Manufactured Anguish

For over six decades I have been personally hearing about how hateful the United States of America is.  My formative years began in the 1960’s just about the time integration became a reality.

My parochial elementary school began filling the seats with a modest number of black kids.  We learned lessons, recited poetry, prayed, played, and acted in school plays, together.

We were not black and white kids, rather we were kids.

Our parents worked together at the local factories, shopped together at area stores, and drove similar cars.

But all was not without controversy.

Today’s headlines scream racism from every angle and place white people squarely in its crosshairs.

Just a month ago I discovered I was suffering from something some nitwit ginned-up called “systemic racism.”

According to news reports, systemic racism is an element derived from the amount of melatonin in ones body.  If you’re black, you’re okay; if you’re white, there’s no hope for repentance.

Over those six previously mentioned decades I played ball, worked, socialized, and admired blacks – not because they were black, but because they were friends and colleagues.

Because a dirty cop in Minneapolis, Minnesota, killed an unarmed black man, black and white members of society joined together to condemn the hate while resurrecting systemic racism.

Once again, whites, including myself, were labeled racist without a shred of evidence other than self-imposed grandiosity and years of fictional cultural lore passed down from generation to generation about how bad whites are.

In the name of “justice,” over-exuberant malcontents took to the streets to stand side-by-side the protestors, in a Trojan Horse-type scenario.

A peek into Minneapolis' Summer of Love

Anarchistic white thugs along with greedy black thugs looted and rioted major cities across America, making demands and requiring atonement for decades of oppression towards blacks.

A case of perpetual slavery again reared its ugly head and began pointing at everyone and everything not black.

Dumpster fires were commonplace as were broken windows and burned-out vehicles.  Cupcake shops were vandalized for some inane reason that only makes sense to the puny-minded miscreants among us.

Running out of ways to impose that “shock factor” on society, these hooligans turned to statues.  Inanimate relics of a time gone by, history to remind us of the past, needed to be destroyed in the name of that bogus systemic racism.

Monuments to our Founding Fathers, Christopher Columbus, varying Presidents, and even abolitionists, were unceremoniously torn down – with some being decapitated and set afire, with others tossed into ponds – to make a point.  Alas there was none to be found.

This senseless vandalism and destruction of history, although criminal, is not seen as a big deal to affected governors and mayors and city council members.  According to one mediocre mayor, this is viewed by her as a beginning to the “summer of love.”  Sure.

But the true deep thinking is arising to the surface to demonstrate how intelligent or ignorant these angry protestors really are.

Every action’s excuse is connected somehow – much like the seven degrees of separation of Kevin Bacon – to racism.

George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and even Matthias Baldwin, an outspoken abolitionist, statues were destroyed because of some sort of link to racism and slavery.

These weak minded, destructive clowns are using white America as a target for their heinous, ill-directed attempt as “justice,” while forcing white society into silence.

I have yet to hear about any mosques burned, looted, or otherwise vandalized.  These studious anarchists should have learned that a religious leader named Muhammad took slaves after he moved to Medina in what is now Saudi Arabia.

Go ahead and poke your grubby little fingers in the eye of Islamists rather than passive Americans.  See how many acts of violence you’ll be able to get away with.

Wink, wink.

Unemployment Line

This story from 2018 is being recycled because of its direct relation to pre-election time 2020.  I added some extra thoughts, but it remains applicable to November 3, 2020.  

My retired life is quickly approaching its ten year mark.  Before you give me the finger, remember that I had worked for 41-years, in many capacities.

And during those two score, I had plenty of bosses – most of whom were mediocre, at best.

They so badly wanted to impress their bosses that they felt compelled to make us do something – anything – to give the impression of productivity; the end product was actually less efficiency.  Allow me to explain.

 

I once had a boss named Eddie who was always the smartest guy in the room, if only in his mind.  Eddie was a numbers fellow who loved to see statistics, and he often used them in an attempt to impress his boss.

Eddie didn’t care about what his boss thought because he was too smart to listen to da man.  So he inundated the upper echelon with countless, useless charts, graphs, and summaries.

His boss thought those stats were nonsense; nonetheless Eddie wanted and thought he needed them to justify his existence.  Eddie’s employees were not important to Eddie; only Eddie was important to Eddie.

And so life went for many, many years.

All this brings us to the cusp of elections in the United States and the crux of today’s blog.

In November, we will be offered an opportunity to make our selections for representatives at the local, state, and federal levels.

We will be inundated with smarmy ads and cardboard signs and countless robo-calls to make our decisions of whom should be sent to work in the government on our behalf.

Some of us will do our due diligence to make an informed decision about who may be trustworthy and who will not, that will treat my tax money as if it was their own, and who will likely take my concerns to heart instead of deep-pocketed special interest donors.

Others will simply look at the candidates and vote for the woman, or minority, or transgender, or lesbian, or Muslim, because those voters are simply shallow.

Calls will be issued to “get out the vote!” and enter the voting booths with little, or no, information and direction.  This is the feel-good bunch of our society that has no plan or clue about what the future should hold.  Alas.

But the most important issue in any election is not if the candidate wears beautiful suits, wants to punish success, is related to a former office holder, or is even plain inspirational.  The most important issue is will our candidate heed our wishes and wants.

Just as with Eddie, no one else mattered.  Decisions as how to realize our goals and missions were irrelevant, although we as rank-and-file employees with institutional knowledge and historic information were more mentally prepared to achieve significant accomplishments, Eddie was the boss.  Amen.

So many failures were the result of these poorly executed plans instituted by arrogant incompetence.

That is why our stable of politicians should do their jobs.  And their jobs are the execution of their voter’s desires, since they are our employees.  They work for us.

They receive our money in the form of paychecks and should listen to their constituents.

Rarely ought the absolute independence of their votes trump my desires.

Once again, they work for us.  Make them do their jobs or send them to the unemployment office.

Now, more than ever, constituent’s wishes should be paramount, but they’re not.  It is plain to see how out-of-control select cities have become, most of which are being led by self-centered mayors. 

I’m certain there are residents in those mayhem zones that are terrified of having their homes burned or becoming victims of physical violence.  All the while their duly elected officials are dithering over not being re-elected by the miscreants making trouble for all.

Don’t forget this irresponsible behavior lest you want to be the next victim by political Eddies.

You Must Ask Permission

My sainted wife often uses the phrase, “He has to build you a watch to tell you the time.”  Those special words are used by her to describe me.

A simple “verbose” or “long-winded” would suffice, but not to her.  This way she can make a point and underline it with a stout, permanent Magic Marker. 

With that being said, let’s get started with today’s watch-building exercise.

I’m currently in the process of replacing a modest garage of questionable stability – not unlike the current Speaker of the House – with a new, larger one.  The old garage consisted of board-and-batten construction, and was constructed roughly 90-years ago.

Termites and destructive salt air have taken their toll; the only things holding it up were termite poop and good luck.

To eliminate any chance of injuring local thieves who might break in and steal rusty yard equipment I tore it down after deciding to rebuild anew.  It wasn’t difficult.

I diligently visited my county seat-of-government to obtain a permit.  The nice man at the desk patiently listened to my plight before offering a resounding “NO!”

Easy summer reading material

It seems as though the old garage, which stood in its original location for nearly a century – without bothering anyone – was now too close to the property line.  It hadn’t moved since its original construction, but it was too close and needed to be moved 3 ½ feet further from the property line.  Amen.

Seven trees worth of paperwork, a building permit fee, application for a variance, and $460, got me inches closer to rectifying my situation.

Of course this vital information was necessary before publication in the local newspaper for weeks before the zoning appeals meeting.  This whole process took five months before I was called to the meeting.

Armed with photos, documentation on distances, health department maps, and positive letters from neighbors, my sainted wife and I trudged our way to the seat-of-government.

There, we pled our case and after a few minutes, we were granted the variance to build a larger, safer structure the same distance from the property line.  Problem solved.

Unfortunately, the COVID-19 virus struck with a vengeance and the entire Milky Way was subject to house arrest, shortly thereafter.

Between the arrival of inclement winter weather and the WuFlu, my new garage project sat idle for a few months before I called for a foundation inspection from the county.  Alas, my permit had expired, and I needed to begin this entire process anew.

Several strategically placed phone calls quickly rectified this manufactured crisis, but not before a thorough dose of antacids and a few hours of yelling at Smokey the Cat (just because he was handy.)

It was at this time I became reflective about where we are as a society, and how we got here.

We regularly hear how we live in the land of “freedom.”  We don’t.  We live in the land of “NO!” generated by the powers-that-be who are drunk with authority.  Allow me to explain.

In 1890, 130-years ago, America was recovering from the War Between the States, aka.: the Civil War.  Rebuilding its infrastructure was paramount to survival, and ushering in the industrial era was key to productivity, blazing the way to the most productive society in the world.

But those 13-decades helped usher in more and more regulations that quietly eroded our nation’s freedoms.

As you can see I needed a permit to build a garage. But you may also need a permit to do the following things in today’s progressive America:

• Collect rain water
• Protest
• Own a gun
• Cut hair
• Go fishing
• Start a business
• Sell products
• Own property
• Marry
• Build a house
• Hunt

We have gone from deciding our directions in our lives to ceding our rights to the government.  And while some of these permits are required in the name of safety, others are merely revenue-generating exercises.

And the time is now for you to keep these freedom-robbing regulations in mind when casting your ballot for elected officials at any and all levels of government, my dear sainted wife.

Mirror Image

If we look in the rearview mirror we can still see Independence Day of 2020.  Independence Day, otherwise known as Fourth of July, celebrates a new country’s birth after its departure from the rule of England.

Adam Schiff's mentor, King George III

This exodus was due to many factors including religious and speech freedoms denied by England’s King George III.  Through the Revolutionary War, America rose from a far away land to the greatest nation on Earth.

Ten men, now called the Founding Fathers, gathered to write a set of rules for this new nation that began with Ten Amendments; those are now called the Bill of Rights, and pave the way for the entire Constitution of The United States of America.

Each year we celebrate this separation from England on July 4^th, Independence Day.

Those Founding Fathers were men with true vision.  According to several sources, the average age was about 40-years, with some in their 20’s.  Alas, those sources were a bit thin on who was what age.

In any event, these ten men put their heads together and eventually created a document so thorough that is has outlasted the charter of any nation in the world by roughly 224 years.

You read that right.  According to The Heritage Foundation, “the average constitution lasts less than 20 years.”  That’s a mighty impressive achievement.

Fast forward to 2020, when much has changed in the world. 

 In May 2020, a fellow named George Floyd was killed by a dirty cop in Minneapolis, Minnesota.  The facts are still nebulous, but Floyd was wrestled during an encounter with police.  After a struggle ensued he was taken to the ground and was subjected to a “choke hold” by a cop.

Floyd died.  The cop was fired and arrested.  Protests began.  Looting occurred.  Fires were set.  Missiles were thrown at police.  The Minneapolis mayor lied about the mayhem.  And the media were happy to be complicit.

False narratives about the protests-turned-riots peppered the print and electronic media, with mayors from Minneapolis, New York City, Portland, Atlanta, and Seattle, all providing jaded accounts of the destruction occurring in their jurisdictions.

Using phrases such as “experiment in life,” and “Summer of Love,” were merely remains on a stable floor from equines eating their oats, of which both media and elected officials felt compelled to brag about – all dispensed by Democrat mayors and governors.

And those Leftist mayors and governors desperately tried to antagonize President Trump at the cost of law-abiding citizenry, to no avail.

Then, geniuses in Seattle who were not content with protesting and rioting decided to take over a six-block area of Seattle, Washington.

The Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan thought it would be sporting to poke President Donald Trump in the eye.  She publicly mocked him and his suggestion to send in federal troops to restore a sense of normalcy and public safety.  She told him to hide in his White House bunker.

It wasn’t long before this group of childish malcontents decided to pick a name for their newly established area (which they stole from – much like they insist the white man stole America from the Indians.)

Their thoughtful name was CHAZ, Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone.  An agog media splashed that acronym proudly across newspaper headlines and on TV news screen crawls.  Still, they had no official leader.

A few short weeks later, CHAZ was changed to CHOP, Capitol Hill Occupied Protest, likely because “autonomous” was too difficult to spell.

These anarchistic nitwits realized they needed food to sustain their existence, so they raked up a small patch in a public park and planted some seeds.  Evidently they thought this was what Michael Bloomberg was referring to when he mocked farmers and farming.

Mayor Durkan’s Summer of Love fest soon turned deadly with several shootings and at least two murders and one rape, and with love rapidly draining from CHOP, only inane demands leaked from its proverbial sinking ship.

All this made me think about Independence Day and how we arrived at the greatest nation on Earth.

The miscreants in Seattle never came up with a Constitution, although they were about the same age as our Founding Fathers.  They failed to select a leader.  They had difficulty even naming their stolen property. 

In fact, the only things they did well were demonstrate their poor gardening skills and their collective low intelligence.

God Bless America!

Recap

Over the past few years my life has been modified to reflect the natural order of things.

Congressional Democrats and one Senate Republican were desperately trying to impeach President Donald Trump because, well, just because.  Twenty-four hour news about this half-baked effort further split America politically because a presidential election is due in November.

Amid all this, I awoke one January morning and learned my flu shot was no defense against something called Coronavirus disease 19.  All I needed to do to prevent from getting this disease was wash my hands for 20-seconds.

That was until varying state governors and federal doctors and scientists claimed their newly-enacted emergency laws required everyone wear a mask lest we would contract this flu and die.

We were not allowed outside to bike, walk, swim, picnic, paint, perform yard duties, wash the car, or any other exercise that might – MIGHT – spread this underplayed flu to others.

Soon, neighbors were turning neighbors in to the police for sweeping their sidewalk; police were threatening others for planting garden seeds, while grocery stores remained open for business.

Whilst this was occurring, politicians across the country demanded we be remanded to what I call “house-arrest.”  We were ordered to remain indoors, segregated from society, while local jurisdictions released criminals from their jails.  It is still unclear as to who was supposed to be protected by these inane orders.

Nonetheless, we obeyed and avoided gyms, doctor’s offices, and general socializations. 

To stem the tide of spreading this flu America intentionally put the brakes on our incredible economy.  Stores, businesses, and generally non-essential enterprises were ordered to shut down.  This was designed to keep people home to prevent transmission of the Coronavirus.

Mortgages were quickly becoming delinquent, cars were on the verge of being repossessed, and credit cards were being maxxed-out, as schools were being closed and all students given reprieves from dreaded final exams.

Restaurants remained closed to protect the adults in America.  Those are the same adults that are supposed to use “common sense” to select our leaders through elections.  Too bad our incumbent politicians think we’re too stupid to decide if, when, and where we can leave our homes to simply exercise.  I’m just saying…

Meanwhile, sporting events were put on hold, including golf, football, basketball, soccer, fishing, horseracing, auto racing, and competitive gardening (more on that in the future,) wound up in suspended animation.

Keeping schools closed also means no college sports, either.

But street thugs and anarchists hijacked protests of a bad white cop killing a black counterfeiter.  Protests quickly turned violent with stores and restaurants becoming victims of arson.  Looting clothes and HDTVs became fashionable while police vehicles were damaged, all in the name of “peace and justice.”

Suddenly, those critical medical masks from paragraph four weren’t so critical because the thugs and malcontents wreaking havoc on society were now in charge.

Local mayors and involved governors decided this mayhem was acceptable and let the miscreants ‘do their thing’ all the while threatening the law-abiding among us with jail time for flouting the important mask orders.

Since this all began, professional sports have discovered ways to permanently chase fans and patrons away, wholesale.

Throughout all this, Congresspeople and Senators have been criticizing President Trump for his attempt to restore a sense of normalcy to our country.  Their words of encouragement are directed at society’s hooligans as they are now cheering the removal of statues.

Speaker Pelosi demonstrating the correct use of a mask

Yes, statues have become more dangerous to society than killing babies.  Historic works, some of which are over a century old, are being destroyed in the vein of eliminating societal discomfort and overcoming “systemic racism.”  Speaker Nancy Pelosi is active in this effort.

Life is beginning to settle down as restaurants are now reopening, and looters and arsonists seem to be running out of matches.  And the populace is once again beginning to smile about their lives.

As an effort to help, Jerrold Nadler and Adam Schiff have announced their desire to get back to their impeachment efforts of the President.

Atta way, boys and girls!  You just demonstrated how much you abhor America and Americans.

Way Back When

Back in 1969, a British group named Jethro Tull made a song titled “Living in the Past.”

It’s a catchy tune, in fact, probably their best known song.  Just what it was directed at is up for debate; some music scholars believe it was written about ruing the effects of war, others think it was directed at past personal relationships.

Jethro Tull, the band

In any case, I like that tune.

But it was this song that got me thinking about life, in general.

People have been talking about the way things were “way back when.”

The tiny Eastern Shore town in which I reside has seen many changes throughout the years, some of which have been positive.  Wink. Wink.

Back when, there were 15 churches serving this little whistle stop.  Today, there is just one.

Back when, people spoke cordially to one another.  Today, my neighbors prefer to remain anonymous.

Back when, the town’s volunteer fire department erected Christmas lights over the streets that remained up year-round.  Today, there are none.  Alas.

Those changes are fondly referred to as “progress.”  And, I’m told, that those changes are a result of people being busier than they were, back when.

I’m pretty sure that is an anomaly in the analyzation of the situation.  People didn’t have 30-hours in a day; back when, the days were still 24-hours long.

In any case, living in the past was fine for that time in our lives.  Our friends were different – likely they were young neighborhood miscreants with whom we were forced to associate because we didn’t drive at the age of 12.  We all had bicycles with tons of miles ridden behind us.

We played whiffle ball and dodge ball because we didn’t have computer games.  We were considered fortunate to have extra loose leaf paper to draw pictures on.  And each boy had a toy gun of some sort in order to play army or cowboys and Indians.

Our parent’s biggest woe was us buying beer from the corner store.  We didn’t worry about illegal drug use.  Our parents were afraid to overdose on aspirin, but were delighted to score some Valium, to “calm their nerves.”  Washing them down with a glass of Scotch helped them reach the finish line sooner, FYI.

A stolen bicycle was akin to horse theft.  Today, armed car jackings are generally shrugged off unless someone dies in the process.  Times have really changed.

But it was when time came to respond to the ol’ high school reunion that things went catawampus.

HS reunions are events everyday friends and foes put their difference aside and reunite for the sole purpose of bragging about you to people who could care less.

Back when, the kids I went to school were not very bright, as I recall.

My classmates in kindergarten couldn’t cut a straight line with those crappy scissors, and ate that white paste the teachers gave us.

Third grade brought some real challenges when dismissal time arrived.  At least a few kids couldn’t locate their own coats and umbrellas for the trip home.

Sixth grade was simply awful for many who had difficulty reading and doing simple advanced placement calculus.

Before long we all made the transition to high school where the proverbial wheat was separated from the chaff.

There was no time to slow or wait for the less studious among us.  Others in our classes needed the rigidity and structure to keep the lesson plans on schedule.  Period.

Again, our passage into society or higher education finally occurred.  And then, after most of the angst waned, you get a letter inviting you to attend your class reunion.

That diet won’t work quickly enough, your résumé isn’t going improve in three months, and your health insurance doesn’t cover plastic surgery.  Just stay home with some Valium and Scotch.

It’s time to stop living in the past.

Two Free Bus Tickets

Revolutionary Communist Party Member

Gregory Lee Johnson

It was during the 1984 Republic National Convention, in Dallas, Texas, that Gregory Lee Johnson felt compelled to burn the American flag.  Since I wasn’t there, I have no way to know why, but he was promptly arrested for desecration of the American flag, as he should have been.

But Johnson, it turns out, was protesting something – much like exuberant youths of today are regularly protesting something, anything – deemed unfair, dangerous, too white, too black, too cold, not cold enough.  But you get the idea; and Johnson took the matter of his arrest to the Supreme Court.

A team of lawyers took Johnson’s case there under the idea his blatant, arrogant arson of an iconic symbol was merely him exercising his First Amendment rights under The Constitution.

Since the Court was split to favor Democrats – the party that hates America and Americans – the ruling, after deliberation, agreed with Johnson.  It said he could burn the American flag even though his actions expressed hate during a time when America was healing.

Keep in mind the Vietnam war had just ended with returning soldiers spat upon and called dirty names for trying to perform their jobs in a foreign country in which they weren’t wanted.  They returned to a country where strangers were now berating them, too.

Johnson’s Supreme Court ruling was heralded as a milestone for free speech followed soon thereafter by drowning religious icons in jars of urine in the name of art under The First Amendment.  Leftists now possessed a get-out-of-jail-free card to do nearly anything antagonistic, and hide beneath the very Constitution they so hate.

It’s been nearly forty years since Johnson became famous for poking his finger in the proverbial bear.  And this is where my story begins.

Since I was a little kid I enjoyed a sport called NASCAR racing.  Stock automobiles were used in the beginning of this motorsport as its name National Association of Stock Car Automobile Racing implies.

Racers would drive the family sedan to the track, race and drive home in the same vehicle, hopefully with the winner’s check.

Most highly educated people – at least they think they are – look down on NASCAR racing and its fans as being less-than-equal to themselves as grossly undereducated.

That’s their opinion, but there’s an old saying that goes, “Opinions are like a$$ holes; everybody has got one, and they all stink.”

Up until this last week – June 7, 2020 – to be precise, I watched NASCAR races and enjoyed most of them.

Decades of cheering for spectacular races and fraction-of-a-second finishes, kept me coming back week after week after week, for over fifty years.

Leading up to June 7^th, our nation turned into a tinderbox with malcontents and troublemakers burning buildings and looting and taking over entire sections of cities, all in the name of something they term “systemic racism.”

NASCAR used to have black drivers, and still has black pit crew members, as well as black NASCAR officials.

The lone black driver in 2020 NASCAR is a fellow named Bubba Wallace.  His entry into the sport a handful of years ago was met with great hoopla about the sport re-integrating.

Before the June 7^th race, Wallace read a heartfelt note from his Mother about how she was concerned over any run-ins he might have that would lead to his death at the hands of the police.

After the race, he collapsed during an interview with race reporter Jamie Little.  And later, he expressed his concern about Confederate flags flying over the varying race venues – many of which are located in the South.

NASCAR immediately issued a dictum to preclude any Confederate flag from flying or being noticed at any track on the circuit.  Their reasoning is that no one should feel uncomfortable.

Two people who are nearly forty years apart in their actions and opinions have demonstrated how weak a nation America has become.  The American flag is no longer sacred, as is the Confederate flag.  Both are an integral part of our history, right or wrong.

Both flew over deadly battles in which patriotic Americans died for their beliefs.  And now those symbolic banners have been relegated to the rag bag because of the lame opinions and feelings of two whiners.

There are many things that upset me, too.  But I don’t rally fellow Americans to burn, loot, and ruin the lives of others. 

I feel these aforementioned malcontents should have been given a one-way bus ticket out of the country rather than fame. 

As a footnote, Wallace, in a post race interview was asked about racism he personally felt growing up in America; he said he felt very little if any.  Glad he climbed aboard the victim du jour bus.

Way to go, America!