The Contradiction of Trump Support
Donald Trump attends the Hank’s Yanks 1st Annual Golf Classic at Trump Golf Links on Monday, July 6, 2015, in New York. (Photo by Greg Allen/Invision/APhttp://rack.1.mshcdn.com/media/ZgkyMDE1LzA3LzIzL2E5L0RvbmFsZFRydW1wLmYyMjJhLmpwZwpwCXRodW1iCTk1MHg1MzQjCmUJanBn/291253b0/6f3/Donald-Trump-1.jpg
I’ll be the first to admit, I am not a fan of Donald Trump. He says and Tweets cringe worthy things everyday. He steps right into the traps the Leftist media sets for him, then walks back what he said. No, he is not a paragon of virtue, a bastion of integrity or a fountain of wisdom, and the Left feasts on these flaws the way buzzards swarm around road kill. The leftist media pour over every statement, every tweet, every post ready to skewer and slander the President in ways they never would have considered had he been a Liberal Progressive.
Whenever there is interaction between Leftists and Conservatives there is an incredulity in the way the Leftist approaches the conversation. Even if they don’t say it, the question is there,”how can you possibly support such a man?” They are asking the wrong question.
They should be asking, “what is so wrong with leftist ideology that rational, moral, intelligent people would rather support someone like Donald Trump than that ideology?”
I don’t support President Trump by overlooking his many character flaws, I support him because the Leftist agenda is so immoral, so corrupt, so wrong for our country and indeed the world, that I have no choice.
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Gun Control, Divided We Fall
I am disgusted. After seventeen people lost their lives last week at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, We lost our collective minds….again. From news headlines to social media posts, pundits and politicians, everyone has something to say. Whether Democrat or Republican, Conservative or Liberal Progressive, most of what’s being posted is nothing more than ignorant emotionally charged talking points, none of it promoting anything truly objective or useful. The Far Left uses every mass shooting as a platform to push their anti-gun agenda. The ultimate, though unstated, goal of which is to eliminate the private ownership of all firearms. The Far Right then pushes back, hiding behind the Second Amendment, to push it’s ultimate, though unstated, goal of complete and unrestricted access to all firearms. Most of us don’t espouse either extreme, but we lean Left or Right. It seems no one is centrist in this debate, though many claim to be. There are valid points and arguments on both sides, but we have dug in our heels, armed ourselves with our favorite talking points and have stopped listening to each other. The sad outcome of this obstinacy will be more needlessly lost lives.
To restore some reason and civility to this debate, both sides must accept some inevitable truths. Those of us on the Right must realize that the majority of Americans support universal background checks. Many also support expanding the minimum purchase age to include shotguns and rifles. It is inevitable that there will be change to gun control policy. Rather than opposing this change outright, we should take control of the narrative. We should support legislation that prevents the dangerously mentally ill from obtaining firearms, without restricting the rights of law-abiding adult citizens to purchase them.
Those on the Left like to hold the rest of the world up as the paragon of virtue when it comes to the possession of firearms. They must understand that the United States is unique in its treatment of firearms ownership. The United States is one of only three countries that has a Constitutional right to gun ownership. It was the first to protect this right in its founding documents, and the only one that has no Constitutional restrictions against it. Second Amendment proponents understand that this amendment has nothing to do with hunting. It has to do with a citizen’s right to protect himself and his property. Whether it is from an intruder or an overreaching tyrannical government. This amendment protects the tools by which we can defend liberty. Liberty for everyone, Right, Left or somewhere in between. The only way the Second Amendment will ever be repealed is with a bloodbath that will forever split out nation in two. Is that what you really want the ultimate legacy of the Liberal Progressive movement to be?
Here are my personal positions on this issue. I’m pretty sure Leftists will hate them, and Conservatives will think I’m selling out, but this is just common sense to me.
I support universal background checks with an exception for guns willed to or gifted to family members. However, the law should hold responsible family members who knowingly buy guns for another family member who wouldn’t pass a background check.
I support increasing the age to purchase a rifle or shotgun from eighteen to twenty one. The law should apply only to the purchase of a weapon. Persons under the age of twenty one should be allowed to posses and use a firearm under the supervision of an adult.
I support training in firearms operation, safety, maintenance and law. I would not oppose this being mandatory for the purchase of a firearm.
I support the banning of “bump stocks”.
I support increased funding to diagnose and treat the mentally ill. While compassion for mentally ill persons is important, when it comes to firearms, the safety of the patient and the public should be the main concerns. However to protect the rights of a patient, a person would have to be declared unfit to possess a firearm by a licensed mental health professional.
I support holding accountable the agencies responsible for performing the background checks for gun ownership. I also support holding accountable the agencies that fail to report dangerous individuals. The inability or unwillingness of these agencies to enforce the already existing gun laws is a great threat to public safety and will render any reform of gun law useless.
I oppose the banning of so-called “assault style” weapons. This is an unquantifiable term that concerns the cosmetics of a weapon rather than its action. It is a term meant to play on the emotions of people unfamiliar with firearms.
I oppose the banning of high-capacity magazines. It places an unnecessary restriction on law-abiding gun owners, and a well-trained marksman can change magazines fast enough to make such a ban useless. Again, it is a knee jerk reaction, meant to play on the emotions.
I oppose any form of gun registry or database of gun owners. To require gun owners to register their firearms and to maintain a database of those persons and their residences goes completely against the spirit and purpose of the Second Amendment.
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With Liberty and Justice for All
![https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3A2016.11.12_Anti-Trump_Protest_Washington%2C_DC_USA_08735_(22778715758).By Ted Eytan from Washington, DC, USA [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/83/2016.11.12_Anti-Trump_Protest_Washington%2C_DC_USA_08735_%2822778715758%29.jpg "By Ted Eytan from Washington, DC, USA [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons")
Veritas, as a Conservative and a Christian, there is no higher moral imperative than to seek out the truth. Even when it doesn’t gel with my preconceived notions about the world and my place in it, undeniable truth must be accepted. Personal integrity, and personal responsibility are the defining values for most Conservatives. It is what the left both admires and fears in us. To us, truth matters, character matters, justice matters. We play fair, we play by the rules. To the Progressives, Conservative support of Donald Trump just doesn’t make sense. He has fudged the truth on many occasions. He says and tweets cringe worthy statements on a daily basis. He’s arrogant and petulant. He displayed a litany of character imperfections throughout his campaign, and continues to display them into his presidency. The Progressive Left is still in denial about President Trump’s election. Taking to the streets, and the airwaves, in a mass panic they think that by declaring that he is “not their President” they can make him run, tail between his legs, from office. “How?” they demand, “How, could sane, rational people ever elect a man as flawed as Donald Trump?” They are asking the wrong question.
What they should be asking is, “What is so wrong with the Progressive Left philosophy, that the vast geographical majority of the nation would rather have a flawed and divisive man like Donald Trump to lead us, than someone who espouses leftist ideology?” The answer is liberty. The conservative knows that without the freedom to reap the benefits, or consequences, of one’s actions, one can never achieve the quality of character necessary to prosper. Progressives simply don’t get this. The Conservative understands that most hard-working, everyday American citizens, regardless of their political proclivities, want the same thing. To prosper in a safe, peaceful country. The Conservative believes that our rights are inborn, a product of a Creator God or natural law, and the duty of government is to ensure that everyone who is willing to work hard enough, and abide by the rule of law, has the opportunity to pursue the course of his or her choice. There is room for differing opinions, differing philosophies and beliefs. Success and prosperity will mean different things to different people, so some will choose careers that are lucrative, while others will choose careers that are personally rewarding. Our success will depend on the choices we make, and while some may not ever achieve prosperity, no one has a right to another’s earnings. Charity is always on the terms of the giver. The Progressive, however, believes that our rights are granted by the government and absolute equality must be guaranteed. No matter what your choices or character, you are entitled to the same level of prosperity as everyone else, no more, no less. Charity should always be on the terms of the needy. Because there will always be those who prosper more than others, and their generosity cannot be guaranteed, the Progressive believes that the duty of government is to distribute the wealth evenly to everyone within the country’s borders. The Progressive does not or cannot understand that to deprive a man or woman of their earnings to supply someone else, is theft at the most basic and personal level. President Trump understands this, and so far his policies are in line with this basic Conservative philosophy. That is why Conservatives are willing to grit their teeth and bear his obvious moral failings and support him.
What we Conservatives need to understand is that this election was not about putting a “Donald Trump” in the White House. It was about restoring our national culture. It is our duty to expose the hypocrisy and danger of the Progressive left agenda. To do this, we need to claim the moral high ground. We need to show, in our actions and interactions, as we go through our day, that Conservatism truly is the way to peace and prosperity. We need to show that there is room at the Conservative table for everyone, regardless of your sexual persuasion, personal wealth, or religious beliefs. That your personal liberty and dignity will always be respected so long as you are willing to respect the same for any other human being. We cannot do this if we are always on the defensive. We need to educate ourselves, and shut down any attempts by the Left to erroneously label us as homophobes, Islamaphobes, racists, and any other unjustified monikers. We need to reveal their talking points for what they are, mindless, baseless accusations. We also need to quit making excuses for President Trump when he makes inaccurate statements. For better or worse, he represents Conservatism to the world. We put him in office, and we must hold him accountable.
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Great Expectations
Today in cities across the nation, there was yet again another protest for raising the minimum wage. As someone who has worked more than a few part-time jobs, I get it. I really do. Your time is valuable, and to be working in a thankless fast food or cashier job for several hours a day dealing with rude customers and demanding bosses can be soul crushing. You think of the time you could be spending with your family and friends, the meaningful projects you could be completing, the pile of dishes and laundry waiting for you at home, and you think, “There’s got to be more to life than this”.
Here’s the thing, there is. Being a store clerk, or a fast food worker, was never meant to be a career choice. Those are starter jobs. The things you do as an after school job to gain experience in the working world. It’s what you do to supplement the family income, or help stretch the pension. Flipping burgers and bagging groceries isn’t supposed to pay enough, to pay rent or a mortgage, or feed and clothe a family of four. That’s what professional and skilled labor jobs are for.
Again I get it. Going back to school, means sacrificing even more time away from friends and family. It’s expensive, (though if you are working in a low wage job you probably qualify for some form of tuition assistance). It means finding family and neighbors who will watch your kids for next to nothing because daycare is expensive. It means juggling your schedule around those who are helping to support you in your endeavor. No one should underestimate the difficulty in trying to work, go to school, and raise a family all at the same time. So raising the wage to $15.00 an hour would be such a relief because it could raise some of that burden from you.
But remember, those blue-collar and semi-professional jobs that pay a higher wage, the kind of wage you would like to receive, require a higher level of professionalism. As a consumer, I am the one who will ultimately be paying for your wage increase. If I’m paying more for that already expensive basket of groceries, or the number six jumbo meal, I am going to expect more from the person behind the counter.
When I walk into your establishment, I will expect to be greeted politely, if not enthusiastically, with a smile. Even if you are on the phone (and that phone call better be with your boss or another customer and not your boyfriend). I expect my order to be taken correctly, charged correctly, and correctly communicated to the kitchen. I expect the kitchen to assemble my food with a little love, no more cheese half off the patty and patty half off the bread. I expect you to know your products and work place. If I have a reasonable question about a product, I expect you to know the answer, and if I ask you where something is I expect you to be able to tell me, or better yet, take me there. While I’m standing in your check out line, I do not want to hear about your colonoscopy, your rash, your kid’s rash, that your boss is a bitch, your cousin couldn’t make bail again, or how you had to stay late because someone else didn’t show up to work. It’s not that I’m not compassionate, but there is a such thing as appropriateness.
The idea that you can increase wages at the bottom by lowering them at the top, is a lie. Ultimately a business prospers and its employees prosper when the customer is given a good product or service at a fair price. Where much (of my money) is given, much is required.
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Dear GOP
Dear Republican Party,
Remember the good times we had? Back in the late Seventies and early Eighties, when we restored the country from the policies of a President who gave away assets that we worked hard to build. Who capitulated to our enemies, and pandered to the poor. Back when an abiding faith, a solid work ethic, and strong nuclear families were something to aspire to. When standing on your own two feet and making something of yourself, by yourself were values to be admired. We shared so much in common back then. Our belief that The Constitution was the law of the land. That our government functioned best when it got out of the way, so people could have equal opportunities, instead of piling on regulations to equal outcomes. That lower taxes were the gateway to a robust economy, and that a strong American defense was the key to world peace. You were my first, my only, and it felt so good to be proud to be an American again.
But darling, since you have been hanging out with that progressive crowd, you’ve changed. You invade my privacy, and then tell me it’s for my own security. You’ve sought to expand governmental control of our daily lives. You cower to big businesses and deep pocket donors, even when abiding by their wishes harms our relationship. You criticize the Democratic Party, but offer no solutions to the damage their policies have wrought, and when the current administration tries to circumvent the Constitution, you stand by and do nothing. It’s like I don’t even know who you are anymore.
You never listen to me. You take me for granted. You think that just because I’ve always been there for you, have always stood by you, that I always will, but I can’t go on like this anymore. I’ve had enough. This shouldn’t come as a big surprise. We both know that it’s been over for quite sometime now. I only hung on this long because of a hope of a brighter future for our children. But I must do what’s right for me now.
In case you are wondering, no, there isn’t someone else. There is no one who shares my passions, my desire, for a proud America, a strong defense, secure borders, a fiscally sound government, less governmental interference in our daily lives, and a strict adherence to the Bill of Rights. I know now that I must fight for these things on my own.
If you ever return to your former self, if you embrace once again the values that made us such a formidable team, you know where to find me.
Love,
The Conservative Voter
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What’s In a Name?
Homophobe, Islamaphobe, intolerant, racist, bigot, woman-hater, backward, ignorant, redneck, cracker. If you are a white, Christian, Conservative, you have probably been called at least one of those words, or something worse. Here’s a word for those who are quick to throw out the aforementioned terms, hypocrite.
I don’t know about you, but I am getting weary with being told what I think and how I feel from people who have no idea who I am or what I stand for. People who are content to be told by the entertainment industry what to think, not how to think. People who are too quick to believe what they are told, by a media more concerned with pushing a social agenda, than seeking the truth.
I watch everyday, on the news, on the web, and I am astonished that people blame racism, and bigotry in all its forms when they are faced with the consequences of their behaviors. Common sense and civility have been driven from the public square, and I shake my head and wonder, at what point did the Bill of Rights, specifically the First Amendment, become so twisted and perverted that it is now the instrument by which I am stripped of the very rights it was meant to preserve?
Conservatism has always been about protecting the rights of the individual. Every individual, no matter what your personal philosophy. In spite of the picture painted of us, Conservatism is about compassion and compromise, within a framework of self-determination and personal responsibility. It is clear now however, that the Progressive movement, in spite of the narrative pushed for it, is not about compromise, it is about control.
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Such a Time As This
We are truly living in an upside-down world. Faith, family, patriotism, and self-reliance, were once the moral bedrock of our society. Now, people who live by those precepts are seen as weak-minded, or eyed with suspicion. People of faith, and Christians in particular, are seen as anti-education and anti-science. Unable to think for themselves, they turn to an invented superstition to make up their minds for them. Women who choose to become single mothers* are heralded as trend setters. They are heroines who are breaking down the fettered bonds of matrimony. While women who choose to make the sacrifices necessary to have a loving marriage and a two parent household are seen as ignorant and dependent. Husbands and fathers are gleefully portrayed as abusive tyrants, or bungling buffoons. Those who love our country and the Constitution, those who are willing to fight and die for the freedoms we have left, are seen as dangerous revolutionaries. Backward crackpots who are worthy of suspicion and avoidance. Living by the consequence of your choices used to be a basic understanding, taught from childhood, but now millions of us are willing to trade our hard-won freedoms for a government controlled lifestyle. Free from worry or want, we neither know nor care how our lifestyle is funded and we are satisfied with mere subsistence.
We didn’t get this way overnight. There has been a slow eroding ever since the Communist Manifesto was published back in 1848. It kicked into high gear when the Baby Boomers came of age. It seemed for a brief period in the eighties that we had beaten back the hippies, but it didn’t last long. Now under the progressive control of the current administration, it looks like the Liberal Progressive movement might finally claim victory.
“From each according to his ability, to each according to his need”. This quote, popularized by Karl Marx, doesn’t seem so wrong at a first look. After all, don’t those who have plenty have a moral obligation to help those in need? This would have made perfect sense to those living in early industrial Europe. Working class people who because of their social status, had no political power and were never truly allowed to prosper from their labor. Ironically, the Communist philosophy that sought to equal the field by eliminating private property and distributing it equally among everyone, could only work if that property and the division of labor were placed under the control of a limited number of individuals. These people would then dictate the balance of the labor force between manufacturing and agriculture. They would distribute resources as they saw fit. The Communist Manifesto that promised that every laborer would earn his subsistence from his labor, delivered only that. Everyone could survive, but no one, except those in control of the labor force, could prosper. The Proletariat would go from being controlled by the industrialists to being controlled by the government. This system of government that promised economic freedom, instead took all freedoms away.
In spite of the historically documented failure of Communism in every country where it has been tried, the Liberal Progressive still insists that governmental control produces a better standard of living than personal control. This is not what our Founding Fathers believed. The Founders sought to create a society where individuals controlled property and the government. There were no royalty, no titled gentry. Without government interference, every man was free to succeed, but he was also free to fail. In a free society, it is the risk of failure that compels the individual to better himself. The harder you work and the better you educate yourself, the lower the risk of failure becomes. To the liberal progressive, any risk of failure is unacceptable. It is better that no one prosper if it means that anyone might fail. Complete equity in the whole of society is the Liberal Progressive goal.
The most dangerous way this goal manifests itself is by the Liberal Progressive’s belief in moral relativity. There is no good or bad, no right or wrong. No lifestyle, personal choice, or belief system is better or worse than any other. The man who sits under a shade tree all day deserves his daily bread just as much as the man who toiled in the field all day to produce it. An Al Qaeda terrorist is just as much a freedom fighter as a Minuteman who fought in the American Revolution. Stealing from others is acceptable if they have more than you. The only evil the Liberal Progressive recognizes, is the discernment of evil. This is how a terrorist attack on an American military base can be called an act of workplace violence. It’s how Israel can be criticized for the heavy-handed defense of their country, while the brutal acts of the Palestinians against the Israelis, and even their own people, are ignored. It’s how a police officer can be labeled a racist murder with no evidence proving that is the case, while a young man, who moments before his death was robbing a convenience store, is lauded as a hero. It’s how an unborn child can be regarded as a parasite in its mother’s womb, and how mankind at large can be regarded as a parasite on the earth. It is this defective moral compass, that compels the President, a man steeped in Liberal Progressive ideology, practically from birth, to travel the world apologizing for the country he is supposed to lead. So warped is his thinking, that he truly believes that Islāmic terrorists are not evil, just misunderstood.
Perhaps the only truthful words uttered by this man, were his campaign promise to “Fundamentally change America”. It’s frightening how much he, and the Liberal Progressives have succeeded.
*This passage is not meant to include women who were abandoned, widowed, or escaping abusive situations.
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Modern Day Minutemen?
“We stand for freedom, for our rights, for social independence, for democracy, for freedom of speech, for everything, for a normal life,” she told The Associated Press from her hospital bed in Kiev. Excerpt from interview with Olesya Zhukovska
The words of this young woman, an ordinary Ukrainian citizen, a paramedic, should strike a chord with every American. They should give us pause, to stop and think about how precious these rights are. Right now in the Ukraine everyday people, most of them young, and middle class, are willing to die for them. I’ve listened to and read the interviews of these courageous people. I am amazed, and shamed by them. Amazed at their bravery and tenacity, shamed that they are willing to die for what we take for granted.
Sadly, we don’t just take these rights, rights protected by the Constitution, for granted, we are actually begging for them to be taken away. We ask the federal government to take away our sovereign right to bear arms. We look the other way when the FCC wants to monitor our newsrooms. We allow the IRS, a bureaucracy created to impose taxes on us, to dictate our health care. Is there any logic to that? We are happy to trade our personal freedom for a life free from worry or want. Let the government take care of us, just so long as we do not have to assume responsibility for our own lives. We willingly elect to office men and women more interested in increasing their own power and pocketbooks than meeting the needs of their constituencies. If we go to the polls at all, we choose candidates whose names we recognize, who are the best looking, the person our mother told us to vote for, or someone promising more free stuff. We are gullible and believe pretty speeches. We don’t expect our press to thoroughly vet our candidates and we don’t demand excellence from our leaders. We settle for men and women of lesser integrity lest we have to look too deeply at ourselves.
Meanwhile, half a world away there are those who are prepared to die for what we are happily throwing away. The very rights that generations of our own young men (and women, too) have fought and died to preserve. The rights that our Founders painstakingly preserved in our Constitution, that we might be a shining example of what a nation can become when its people are free. The kind of nation that the Ukrainian protesters are trying to create for themselves.
Yes, we should be ashamed
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Quick! Pour Me Some Pepto
Barack Obama signing the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act at the White House (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Today, as I was on my way to drop off the old “Silver Toilet” for an oil change, I turned on the radio and was subjected to this little gem here.
So this is not about spending. And this isn’t about fiscal responsibility. This whole thing is about one thing: the Republican obsession with dismantling the Affordable Care Act and denying affordable health insurance to millions of Americans. (Applause.) That’s all this has become about. That seems to be the only thing that unites the Republican Party these days.
Through this whole fight, they’ve said the American people don’t want Obamacare, so we should shut down the government to repeal it or delay it. But here’s the problem: The government is now shut down, but the Affordable Care Act is still open for business. (Applause.) So they’re not even accomplishing what they say they want to accomplish. And, by the way, in the first two days since the new marketplaces — basically big group plans that we’ve set up — the first two days that they opened, websites where you can compare and purchase new affordable insurance plans and maybe get tax credits to reduce your costs, millions of Americans have made it clear they do want health insurance. (Applause.)
More than 6 million people visited the website HealthCare.gov the day it opened. Nearly 200,000 people picked up the phone and called the call center. In Kentucky alone — this is a state where — I didn’t win Kentucky. (Laughter.) So I know they weren’t doing it for me. In Kentucky, nearly 11,000 people applied for new insurance plans in the first two days — just in one state, Kentucky. And many Americans are finding out when they go on the website that they’ll save a lot of money or get health insurance for the first time.
So I would think that if, in fact, this was going to be such a disaster that the Republicans say it’s going to be, that it was going to be so unpopular, they wouldn’t have to shut down the government. They could wait, nobody would show any interest, there would be, like, two people on the website — (laughter) — and everybody would then vote for candidates who want to repeal it.
Excerpt from:
Remarks by the President on the Government Shutdown
M. Luis Construction Company, Rockville, Maryland
The arrogance was just too much to take. I shouted out loud “of course the website was flooded!” “We have no choice, it’s the law!” Surely Obama isn’t so narcissistic that he actually believes that people are flocking to the website in droves because they love him and his policies; not because he has forced them to comply by fining them with a tax penalty of they don’t. No, wait, he is. Like Sally Field accepting her Oscar, Obama gushes every time he looks in the mirror, ” you love me, you really love me.” I had to turn the radio off, I couldn’t stomach any more. Every day we are subjected to the propaganda, the soft ball interviews and outright lies of this administration, and no one, steps up to call them on it. It is beyond frustrating, and more and more it seems like we are powerless to stop it.
I keep asking myself, where are the Republicans?, Where are the people I hired by my vote to represent me? Why is there not a televised rebuttal every time Obama opens his mouth? The Republican party has taken the common sense of the American people for granted. They just assume that the masses are smart enough to see through all the lies and deception. Well, apparently they are not, after all they reelected the most miserable excuse for a leader this country has ever known, to a second term. The GOP needs to start striking back, they should have started months ago. Every speech Obama gives needs to be followed by a Republican press conference, pointing out each lie and fallacy one by one. Since we can no longer count on the mainstream media to educate the masses, the Republicans need to fill the airwaves with short PSA type commercials. Short spots of airtime, such as PJ Media‘s Afterburner, that extol the benefits of conservatism on society and highlight the perils of Obama’s Socialism.
The GOP needs to embrace its new blood, the Ted Cruzes and Rand Pauls and other’s of their ilk need to be endorsed and encouraged, not stabbed in the back by their own. The American people are hungry for representatives who will challenge the status quo, and speak for us, not speak down to us. 2014 is closing in. The Republican party does not have the luxury of time. This is indeed our most desperate hour.
Observations and Opinions of a Middle Aged Housewife 
Freedom of Speech, Freedom From Thought and the NFL Insanity
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” (The First Amendment of the United States Constitution)
It seems as though my beloved United States of America has lost its ever-loving collective mind. Never in my lifetime, have I seen such asininity on full display from entertainers, athletes, so-called community leaders, and the men and women we elect to represent us. Our President types out more Tweets than an emo teenager, NFL players, take a knee during the National Anthem, disrupters of all kinds try to impede the Democratic process, and rioters destroy their own neighborhoods. Politicians and community organizers pander to any group they can label as a victim, and the white supremacists pander to the only group left, white Christian males. Feelings trump facts; everyone wants to be heard, but nobody wants to listen; right and wrong are whatever you want them to be, and the truth no longer matters. It makes me want to stand up and shout as loud as I can “Can’t we all just grow up and get along?!”
The participants in all this insanity believe that their words and deeds are sanctioned by the Constitution; that the First Amendment is a protective shield that gives them the right to say and do whatever they want without consequence. Well, no, it doesn’t. Since apparently, the Constitution and the mindset of the men who wrote it are no longer taught in public school, it looks like it’s up to me, the Middle Aged Housewife, to give you all a common sense, middle class, refresher course.
Let’s start with “freedom of religion”. This part of the amendment was created to prevent the Federal Government from establishing an official national religion. Many people came to this land to escape from religious persecution in their homelands, and being able to worship G-d how they saw fit was important to them. Interestingly, this amendment makes no mention of the “separation of church and state”. That statement was made by Thomas Jefferson in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association, confirming that there is a wall between the government and religious practice. This was meant to assure religious leaders that the government could not dictate religious practices.It was not meant to infer that politicians, public officials and educators, could not rely on their personal principles, religious or otherwise, to guide them in their decision-making. When public schools ban prayers, and public buildings remove copies of “The Ten Commandments”, they in reality are violating the First Amendment. However, we Christians must realize that while this amendment was meant to protect our religious rights, it also protects the rights of non-Christian belief systems. This means that a ridiculous statue of a Satanic goat ministering to children has just as much a right to be in front of the courthouse as a stone with The Ten Commandments, a Cross, a Nativity Scene or a Menorah. As individuals, we have the right and the responsibility to practice our beliefs, and to bring our children up with the knowledge that under our secular form of government, all religions have an equal right to exist, but that doesn’t mean that all forms of religion are equally benevolent or beneficial.
In my next post, I’ll explain my take on Freedom of Speech.
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