Because they know it is a matter of life and death. And first above all things, the military values life. To so many other people, living by feelings is the way to faster gratification of whatever desire they have. How they choose what they choose isn’t such a weighty matter to them. But they couldn’t be more wrong. Dead wrong.

The Chalk Talk

2009-05-19T07:43:00.002-04:00

How about some sports talk? The kind of stuff that doesn’t really matter in the Grand Scheme of things, but can still pass the time in an enjoyably adversarial way. At least for some of us. . I’m a huge Mets fan, been so all my life. And I carry on the NY tradition of choosing one of the NY teams and generally despising the other. When you hear a NY sports fan say “I root for both teams”, (Mets/ Yankees, Giants/Jets, Rangers/Islanders) you know they really don’t root for any team, they just want to hop on the hot team, or are too namby-pamby to make a choice and stick with it. Any real NY sports fan will back me on this.

I think the Mets have a serious problem whether or not Carlos Delgado’s injury is short or long term. Even if he’s back in the line up quickly, he’s going to be playing with some discomfort because at his age the body just doesn’t heal as completely as quickly as it did when it was only 25 years old. And Delgado’s importance to the Mets was shown last year when he had a dreadful season for the first three months or so (and not coincidentally so did the entire club) then got hot as Hades the rest of the way. And you know the ending to this story. I believe he’ll be diminished the rest of the way and that is beddy, beddy bad as an ex-Met used to say. And if the injury is long term toss in a few more beddys. So, do the Mets have anyone on the bench to at least spell Delgado more than usual? No. I think the Mets have got to reach into the Wilpon coffers and get a proven 1B to be the everyday starter and use Delgado (if possible) to spell the new guy. The good thing for the Mets is right now there are a number of good 1B’s who could be had without moving into luxury tax land. My personal choice – Nick Johnson of the Nationals. Washington is awful and looking to jump start the rebuilding by trimming the payroll by dumping a few expensive vets. Johnson fits the bill. He’s in his walk year and is making 5.5 million. If Delgado looks good by year's end the Mets can let Johnson walk. If Delgado starts looking his age the Mets can re-sign Johnson or try to. It’s up to GM Omar Minaya, and the health of the Wilpon balance sheet.

There are reports all over the place that the Hamlet-of-Hattiesburg, Brett Favre is going to have surgery on a tendon in his throwing arm. After last season, when Favre had a big drop off in performance after Thanksgiving until the season was over, it was revealed that he was playing hurt. The upcoming surgery will “release” the tendon, which in orthopaedic speech means cutting the tendon through. Expected to perform the surgery is Dr. James Andrews, probably the most well known name in sports medicine. Andrews has said recovery will take 6 to 8 weeks. As the rest of the story goes, Favre will then sign with the Vikings. So Brett finally gets what he wants, a shot to beat Green Bay, at Lambeau Field. Every employee who feels that he has be discarded unjustly, inside somewhere, wants to get a little payback on his former boss. And Favre is no less human than any of us. How many examples are there across professional sports of fine accomplished athletes who stay on too long. Even though Favre and the Jets were having a decent season before he got hurt, in first place in the AFC East for a few games, he wasn’t the Brett Favre of his prime (who could be?) or even the Brett Favre of 2008. I guess it just a desire to have the last word. The Vikings are solid on defense, and on offense Adrian Petersen is in anybody’s top 2 backs in the league, plus the receivers are talented and the offensive line is better than Favre had with the Jets. But I don’t see Minnesota making a deep playoff run. If Chicago surprises, and Jay Cutler makes their offense his, and if Aaron Rodgers has a better year as a sophomore starter in Gree Bay, the Vikings may not even reach the postseason. But the NFL is a place where almost any team can catch fire and have a terrific run of success. At some point Minnesota is going to have to fish or cut bait regarding Tavaris Jackson’s ability to lead the team through a full season. Signing Favre allows them to dodge the issue for another year. If the 40 year old can stay upright.

The ESPN booth for the 2009 Monday Night Football schedule is getting a lineup change. Jon Gruden will replace Tony Kornheiser. Kornheiser stepped down because he has a well known fear of flying and after looking at the MNF slate, he was looking for ways to “extricate” himself.. I was so-so on Tony K. The TV show he hosts with Mike Wilbon,Pardon the Interruption,is okay with me in small doses, but I didn’t think he added much to MNF. I did see John Gruden on somebody’s draft coverage and wasn’t impressed. But he’s owed the benefit of the doubt. He’s smart and certainly knows the game. As a coach I thought he knew how to turn a phrase. We will see.

The NY Times - The Gray Pallor of Death

2009-05-18T06:09:00.004-04:00

Here's some more about the N.Y. Times I still encourage all of you to read the first news link in the homepage's "The Whole Truth" links feature. Reading the next two links wouldn't hurt either. Today opened up with a real bracer didn’t it? The NY Times coming clean, in their usual squishy and self-excusing way, about killing an ACORN corruption story at a moment in the 2008 campaign that may have damaged the Obama election effort, wasn’t a complete surprise. Like the expected passing of a terminally ill relative, the final moment still comes as an unpleasant jolt. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Maureen Dowd’s apparent plagiarism, which is also explained away with an ‘aw shucks, I plain forgot’ justification regarding the lifting of a paragraph from Josh Marshall’s Talking Points Memo blog.

It is becoming a not infrequent thing to learn that the Times is involved in some sort chicanery or ethical lapse (what is more frequent than a lapse?), plagiarism or just plain prejudice –bias is too limp- when it comes to writing anything about people or events that cast a less than flattering light on their favored persons and issues. Sorry for that sentence. I’m not going to list all the examples of what I’m referring to. You either already know them or can easily look them up by googling “ NT Times plagiarism”, or “bias” or “Blair.” I’m sure if you hit one story you’ll easily find lots of information on the entire Times’ record.

I am no paragon of virtue. But the days are not so long gone when people who benefited from unscrupulous supporters would come out and at least chastise the culprit, or hopefully sever association with such a person or organization. Now I know Obama can’t stop the Times from covering him, and denying press credentials would, I think be draconian. But getting in front of a teleprompter microphone and telling folks oh something like “The New York Times acted counter to the best standards and practices of the journalism business and I hope a few heads roll over this.” would be nice. And the Times itself wouldn’t have to change much of that statement in a public apology regarding Dowd’s ethically lax attitude. But the state of things being what they are, neither of those honorable things is going to happen. As a senior Art History major I cited a quote that opened my term paper incorrectly. I didn’t leave the citation out, just erred on the book I got it from. I got an ‘F’ and nearly didn’t graduate because of it. How much do you think Dowd will find missing in her next paycheck?

This is another example of the Left’s rallying cry of ‘IT’S NOT ____________ WHEN WE DO IT!’. You fill in the blank. When the Left does it, it’s “editorial discretion”, when the Right does it it’s “censorship”. And the thing for me that is so migraine inducing is that the people on the Left of genuine goodwill and are not talking point parrots when having a conversation, even these decent folks will never raise a critical voice or entertain the thought that perhaps they’re “ridin’ with the wrong posse.” Not to blow the Right’s horn but it needs to be pointed out that in the ‘50’s, William F. Buckley took on the John Bircher’s, the anti-semites and other assorted kooks on the fringe of conservatism and purged them from the conservative movement. This was right, honorable and courageous. The Right’s swift and complete rejection of David Duke when he attempted to run for office as a Republican also demonstrates the Right’s refusal to amass gains at the expense of good ethics and high integrity. I know these two things exist within lots of folks who pull the ‘D’ lever. Who speaks for them? Why are they so invisible? Can it really be that the Left is really that bereft of people who will not sacrifice principled behavior for political gain? I really do know the answer to that question. I just really don’t like thinking about it.

San Francisco Knows What's Best For You

2009-05-16T15:03:00.003-04:00

Socialist Board of Supervisors moves to save freedom to travel by killing it.For those fortunates among you who have never had the pleasure of living in an urban paradise, I will probably be introducing you to what it's like in my posts. Many densely-populated cities have Alice in Wonderland governments, but San Francisco's is almost in a class of its own.

San Francisco's streets are falling apart, literally. Occasionally, two or three automobiles get devoured by a sinkhole which suddenly appears as a result of the crumbling infrastructure. Parking is a nightmare, and when you find a place to park, you will pay some of the highest meter or public parking rates in the nation. If you're a developer who is lucky enough to get a business building permit, your request for two hundred parking spaces in the building will be reduced to fifteen or twenty. If you want to get from The Wharf to Ocean Beach, your traveling time in a car is about twenty minutes. On public transportation, that would be more like an hour and fifteen minutes to three hours, depending on which bus or train breaks down along the way.

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors has the answer. Raise the parking rates even higher, reduce available parking even more. Add Sundays to the meters on the streets (already in place in the downtown area), as well as imposing the higher parking rates at city-owned parking lots. Add five dollars to each parking ticket, even though our current fine rate is enough to support a small country. Cut street-cleaning in order to increase the fines on cars which are not moved during our already spotty street cleaning days. Folks, this is not my opinion. These are the exact words of the current proposal being presented to the full Board by Supervisor John Avalos.

Why would they do this? Because government knows best. The Muni (our local system of buses and light rail) didn't get all the money it wanted in the recently proposed city budget. But that's not the reason stated by the noble Supervisor proposing this brilliant solution. It's for the seniors, the "lower income" riders, and (you guessed it) the children. Never mind the occasional murder or mugging on the buses and trains, the multiple delays, the obnoxious drivers,and the arrival times that rarely bear any resemblance to reality--the Muni stinks, literally. The smell of urine, feces and unwashed bodies is almost unbearable. I keep bottles of Fabreze handy at work just to get the smell off my clothes, and I'm no pinky-finger metrosexual. "Hi, Mr. Homeless Person, what is that unusual cologne you're wearing?" "Hello, Mr. Junkie, I hope that's a clean needle you're using." "How are you today, Mr. Thug? My wallet's a little light today--you aren't going to kill me are you?" "And how have things been going for you, Mr. Drunk? I didn't know they even still made Thunderbird."

But everybody knows that public transportation, and only public transportation should ever be allowed in a big city. There is the allowance for walking or bicycling, but anyone who is not a well-toned athlete can tell you how practical those alternatives are in this city of cliff-like hills. But in order to keep the public employees working, union drivers employed, and people happily riding together in rolling sardine cans, the automobile must go, right after it has paid for the increases mentioned above to close the Muni budget gap.

A Mr. Goodwrench ad from a few years back had a jingle at the end that said "It's not just your car, it's your freedom." If our Supervisors and Mayor ever saw it, I'm sure they had a good laugh at the concept of freedom, then went back to figuring out how to increase the Muni budget, which currently stands at over seven hundred million dollars per year.

The Great Race--San Francisco Style

2009-05-15T19:46:00.004-04:00

San Francisco's famous (or infamous) "Bay to Breakers Race" takes place this Sunday. It's another example of the local saying "only in San Francisco."
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The event starts at San Francisco Bay, runs across the city, up Hayes Hill for those of strong spirit, back down the hill and on to the Pacific Ocean side. The 7.5 mile race itself started out normally enough. In 1912 the city fathers and local businesses joined together to come up with a citywide event to encourage a spirit of growth and sense of pride following the disastrous '06 quake. It is one of the oldest continuous running big footraces is the world. The race was only for men, but this is San Francisco and for once its departure from the rules made sense, but in a uniquely San Francisco way. The first woman to run in the race in 1940 disguised herself as a man. Wearing costumes was already part of the fun, so she got away with it. In fact, she finished near last, just ahead of a man disguised as Captain Kidd.

Women were not allowed in the race officially until 1971, but as the costumes got more elaborate, it's likely that many women ran in the races after the now iconic Bobbie Burke. At one point,the race attracted 110,000 runners, making it the world's biggest footrace. The last few years, the race averages around 62,000 which is still not small potatoes. In 2007, a woman was the winner but women had been doing very well in the race for years.

The race is broken up into segments for the regular runners, costumed runners, and recently for floats carrying beer, multiple group runners (the first "group runners" were the UC Davis track team who tied themselves together to form a centipede) and a couple of other categories which escape me at the moment. But the biggest draw over the past few years has been the nude runners.

The end of civilization is at hand. Things got a bit out of hand at last year's race, so the committee has banned nudity, alcohol, and the booze-carrying floats. Those of us who know the city well may attend the race just to see if the committee can pull this travesty off. What fun is a race where Captain Kidd can no longer be followed by Naked Nancy and Nudie Rudy? This town really is going to hell.

Nice Bones, Nicer Taxes, Nicest Season

2009-05-15T00:34:00.003-04:00

The TV show ‘Bones’ has really grown on me since I started watching it in reruns. When it debuted I never tuned in because I didn’t care for pre-premier ad campaign. I thought it was just another twist on the cop drama. To an extent it is. This time, they put an anthropologist and other research scientists in place of your run of the mill forensic pathologists. The writing is clever, the plot twists are quirky and the characters are all odd balls without being weird. I came to like ‘Law and Order’ after first watching reruns. But where Law and Order intentionally avoids very much character development outside the precinct and courthouse, Bones gives vivid portraits of this group of people professionally and personally. Bones doesn’t take itself too seriously either. Sometimes it can be the story that stretches credulity, sometimes it’s the technology and sometimes it’s the IQ of some of the characters. I’ve got to say this too, the title character Dr. Temperance Brennan, a forensic anthropologist hence the ‘Bones’ nickname, played by Emily DeSchanel, and her co-worker/best friend Angela Montenegro played by Michela Conlin are the easiest women to look at on the small screen.

I was surprised to learn today that Russia has a flat-tax system in place for collecting government revenue. Amazing that a nation that has only been “free” for less than twenty years, and is having real problems defining their version of democracy and market capitalism, managed to get this issue exactly right. I haven’t actually seen it but I’d bet the entire Russian tax code could be written on one of Sheryl Crow’s single sheets of TP. So why, after 223 years of practice is the American tax code nine or ten inches thick?

Spring is here, and as sure as fall follows winter, summer will arrive soon. Summer brings a lot of nice stuff with it. Water sports, cook-outs and outdoor stuff in general, the Fourth of July, football training camp and the thing that makes it all possible, the warmer weather. This is why I don’t like summer very much. I prefer the cool weather of autumn most of all and I can even enjoy the biting cold of mid-February in the northeast. But the heat itself isn’t what bothers me about well, the heat. It is the effect of the heat on the everyday disposition of most folks that turns me off. From June to September people are just way more easily pissed off and hyper-prickly. And it’s because they can’t get out of the heat. Let’s face it, when you start to get hot and sweaty you start stripping off. If you wind up naked and are still uncomfortable hey you’re stuck. I’m talking about the outdoors, not escaping into an air-conditioned Wal-Mart. Uncomfortable people are not much fun to be around. Less courteous, less cheerful and way more impatient. Ever notice how pleasant life seems when the leaves turn? Sleeping with the window open is rest at its restful best. And when you get cold, there is always another layer to throw on. Hell, Alaskans have all kinds of fun outdoors all the way through the winter because there are clothes that can keep a person comfortable – including the lovely Governor Palin. People are nicer the cooler the temperature. What’s more fun? Sitting with your person in front of an air conditioner trying to stop schvitzing, or curling up together in front of a glowing fire? Summertime? Something else that has a reputation that bears small resemblance to reality.

Should marijuana be legalized? I used to be firmly in the ‘no’ camp. Even when I smoked daily for a long time. I believed – no still believe – that it is a gateway drug. Not in the sense that a pothead will crave a greater high and seek out and find the chemicals. That happens a lot less than folks are led to believe. Pot is a gateway drug because being illegal; it puts even the casual user in contact with dealers who are willing and indeed hoping to get the pothead to try coke, crack or any other thing available to increase the dealer’s profit. But, if pot were legal and could be bought in a liquor store, or grown legally for personal use, lots of potheads would never drive to the local stop-and-cop street corner, or ever see the inside of a crack house. Potheads are mellow, like to avoid not create hassles, especially hassles like getting out of the recliner, and will only travel as far as the refrigerator, in an emergency the closest diner. Potheads are certainly never violent, over indulging just leads to nodding off to sleep, not vomiting or life threatening OD’s and smoking it is no more addicting than smoking cigarettes. Less I’d wager. I stopped smoking when I moved to a place where I didn’t know anyone who smoked, didn’t know where the street connections were and wasn’t willing to go on safari. There were no withdrawal symptoms physical or psychological. So now I’m a supporter of legalization, and I’m saving my money for when the day comes. To buy stock in Twinkies and Frito-Lay.

Prime Real Estate Available in Bay Area

2009-05-14T16:14:00.002-04:00

California's Governator has announced he is going to put Scott Peterson's home (aka San Quentin Prison) on the auction block. That should save the bankrupt Golden State.The State of California has run itself so far into debt that Gov. Schwarzenegger is going into the real estate business. The second most famous prison in the San Francisco Bay Area (Alcatraz being number one) will go on the auction block if the economic band-aids that are on a special ballot this month don't pass. Most Californians believe the governor is bluffing, but much stranger things have happened here on the left coast. So if you want your own personal residence, complete with "death chamber" (formerly known as the "gas chamber"), get your pennies together. You'll not only have a residence with a fabulous view of San Francisco across the Golden Gate, but you will be playing your part in saving the once-great profligate State of Kahleeforneea.

Killing the Raptor Will Be Bloody

2009-05-14T01:13:00.002-04:00

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates’ recent decision to kill production of the F-22 Raptor is disappointing to more than just the employees of the aircraft’s manufacturer and those of the sub-contractors who participate in the production of the aircraft. It is disappointing to the pilots of the F-15 Eagle and F-16 Falcon squadrons of the U.S. Air Force. Disappointing, not only because many of them will never get to pilot a Raptor, but because they now know that in the future more of them will die flying the aging Eagles and Falcons. Secretary Gates has traded blood for money.

Critics of the Raptor will claim the plane is too expensive. It is the most expensive fighter anyone has ever produced. But critics of military spending will say that improving the infantryman’s canteen is too expensive a proposition. Some critics have claimed its intended mission is a remnant of the Cold War. Nonsense. The mission of the F-22 is air superiority. This has been the mission of fighter aircraft since fighter planes first appeared over the battlefield in WWI. Establishing air superiority means the control of the airspace over a battlefield and denying that airspace to the enemy. It means your ground forces can maneuver and fight with no danger from above. It means attacking the enemy from the air with complete flexibility. It means your wounded get evacuated to medical care faster and in total safety. This mission is no longer relevent?

The evolution of the fighter plane goes like this. First generation – the bi-planes of WWI. Made of wood and canvas, armed with a machine gun, low speed and low ceiling. The Sopwith Camel, a British plane, was head of the class. And for all you folks who only get your news from The Daily Show, the Camel was real, not just Snoopy’s doghouse. Second generation – the monowings of WWII. Metal frames and skins, very powerful engines, multiple machine guns and/or cannons, higher speeds, ceilings above 20,000 feet. The American P-51 Mustang, fitted with the Rolls-Royce Merlin engine was seen by Luftwaffe head Hermann Goering over Berlin escorting B-17 bombers. Goering turned to an aide and said, “The war is lost”. Third generation – the sub-sonic jet. The Meserschmitt ME-262 was the first jet fighter to see combat. Deployed too late in WWII to make a difference in the outcome, it flew higher and faster (by over 100 mph) than the P-51. The best examples of this generation of fighter were the American F-86 Sabre and the Russian MIG-15. Going head-to-head in the Korean War, the F-86 established a kill ratio of 10-1 over the MIG-15. Fourth Generation – the super-sonic jet. This is the current generation of fighter. By a wide margin the F-15 Eagle is the gold standard. Besides the U.S., the Eagle is flown by Japan, Israel and Saudi Arabia. Like Rocky Marciano, the F-15 is undefeated. No Eagle has ever been lost to enemy aircraft fire. A 104-0 record.

The only problem with the F-15 is its age. It has been in service for more than thirty years. Sooner or later, probably sooner, an enemy of the U.S., probably Russia, is going to develop a plane that can match or surpass the F-15. The Russians have a pesky little habit of deploying new military weapons, weapons assumed to be beyond their technological capacity, by surprise and at the most dis-advantageous time to its enemies. The T-34 tank was deployed in the summer of 1941 to the shock of German generals. It was more advanced than anything Germany had to that point. In Korea, the American F-80 Shooting Star was doing quite well until China entered the war, and with it the MIG-15. Unlike anything before, its design and abilities sent the U.S. Air Force into spasms. So a rival, or worse, a superior to the F-15 is on the way. We just don’t know how soon it will debut.

The F-22 Raptor is not the next generation of fighter. The Raptor skips a generation. The current generation of fighters can all fly at supersonic speeds. But not for very long. Most cannot launch weapons at the edge of their envelopes. The F-22 can not only reach higher supersonics speeds than anything other fighter in the sky, but it can cruise at these speeds. And can use all of its weapons at these speeds. In fact, the F-22 is so fast and so maneuverable, that its flight control software has inhibitors built into it to prevent the jet from performing maneuvers that would kill the pilot. The Raptor may well be the last manned fighter plane America produces. Oh, and did I mention that the F-22 is also invisible to enemy radars? The F-22 guarantees that America will command air superiority in the skies above any battlefield we would find our selves on long into the future. And this means who knows how many fewer flag draped coffins.

One hopeful note from history. In 1979 President Carter cancelled the B-1 bomber, in favor of refitting the venerable B-52 with the then new cruise missile. At the time the B-52 was approaching 30 years in active service. The B-1 was one of the first deployed U.S. aircraft to use radar evading tactics and nascent stealth technologies. Another thing in the long list of things Ronald Reagan deserves credit for is the restoration of the B-1 project during his first administration.

The scenario Secretary Gates and President Obama have signed the pilots of the U.S. Air Force onto is this: Fighters with equal of greater capabilities than the F-15 will come into the inventories of our enemies. This will mean that greater than necessary numbers of F-15 and F-16 pilots will die in engagements with these planes. Our ground forces will be exposed to attack from the air, and more of them will die than now do while America still can maintain total air superiority. Those wounded in ground combat will not get to medical care as quickly, and those who transport them will also face attack and death from above. This administration has traded blood for money.

Obama keeps another Bush policy

2009-05-14T01:05:00.002-04:00

So, liberals, how’s that purging of all Bush policies connected with the War on Terror working out for ya’? President Obama announced today that he is overriding the Justice Department decision to release photos of prisoners held in detention by the military in Iraq and Afghanistan. I’m not knocking the President for this. . It is the right thing to do, and dangerous to do otherwise. But once again, say it with me liberals…..Bush…..was…..right! Obama has held over to his administration Robert Gates as SECDEF and General David Petraeus as CENTCOM commander – both evil minions of Lucifer George. Close Guantanamo? Life goes on as before in that Bush created fifth circle of Hell. Renditions of captured prisoners, another Bush administration practice, continue with the blessing of the President. President Obama has also re-asserted the same rights of executive privilege that were used against Bush as proof of his secret, nefarious, evil intentions. That’s five major items that everyone on the left demanded be changed once Obama was elected. So how foolish do the Kos Kids, MoveOn-ers and Keith Olbermann feel? I told you girlfriend, he was just sayin’ that so he could flap your flounder.

Speaking of fish, I don’t know why but I just cannot eat the stuff. I’m an American with a Norwegian and Italian family tree. So on both sides of the holiday table I’ve got big fish eaters. But not me, not by a country mile. I make two exceptions though. Lox on a bagel, and my mom’s tuna salad. Funny but I’ll scarf down shrimp, calamari, and oysters and lobster like they’re not making anymore of it. But if it’s got scales, and not named Charlie it’s out. Even fresh water species.

I got a funny joke in my inbox this morning. Well I thought it was funny. A Polish man goes for an eye examination. The nurse says, “Do you see the letters C-Y-Z-E-K-W-M-K-I ?” “See them?” the man says, “I know him!”. For the life of me I will never grasp Polish phonetics, or the Cyrillic alphabet of Russia. And exposing a bit of “geek-ness” here, I have tried to do both.

Sports writer Mike Lupica of the New York Daily News, really gets up my nose as the British say. I first remember reading his column right around the time Tom Seaver got traded to Cincinnati from the Mets. I don’t remember all the particulars but he got into back and forth debates with the great Dick Young the senior sports guy at the News then. And he really came off as quite a punk. He is forever using this really eighth grade device in most of his columns; it goes something like this…..”it had that Yankee feel to it…..as big a New York moment as Alvy Singer meeting Annie Hall…. Lupica may as well start every column with “it was a dark and stormy night”. And boy does he kiss ass. Much worse than Bob Costas. Bob Costas flashing his Mantle card at mantle’s funeral. I was embarrassed for the guy. Sorry about the Costas sidestep. The only time Lupica ever wore a jock was when his classmates pulled one over his head. Whoever thought of having this punk also write columns on politics was definitely off his chump. I lay that at the feet of Mort Zuckerman, the publisher of the News.

As long as I’m riffing about writers, let me say a few words about Jay Nordlinger over at National Review. He knows everything about fine music and has good things to say in his “Impromptus” column at NRO. There is usually of couple of them each week. And he gets some very, very interesting people to sit for interviews. His passion about the plight of political prisoners and dissidents in places like China and Cuba is more than admirable. A real fighter for those suffering and in prison for believing in liberty. I recommend him highly. And he answers e-mails to boot.

Welcome Andrew Price and LawhawkSF

2009-05-13T13:52:00.004-04:00

I'd like to officially welcome AndrewPrice and LawhawkSF to Sherman's March as our new contributors. Both men are insightful observers of the passing scene. Their well reasoned and pithy commentary on events and trends make this place better. They can also be very funny. So read their stuff. You'll be glad you did. Hail fellows! And well met! -Auguste