Category → Government Of the People…
Happy 249th Birthday, America
Memes, memes, memes
EDS NOTE: OBSCENITY A flash bomb explodes on the 101 Freeway near the metropolitan detention center of downtown Los Angeles, Sunday, June 8, 2025, following last night’s immigration raid protest. (AP Photo/Eric Thayer)
Israel is defending Western Civilization, say thank you
Forgive my long absence. Last week I had a careless tired body-tired mind workplace accident where I got to watch my body’s hydraulic fluid spray out like a hose from my leg. That scared me, and I drove myself to the ER forty minutes away, dodging possums, porcupines, rattlesnakes, and deer in the roadway the entire way. I got stitched up and am moving around, but one thing I am beginning to accept is that while I am still very strong, I am no longer forty or even fifty. And when I feel tired now, after working hard all day, it is time to put down tools and step away from the work site.
It is a pretty good reason for being a week overdue here on the blog. Really, you should have seen my place. It looked like a murder scene…blood everywhere. Took me hours to clean it up.
So, Israel is defending Western Civilization from Iran’s nuclear hungry genocidal Islamofascists, and all of a sudden I am surrounded by the “woke right.” As if genocidal dictators who have stated for almost fifty years that their intention is to force convert or blow up, destroy, and kill America and Israel, as well as the rest of Western Civilization, all infidels, should have nuclear bombs.
“If Israel has nuclear bombs, why can’t Iran?” goes a common question. Finding moral equivalence between one of the world’s few free democracies, Israel, and one of the world’s most oppressive, cruel, destructive, war-mongering, terrorism-exporting, deceptive theocracies, Iran, requires a person to make a huge leap in rational judgment and factual observation, and do so with a healthy boost of ridiculous raw Jew hatred.
Turns out the woke right, the fake Christians like Tucker Carlson, Patrick Bet David, and Candace Owens, understand that hating Jews is a good business. They get lots of online clicks and a decent angry support mob to follow them around. To win a policy argument about nuclear proliferation among genocidal regimes, versus the democracies being targeted by them, all the woke right people have to do is malign all Jews (not just the leftist ones, who we all must admit are especially aggravating because they are especially destructive when they of all people should know better), or ascribe malice to all things Jewish and Israel.
“America must stop fighting the Jews’ wars” or “Israel’s wars” goes another refrain, as the woke rightsters strut and preen, puffing up their supposed anti war chests, pretending to be superior while our Western Civilization is burning to the ground from within and without.
Never mind Iran’s (and China’s) public plan to destroy America, the Great Satan, which they could easily do with all of the jihadis they have hidden here in America. No, apparently all wars are started by “the Jews” because you know… it’s simply just “the Jews.”
Not Iran itself. Not jihadism. Not Islamofascism and Islamosupremacism as witnessed through a tremendous amount of violent jihadism focused on Israel and Jews worldwide. No, according to Tucker Carlson and his fellow woke rightsters, we are supposed to believe that a population of maybe ten or twelve million Jews total on the entire planet is manipulating and victimizing the two billion Muslims and one and a half billion Christians and one billion Hindus and one and a half billion Han Chinese who own everything and run everything. And so, accordingly these Iran Firsters say Iran must have nukes. Because the Jews.
This is humiliatingly lame Neanderthal stuff. It is intellectually indefensible. While I am proud to be MAGA since 2015, and I have all of the MAGA hats, tee shirts, socks, underwear etc of Trump MAGA Land, I am embarrassed to have to share one inch of ideological space with these woke right people. They are making common cause with true evil, and spreading evil and hate, while claiming to be real Christians, real Americans. Tucker Carlson is a fraud, I hate to say. I had been a huge fan of his for all of the right reasons (he was an excellent journalist who asked the right questions), and now I detest the guy, for all of the right reasons.
For the past year, Tucker Carlson has been warning that an Israeli war with Iran will result in World War Three and the end of the world. In the past few days his anti Israel scaremongering has been proven wrong, but he has not relented. He wants Iran to have nukes so Israel can be bullied and blackmailed and forced out of existence, if not blown out of existence. Never mind what happens to America in the process. Carlson is a Jew hating America hating Iran Firster.
If you hate Jews, you hate Jesus, and if you hate Jesus you hate Christianity. If you hate Israel so much that you are willing to sacrifice America, like Carlson, you are not MAGA, and you are not pro America. Being an America First conservative, as I am, means putting America before all other countries. But it does not mean crawling under a rock and hiding and pretending that the world outside is not happening. That is childish.
If you are that much of an isolationist, then you are a fool and you really do hate America, because you want America to fail. America is part of this world, and we must live within it, we must engage it. That means having alliances and relationships with other countries, and occasionally defending ourselves from other countries. The planet is a chess board on which we must occasionally project power. Failing to project power means that others will project power onto us, and America is not too big to fail.
War does not need to be conducted with American boots on the ground, or even by Americans. Being anti war does not mean just laissez faire letting things happen randomly, like letting Iran get a nuclear arsenal and then them bringing America-ending nuclear war directly to us. To every thing there is a season, a time for peace, and a time for war. Sometimes we just have to give war a chance. Smart Americans can define or implement war however they want, so long as our national interests are protected and our precious military personnel are not squandered.
In 1979, Iran openly declared war on America and Israel, and they and their allies have never missed an opportunity to burn our leaders in effigy and our flags in public. Iran’s war with Israel did not start a few days ago, it started in 1979. Now on the cusp of confronting nuclear powered maniacs who hate all of us Westerners, Israel is taking huge risks and making huge sacrifices to ensure that Americans sleep comfortably at night. Israel is taking a beating to eliminate Iran’s nuclear program.
If you are truly MAGA, and truly American, then you appreciate hard work and risk taking. Say Thank You to the Israelis, who did the heavy lifting that no one else was brave enough to do. Don’t be a mean spoiled brat, like Tucker Carlson. His behavior is not American.
Seriously, Trump vs. Musk?!
Like so many supporters of President Donald Trump, I am unhappy, shocked even, at the unhappy falling out between the president and Elon Musk. Not only is the disagreement about policy, which happens every day in politics and which grown ups take in stride, without fracturing their relationship, because our relationships are more important than being “right” on one policy issue or another, but both men are not showing their best sides.
Why are both men acting like this in public? Because they are both high-T prominent businessmen who have built successful businesses and they are both used to giving orders and being in charge.
But it does not matter why they are publicly fighting with each other. It matters only that they are fighting, because it is personally and professionally bad for each of them, bad for America, bad for the Trump Administration, bad for public morale. Trump looks too easily upset and unappreciative, and Musk looks thin skinned, disloyal, and vindictive. All bad, no upside.
What I would like is for President Trump to say “Elon, I am sorry I lost my temper. You have been an incredible asset to this administration and a good friend to me personally. Thank you for all of the sacrifices you made to start DOGE and get American government back on track to serve The People. Let’s stay in touch.”
And just leave it at that. Showing good, strong character and taking the high road. For the good of America, which President Trump has always done. And let’s be honest: Elon Musk has sacrificed a TON for his work to bring the federal bureaucracy to heel. We all owe Elon a huge thank you for that.
Edit: Today is the 81st anniversary of D-Day, the Allied storming of Nazi Europe. At huge cost and sacrifice, in the cause of freedom. America was the leader. This is true leadership, and the kind of thing that actually matters in life.
Thank you to The Blaze
Anatomy of a primary election
On May 20th, Pennsylvania held its primary election. Mostly local seats and judgeships were on the ballot, which are definitely important, but the real prizes were the PA Commonwealth Court and the PA Superior Court. As has come to be usual here and in many other states, the conservative/ independent-minded grass roots fielded their candidates and the state Republican Party fielded its candidates.
And as usual, the PA Republican Party was directly involved in the selection of the primary election candidates, their endorsements, their negative attacks, funding, etc. When a political party gets in between The People and their choice of candidate, the party always loses in the long run. When The People believe the party does not share their views or values, and is only pursuing the selection of certain candidates who will be malleable and loyal to the party, then The People lose faith in the party.
Here in PA there is real animosity between grass roots conservatives and the PA GOP establishment.
This election we had grass roots candidate Maria Battista vs. PAGOP candidate political establishment-endorsed Ann Marie Wheatcraft for Superior Court judge. Battista had run before as the GOP endorsed candidate, and had lost to the grass roots candidate. This time around, for whatever reason, she was on the outs with the PAGOP and on the in with the grass roots groups, like Lycoming Patriots. Wheatcraft had the PAGOP endorsement and money.
For the Commonwealth Court we had well known Second Amendment attorney Josh Prince vs. unknown state bureaucrat attorney Matt Wolford. Bureaucrat Wolford was mysteriously endorsed by the PAGOP, even though he has worked most of his career at the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection, an agency that no matter which incarnation it embodies, and regardless of which political party is running it, nonetheless is associated with heavy-handed regulations and lawless bureaucrats who routinely beat up on private landowners and businesses. Not exactly a likely place to give birth to a solid Republican candidate for any office, much less a judgeship.
The long and short of these two races is that Battista the outsider defeated Wheatcraft the moneyed insider, and Wolford the party endorsed yet unknown bureaucrat and mystery “Republican” defeated grass roots favorite Prince. Moreover, Prince was endorsed by numerous organizations, like Gun Owners of America, Firearms Owners Against Crime, etc.
These are strange results.
Normally voters align with outsiders or insiders, but not with one candidate here and not that one over there. And yet that is what happened in this election. Normally, big endorsements gain big traction for candidates, but we saw no evidence of that in the Prince vs Wolford race. Despite his many big endorsements, Prince was utterly crushed even in very conservative rural counties, like Lycoming and Elk, where he was known, liked, and should have won handily. And yet, in these same counties, Battista blew off Wheatcraft’s doors.
Aside from a crooked vote tallying scheme, I have no explanation for this odd outcome that defies all odds and conventional thinking. Except for one possible variable that tends to get overlooked these days, and that is ballot position. That is, where does the candidate’s name fall on the ballot – top, middle, or last.
Studies have shown that ballot position does matter, or it can matter, but much less so when voters feel compelled to look up candidates on the internet. With its easy information access, the internet has been the great leveler of campaigns everywhere. Big campaign money cannot always defend a candidate’s bad record, which will be all over the internet, visible to the voters who but follow a few clicks on a search engine.
Battista had top and Prince had bottom on their respective ballots. Meaning that the 3/4-4/4 super voters who make up the primary election electorate, were unsure of who to vote for and simply and superficially chose the first name they saw for each position. That could explain the opposite results we got for both candidates, Battista and Prince.
As we see here, the voters have to want to know something about the people they are voting for in order to defeat the ballot position factor, as well as overcome often superficial campaign advertising. And so we learned a hard lesson here: The vaunted and lauded super voters did not necessarily do super research into the candidates. They apparently did not bother to look up the candidates before walking into the voting booth. They simply saw a name at the top and made their choice.
And that is the gory anatomy of Pennsylvania’s 2025 primary election, God help us all.
Does ballot position really determine who a lot of primary election super voters choose? From this election, it would seem so.
Elk County is a very conservative rural place where DEP bureaucrats are hated like poison ivy. The 2025 results there make no sense, unless ballot position is the primary factor.
Doesn’t it seem mean spirited to not even mention candidate Josh Prince? Doesn’t it further alienate his supporters? What is that all about?
I have never seen election results like this. If conservative rural Lycoming County super voters feel so strongly about conservative candidate Battista, they for sure would have felt just as strongly about conservative candidate Prince. And yet…the results seem to prove that ballot position is the most important determinant
Dauphin County
Dauphin County
Memorial Day thank you
Thank you to the Armed Services personnel living and passed who have risked and sacrificed for all of us free American citizens today.
Isn’t it strange that there are so many heroic acts of bravery and valor on the battlefield, and yet almost none found in politics?
Vote for Josh Prince on Tuesday
This coming Tuesday is Primary Election Day 2025 here in Pennsylvania, and if there is one person you vote for, it should be Josh Prince, candidate for Commonwealth Court.
Josh has an incredible career as an attorney. Remarkable for someone his age. He has amassed a lot of wins in court by dint of his hard work and intelligence. I know from my own personal experience as a co-client of his, here in Harrisburg, where he successfully represented FOAC, me, and another person, in challenging Harrisburg City’s illegal anti-gun ordinances.
This is why Josh Prince has been endorsed by so many state-wide and national organizations, like FOAC and Gun Owners of America.
Josh’s opponent is the exact opposite of Josh: Matt Wolford is a dreary, inexperienced state government attorney, from an agency known for beating up on innocent people, and who has an interesting criminal history of his own.
Yes, the PAGOP selected Matt Wolford and endorsed him, despite the fact that he is far less qualified than Josh Prince. This strange choice is par for the course and SOP for the PAGOP, which always always endorses weak candidates who then go on to almost always lose in the general election. Probably because the PAGOP wants weak people they can control, instead of strong independent-minded people like Josh Prince.
The PAGOP always prefers to lose elections to Democrats than to have independent-minded conservatives win.
But you, the Pennsylvania voter, do not have to follow the PAGOP. You have agency, your own ability to act on your own, to act in your own best interest, to see your own ideas and values through at the voting booth. If you want the best possible person to be elected to the Commonwealth Court, then vote for Josh Prince on Tuesday.
Also, vote NO on all PA supreme court retentions later this year. Send a strong message. Tell the Uniparty political establishment that you, We, The People, want qualified citizens sitting in judgment of us and our claims. Not spineless political hacks picked from the bottom of the barrel.
You can learn more about Josh Prince at https://www.princeforjustice.com/.
John Fetterman, canary in a coal mine
If a healthy body politic is measured by the amount of middle-ground, America is in trouble. If the health of the body politic is assessed by polarization, America is in trouble. If the body politic’s veins are full of founding principles, great, and of the veins are full of foreign bodies and alien ideas, then the very bloodstream is being poisoned and is not healthy. A poisoned blood stream means the body has not long to live.
It might be popular in the Democrat Party’s mainstream media to accuse Republicans of being racist, or extreme, but the fact is that the GOP is filled to the brim with mealy mouthed “moderates” incapable of taking a policy stand of any sort or substance. Note how US Attorney nominee for Washington DC, Ed Martin, was blocked by old guard RINO Sen. Tom Tillis and at least a half dozen other similar minded Republican senators hiding in the shadows.
And it is the Democrat Party that is increasingly radical, extreme, anti-America, and unwilling to brook any kind of moderation in its own ranks. Note how US Senator John Fetterman is now hostilely surrounded by his own party, the constellation of far-Left Marxist interest groups, and their media apparatus, for the simple crime of being too moderate.
And John Fetterman is no moderate! He has simply broken with far-left woke orthodoxy on American jobs, border security, and supporting key American ally, Israel.
This slight amount of independent thinking alone has made him unacceptable to the Democrat Party…then again, RFK Jr and Tulsi Gabbard were also almost destroyed by a Democrat Party enraged that any of theirs could possibly find ways to work with the other side. His own party is trying to drive him from office with fake MSM reports about him.
All the time I get these ridiculous emails from the Pennsylvania Democrats decrying “extremism,” and yet it is they who are openly extreme. I have no idea how anyone normal supports the Democrat Party today, because their actions and words left all normalcy behind a very long time ago.
Way back when I was a Democrat, over three decades ago, it was a JFK political party that loved America and Americans. I will also say that the NRA member pro-gun and pro-Life Central Pennsylvania Democrat Josh was more conservative than at least half of the elected Republican Party today. This is how far far far Left the Democrat Party has moved.
Who would have guessed it, but Senator John Fetterman is now the main canary in the American coal mine. His political health is the indicator of how healthy and safe America is overall, how politically balanced we are.
If John Fetterman is driven from office, then the only moderation will be on the political “right,” and it will exist only because corrupt spineless jellyfish career GOPe officials like Tom Tillis are too afraid to take quintessential stands on policy based on First Principles (Constitutional principles from our nation’s Founding in 1776 and 1787-1789). And yet they will fight for re-election like their lives depend upon it, because they are making sooooo much money on insider trading.
Senator John Fetterman, you have this Republican’s admiration, and hope for your physical and political health. Hang in there, buddy. We are all watching your senate tenure as a vital sign of life of America.
UPDATE 5/13/25: Senator Fetterman has friends in unexpected places
Says who, the zero credibility far-Left AP? The far-Left teacher’s unions? Sure appears to be a set-up to get a fake negative headline on Fetterman
New York Magazine is another stalwart far-Left Democrat Party machine outlet. Like a sewer outlet.
Sy Snyder is a devoted Democrat Party 360-degree all-things Pennsylvania Democrat “daily pulse” email that also contains the usual left wing marching orders. PennLive is a super partisan pro-Democrat Party political activism organization posing as a “media” outlet. Ha ha.
Upcoming Primary Election recommendations
Pennsylvania’s primary election (Democrat vs. Democrat, Republican vs. Republican, and sadly, no one else vs. anyone else i.e. fewer choices for voters) is coming up in a few weeks. On May 20th, Pennsylvania voters should all be going to vote for candidates they believe will best represent their interests in our self-run government.
Through voting, We, The People, select our fellow citizens to represent us, to be a voice for us, to make sound choices for us, in the giant government blob. Why more Pennsylvanians do not vote, why so many fail to vote, eludes me. Nothing is more important than casting your vote, and yet, historically, few people vote overall, and especially in primaries. Voting is not difficult. It does not take money, or good looks, or nice clothes, or a lot of time, or a fancy car. You, the voter, simply have to make it a 15-30 minute priority on one day in the Spring, and then again one day in the Fall. You go to your voting precinct and vote for those candidates who best represent your views, religion, ideology, whatever. Many elections are really close, and every vote counts. Your vote counts, so do it.
In the state-wide Republican primary races, Ann Marie Wheatcraft is the superior candidate for Judge of the Superior Court. Judge Wheatcraft is hard on criminals and supportive of crime victims, which is how good judges should be and how they used to act. Now, it seems popular for judges to themselves break the law and to also throw Americans aside in favor of hardened criminals. As if the hardened criminals are somehow victims who need the judge’s protection. That appears to be the upside down mindest of Maria Battista, Wheatcraft’s opponent. No thanks. America has had quite enough of this nonsense.
Vote for Ann Marie Wheatcraft for Superior Court.
Joshua Prince is the by far and away best possible candidate for Judge of the Commonwealth Court. Josh has distinguished himself for decades as a court room force for good and for sticking up for the little guy against government over-reach. I know from personal experience, as Josh Prince has represented me personally, and a group I am a member of (FOAC), in a Harrisburg 2A lawsuit we simply had to bring (and which we won). Josh’s demeanor in the court room is impressive, steady, clear, and really organized. I have seen him run rings around attorneys touted as the best of their kind.
I have nothing personal against candidate Matt Wolford, but like so many grass roots voters, I am frustrated by the behind-closed-doors process that got Matt Wolford into his candidacy. Matt Wolford is a product of the Republican Establishment, which across America, and especially in Pennsylvania, is one of the biggest failures of any sort of organization. This is a cookie cutter group that time and time again loses easy races and then says “Aww shucks, we’ll get ’em next time,” even though there is no next time. With the Democrat Party aggressively gerrymandering the voting map, and engaging in motor-voter registration of illegal aliens and last minute changes to voting laws, honest elections look like a thing of the distant imagination. So campaigns must be hard-fought, which is not the PAGOP’s forte.
Of all the GOP groups across America, the PAGOP is especially mostly run by election consultants, who get paid well, whether they win or lose. Pennsylvania GOP politics is all about getting political management and consulting contracts, which has yielded a bitchy and mean-spirited entitlement attitude among the consultant class. They like candidates who will bend the knee and give them consulting contracts when they win. They do not care about policy or philosophy of government; every vote to them is a question of horse trading for money.
While I am on this bitchfest, let us point out that Dauphin County was one of the few PA counties to LOSE Republican voters in 2024. While the rest of PA was moving right with increased Republican voter registrations and votes, Dauphin County regressed. And Dauphin County has been regressing for years. It is probably due to the fact that the Dauphin County GOP chairman spends all of his time on…. high paying political consulting contracts, instead of focusing on winning elections.
To me, politics should not be about making money. But then, I never won any of my election races, which were run strictly on policy. Perhaps if more people like me and Josh Prince did get elected, America would be in better shape.
Anyhow, Matt Wolford comes out of this failed insular, unprincipled, and artificial process, which always seems to yield the most tepid, boring, unimpressive candidates who then go on to lose to aggressive Democrats. Let’s not do that again.
Vote for Josh Prince for Judge of the Commonwealth Court.
Here in the county court system, we have the Court of Common Pleas, where the most basic cases are heard. This is where you, the voter, want a most stable and normal person sitting up there on the bench, judging you. Two great candidates for this role deserve your vote: Fran Chardo and Jim Zugay.
Fran is the current District Attorney of Dauphin County. A more stand-up, normal, clean hands guy you will not find in American politics, anywhere. Fran is even keeled, does everything by the book, is a great listener, and will be exactly the kind of fair-minded judge you want looking back at you when you get carted into court for making some first-time-ever stupid decision that you regretted the moment you did it. Good guy.
Vote for Fran Chardo for Court of Common Pleas.
The other candidate for the Court of Common Pleas who deserves your vote is Jim Zugay, a long-time Dauphin County steadfast functionary and do-er git-er-done kind of guy. Jim has been (I think) Dauphin County Recorder of Deeds, among several other important county roles. And let me tell you straight up: Jim Zugay does not like me, because I am a pain in the butt. Jim is a serious, level headed, by-the-books guy, and he does not like bitchfesty people like me asking annoying questions that are not about getting the job done right now. I admire Jim for that, even though he grimaces when we encounter one another at social events.
Vote for Jim Zugay for Court of Common Pleas.
No, please do not vote for Katy Kennedy-McShane for this judge role. Yes, Katy and her husband are boxers, which is cool, and yes, they work with disadvantaged minority kids, which is very very cool and meritorious. But Katy’s ideological/ philosophical perspective on legal outcomes is not Constitutionalist. Rather, Katy will be a judicial activist, trying to make herself into judge, jury and executioner, or rather judge, legislator, and chief executive, all in one. This failed approach to judicial review has created so many problems by now that America is having a tough time sorting them out. Our constitutional rights cannot withstand this ongoing leftwing assault.
America and Dauphin County need judges who rely on precedent and the Constitution to make narrowly applied decisions. That’s Chardo and Zugay. America cannot take another activist judge, and Katy Kennedy-McShane will be an activist judge. No, no, no.
Finally, Graham Hetrick is the handsomest, most debonair coroner in American history. Few men who carry a gun and badge are better looking or better dressed or nicer or smarter than Graham. For some reason, a lot of coroners are colorful characters, and Graham is the most colorful of them all, while also maintaining stellar standards. The guy had his own national TV show, and smitten lady friends from lives past in distant states would call me out of the blue to ask “Do you know Graham Hetrick? OMIGOD can you get me his autograph, Josh, dear?”
Graham probably has this same electrifying effect on the dead, too, as well as justice for the dead. Vote for him. Dauphin County needs his steady hand in crime solving.
