Women marching in DC + Hollywood = end of an era
Hollywood had the power of suggestion, once.
Producing movies that highlighted the best of human attributes, the best of Americanism, of small town communities resulted in Americans spending their hard-won dollars for more meaningful entertainment. Heroes sold tickets.
Then came the strictly action genre, still riding on the saddle of good vs. evil Westerns. Still we were on board, as the Soviets really were an evil empire worthy of being blasted out of the sky by Rambo. Heroes had bigger muscles, bigger guns.
Then came the sanctimonious genre, and Hollywood really poured on its power of suggestion. Stretching Americans’ willingness to budge on principle, Hollywood mistakenly comingled emotion with contrary logic. And so here we are, treated to a long line of Hollywood stars openly at war with the very people and fans who made them stars to begin with. Americans still believe in God and the Bible, even if they are willing to look the other way on certain policy issues. But they are not willing to abandon their core beliefs.
Drawing upon my work as a conservationist, this Hollywood pickle reminds me of the faux “Highbridge/Sturbridge/ Scarsdale/ Woodcroft Crossing” – type low-density developments ravaging America’s best farmland, destroying the very beauty which first drew Americans to live in those places to begin with.
The similarity and irony are too much to ignore. A sense of invulnerability and profligate spending of hard-won resources drive this mentality in both models. But whereas America has a lot of open land left to develop, Hollywood can ill afford to burn its bridges and crossings. If Hollywood becomes the permanent home of the goofball aggrieved and whiny upper middle class, it will not sustain itself. Hollywood may say it is against capitalism, but without capitalism, Hollywood ceases.
Perhaps the strangest example of this self destruction is actor Bradley Cooper’s choice to abandon the heroic persona he adopted for American Sniper, and trade it in for open contempt of Donald Trump and support for Crooked Misogynist Hillary. Cooper had a fan base across America rivaling any actor, and then he detonated it. Similarly, Jack Nicholson is a talented actor garnering appreciation for being a chameleon, but who knew until recently that he not only supervised Roman Polanski’s rape of a 13-year-old-girl, but then applauded Polanski years later when he received a Hollywood award in absentia?
Need anything be said about Meryl Streep’s recent hypocrisy? She has been held accountable elsewhere, so we move on here.
These are the acts of clueless people, whose once gentle powers of suggestion once held sway over an American public willing to forgive small differences of opinion, but who are now greatly inflamed by the many acts of war and outright treason committed by their former heroes and heroines.
If you are an actor, whose job it is to pretend to be things and people you are not, then it is highly unlikely you are qualified to comment on anything serious, is what America has learned.
After looking over the signs and placards those marchers carried, and listening to their speeches and bad poetry, I could not help but feel sorry for them. They really do not know what they are protesting.
Oh, sure, they did not vote for Trump. OK. But it is very rare for Americans to protest against the outcome of a fair and square election result. That would be really bad form. Super sore loserish. Wearing suggestive hats isn’t a substantive statement, either. It is juvenile.
The women and men who took to the DC streets Saturday with their Hollywood escorts, protesting God Knows What, are coming from a distant past.
Emerging from their caves, where there was once inequity, to be sure, the America around them today does not square with their views. Take all the updated statistics like, for example, women outnumbering men in American medical schools and law schools. Trying to resurrect the distant past and fuel it with Hollywood’s now over-played power of suggestion just gives us a bigger bonfire on which to watch all of the old vanities burn.
You all can go to bed now. I will be happy to kick the dying embers and watch them blink out into darkness.
Confession: I’m going to miss Obama
Still in warm glow from President Trump’s incredible inauguration speech, I realized I’m going to really miss Barack Hussein Obama.
After all, he was the best gun salesman in America for 8 years, better even than Bill “mad rapist” Clinton, persuading even little old grandmas they needed to get cracking on obtaining an effective defensive weapon. Tens of millions of first time lawful gun owners and Second Amendment supporters got their start with and from Obama.
And his political acumen was unbelievable. The guy is a political wrecking ball. I still can’t get over how much he hated his own political party. So much so that he destroyed it. I mean he blasted the Democrat Party to pieces. Obama is so polarizing, such a great liar (“you can keep your doctor”), that since 2010 the nation rewarded him with near universal scorn and rejection, and ejected democrats from safe seats across America.
Across America democrats are in tiny minorities. Republicans control most of the state houses, governorships, and local governments. Everywhere except California and New York. And I’m sure those two states are going to change dramatically.
Thank you, Mr Obama. You’re going to be missed! In a way.
Time to revoke California’s full faith and credit standing
Full faith and credit is the idea that all of the states in the United States operate at more or less the same level of professionalism and responsibility. Full faith in the driver’s licenses of one states are assumed by all other states, and full credit is given by all states to the licensing process of all other states. It is at the core of the Union, it is the glue that binds the states to one another as equals.
California is up-ending this arrangement, however.
California has for a long time been dubbed “the Left coast,” the “land of fruits and nuts,” the “sunshine cancer state,” and all kinds of other funny, silly, and word-play sly riffs on its geography and light-headed lifestyle.
What is not so funny is how badly California has gone off the rails, threatening to take a bunch of other train cars with it.
Phenomenally wild and unscientific regulations, unsustainable minimal wage hikes, outlandish worker compensation and insurance requirements for employers, and other bizarre acts of officialdom there have damaged the state’s economy and the quality of life of its citizens. Businesses relocating from California to Nevada and Texas is now a daily report in regional newspapers.
However, if that isn’t bad enough, consider this, the dead canary in the polluted California coal mine: This week California government officials revealed that they had “inadvertently” released private information on about 3,500 state-licensed firearm instructors. The most personal medical and professional information about these individuals was disclosed to a news reporter, information that can really damage the instructors, and lead to their identity theft. The assumption is that the reporter would widely disseminate this information. After all, if he can damage these people personally, maybe they will stop being firearms instructors, goes that warped logic. It is at least consistent with California’s war against lawful gun ownership, a goal shared by the mainstream media. It was no accident.
This, in a state that goes into wild contortions to avoid identifying illegal aliens it has brought into its illegal “sanctuary cities,” including releasing illegal aliens convicted of violent crimes, who then go on to murder more Americans. Because they are illegal aliens, they are somehow “victims,” and not subject to the rule of law. The state of California puts tremendous taxpayer-funded resources into protecting illegal aliens, presumably because they will be good little partisan voters who continue to vote for more Santa Claus government handouts. It is total lawlessness, because the political goal of complete single-party power and control drives all official decisions.
California has gone so far as to issue driver’s licenses to at least a million illegal aliens, which easily paves the way for them to become illegal voters. This is America’s biggest vote fraud, and as we saw recently it threatens the core of our Republic. American taxpaying citizens deserve better than this. It really is a declaration of war complete with an invasion force. But Americans have been patient and understanding, too much so.
It is time to withdraw California’s full faith and credit standing amongst its peer states.
The resulting death and destruction emanating and radiating out from California reaches every corner of America, and this mayhem demands that other states take action to protect their citizens from California’s wanton disregard for basic law and order, a basic disregard for life and limb of American citizens who happen to be unluckily in the path of a vehicle incompetently driven by an illegal alien. Or on the street when an illegal alien blessed by the state of California pulls a gun and murders in cold blood.
Here are concrete steps the responsible adult states can take to get our United States back under control and serving the interests of the citizens and taxpayers who populate them:
1) Declare all California driver’s licenses unacceptable as legal documents or certifications, and subject to immediate confiscation by law enforcement officers;
2) Declare all California-licensed vehicles subject to immediate search, and illicit contents therein subject to seizure, and the vehicles to be impounded;
3) Declare all other California licenses and certifications null and void, and subject to review in each state.
This is good government. It is a government of good standards, of, by, and for The People.
Donald Trump proving his detractors wrong, over and over
Donald Trump is proving himself the right choice for president every day, as his enemies melt down over every little thing.
And every little thing thrown at Trump is created out of whole cloth.
His cabinet nominees are subjected to garbage accusations designed to impugn their reputations. For example, Dr. Tom Price, the HHS nominee, whose stockbroker ordered $300.00 (three hundred dollars) worth of stocks without his knowledge, is being attacked with fake news stories that he somehow especially benefited from this. Thank you CNN, 100% fake news.
And Donald Trump is batting 1,000 as he keeps smacking fastballs out of the ballpark. Via Twitter, via honest and plain-spoken responses to ridiculously shallow politics. Which is all liberals have left.
And all I can say is, please keep going, liberals. All you are doing is proving our selection of Trump was correct.
Some thoughts on MLK’s “I Have a Dream” speech
Our family just sat down to watch Martin Luther King Jr. deliver one of America’s most powerful speeches, his 1963 I Have a Dream speech at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. Thank you to YouTube for publishing this historically important footage.
We had a discussion about it, and here are some thoughts that resulted:
MLK’s face is clearly moved, the righteousness of his words providing a passion that cannot be ignored then, or now. How refreshing is that.
The causes of justice, freedom, voting rights, and integration were true tests of just how honest America was going to be, how accurately it was going to live up to its promises. Genuine race and fairness issues are almost gone today, due to that passion.
How refreshing it is to hear true righteousness, and dignity, and careful measure. Few leaders since MLK have been able or willing to lead listeners down different paths simultaneously.
In the context of Georgia Congressman John Lewis’s crazy comments about November’s election results, MLK stands out as a real outlier. Race hustlers like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are phonies, and Congressman John Lewis has been riding on his one real achievement from fifty years ago. Are there any honest brokers remaining on race issues? What I would give to have MLK back with us today. America could use his gentleness, his insights, his vision. His truthfulness.
After all, a great deal of the goals MLK put forth in his speech have been achieved. What has not been achieved could easily be ascribed to the destructive methods of Sharpton, Jackson, and now Congressman Lewis, whose personal attack on the president elect brought a swift and accurate rebuttal. American blacks are more the victims of their regressive “leaders” than they are of any racism.
One of my favorite bits of knowledge is that MLK was an ardent gun owner. He was not politically correct. Oh, I don’t believe he was a violent man, bitterly clinging to his Bible and guns in preparation for some racial Armageddon. Rather, he was a hunter, a target shooter, and a practical self-defense-oriented American who believed it was better to defend one’s home from violent intruders than it was to die unarmed.
Unfortunately, this great man left America far too soon, but like all righteous martyrs, MLK’s murder inspired great change in the greatest nation ever on Planet Earth.
Thank you for your many gifts to us, Martin Luther King, Jr. We thank you for the biggest one, your ultimate sacrifice that America might live up to its best hopes and dreams.
Is America like Samson?
Ancient Jewish hero Samson was so strong he could use the lower jaw of a donkey to fight against men who were using edged weapons. It was almost a dismissiveness to use such a low-tech tool under circumstances where failure was not an option. Because it meant death.
From where did Samson get his incredible strength? Obviously he was physically capable, meaning strong and cat-like quick. But he also had a deeper power, a power every human possesses. A spiritual power. It enabled him to rise far above his physical limitations and perform remarkable, superhuman feats of mortal combat.
Samson was a Nazirite, a person who denies himself physical pleasures like wine, meat, fancy clothes, and sex. By abstaining, Nazirites are able to disconnect from worldly distractions and focus on spiritual development. Samson’s strength was not just physical.
The town in northern Israel called Nazareth was evidently a city where many men took on the stringencies which guided them on their spiritual paths through an innately physical and material world. Like Samson before him, Jesus was also a Nazirite. The long hair and beard are famous symbols of the Nazirite oath.
The story of Samson is tragic, because he forgot who he was, forgot his vows of abstinence, and allowed himself to be led astray and into bed by Delilah, who was understandably attracted to his manly qualities.
Once Delilah had conquered Samson sexually, she took the symbolic step of cutting his long hair. Removing the symbol of his abstinence signified his end of being a Nazirite and the beginning of their physical relationship.
Samson lost his strength and was eventually captured by the Philistines not because his hair was cut. It was because his reason for existence had ended. His cut hair was as much a symbol as it had been when it was long. It said he had lost his way, lost his focus, and lost his purpose. He had broken his vow, and the pain of his spiritual failure drained him of physical strength.
The Bible has always been the bedrock of American and Western civilization. After all, religion gives humans basic essential values. It informs how we make choices, how we relate to one another, how our societies function.
But biblical beliefs are lagging these days, with resulting cultural chaos. Americans seem to have forgotten who they are (independent citizens with individual liberty, not serfs), and their purpose (run their own government). This complacency has invited vile intruders to take advantage and control of our many freedoms. Like Samson before us, we have been led astray, forgotten our vows to our fellow citizens, and as a result we are greatly at risk.
Let’s hope America has a spiritual renewal that strengthens our resolve to live by the divine laws spelled out in our Constitution, and not by the whims and laws of mere men.
Obama kicks land conservation in the n*ts
Despite having spent my career in environmental protection, conservation, and especially land conservation, I am always non-plussed when someone waves a magic wand, declares some government-managed public land off-limits, and then calls it “conservation.”
I love land acquisitions for public parks, forests, and hunting areas. Adding to the existing roster of public lands gives us more flexibility with existing areas, more chances to explore multiple use.
In the past couple of weeks lame duck president Hussein Obama has waved a magic executive wand over millions of acres of federally managed lands out west, and declared them national monuments. Obama did not work with land trusts or ranchers to purchase conservation easements or fee simple land out west, thereby adding to the total acreage available for public use. No, instead, Obama did there what he has basically done in the Middle East.
He dropped a turd in the punch bowl, and left the party.
Except Obama is so arrogant, he claims it is a big success.
Nothing damages land conservation more than unilateral actions by Washington, DC, about resource-rich lands specifically purchased to support and benefit the American people. All of them. The magic wand executive-heavy procedure just alienates so many people, you have to wonder if it is by design.
After all, recall that under Obama, the IRS made war on land trusts and conservancies. Silly rules and regulations were enacted making land purchases and tax-exempt gifts and appraisals much more difficult to do across America. My own belief is Obama hates most Americans, and especially people with land, whom he equates to colonists of some sort. So he set out to punish them. All those rich land trusts run by wealthy white people…mmm mmm mmmmmm, no good. Waaaayyy too much “privilege.”
And so as much as Obama is giving a black eye to real land conservation, he is actually doing this to hurt the people he mistakenly equates with the racist notion of “white privilege.”
He is also doing what he did best, which is rule by fiat, like the tyrant he wanted to be and like those he relates to best elsewhere, like Cuba, and Saudi Arabia. Waving the executive magic wand is ruling by fiat. In this day and age, every acre of federally managed land out west has some political land mine under it. You only start kicking it around if you want to stir things up. What a coward and home wrecker he is to stir it up and walk away.
I think Obama enjoyed kicking land conservation in the n*ts. Regardless of the damage it does to land trusts and valuable land conservation programs down the road. It is part of his scorched earth legacy as he leaves the White House.
Did Liberals become Lawless by Nature? Or Habit?
Part of the 1960s counter-culture and protest fuel was a strong sense that ossified American culture and morality were “just, because.” To counter-culture activists, the war in Vietnam was perhaps the best example of this inconsiderate mindlessness. It became a galvanizing centerpiece in the display of Everything That Is Wrong With America.
So both bras and draft cards alike were burned as acts of moral or legal defiance became part and parcel of the movement.
Fast forward fifty years, and the liberal culture is deeply rooted in brazen acts of defiance and protest. Sit-ins, occupations of offices, “die-ins,” stormy public protests are all regular scenes as liberals make their point public.
Somewhere underlying the actions is that old sense that ‘because these things I oppose are immoral, I can engage in immoral and illegal acts of protest’.
Or said another way, ‘I vote the right way, so my actions are infallible’.
Half a step away from this thinking is the idea that whatever politically correct issue du jour is up next, illegal and violent acts are a necessity or at least justified. Heck, people even argue they are the cause. Could be the candidacy and then election of Donald Trump “causing” demonstrators to destroy private and public property, assault fellow Americans, bully co-workers, and accuse anyone who disagrees with them of being violent, hateful, etc.
And here is where a lot of Americans are lost and confused, including me.
Protesting is understandable. Violent protests are not (think of the many recent cry-bully protests against displeasing electoral outcomes).
Strongly disagreeing with someone’s politics is understandable. Assaulting someone over it is not (especially when the assailant claims to be “for love” and “against hate”) (think of the mass violence by liberals committed against Trump supporters for the past year).
Writing a letter to the editor, like Bob Quarteroni did a few weeks ago here in the Patriot News is all-American. Go for it. But trespassing, vandalizing and stealing private property, and threatening landowners with physical harm to make a vague political point, as Mr. Quarteroni gleefully admitted to in his letter, is not OK.
Asking a young lady yesterday to please stop at the stop sign in our neighborhood, and not barrel through it as she did, because two small kids play at that intersection, netted my son and I this response: “I did stop at the stop sign”
“No, you did not, we watched you drive right through.”
“I’ll bet you voted for Trump,” said the dashing young lady, who then gave us the finger and marched on in to the Wells Fargo bank to get her money. Apparently Trump made her drive recklessly.
And then there is the sanctuary city thing, a naked play for votes by one political party that seems to always need a permanently angry underclass. Illegal aliens will do for them, never mind that the rest of America wants them to follow the law.
If a bunch of gun owners decided to ignore gun laws in one of these sanctuary cities, because they believe the gun laws are unconstitutional, punitive, unfair, backwards, and causing crime rather than limiting it, you just know what the city fathers would do: Lock ’em up!
It is interesting, isn’t it, that neither Barack Hussein Obama nor Hillary Clinton nor Bernie Sanders asked their rampaging supporters to stop…. The liberal political leaders actually encouraged the illegal and violent behavior. And in fact, in state houses and the US Congress there is one political party whose elected members continue to hold illegal “sit-ins” and other forms of partisan protest in public, taxpayer-owned places.
So what happened here?
When did liberals go from staking out some intellectual or moral high ground, to destructive, illegal, and criminal acts as a matter of daily behavior?
Somewhere, that old sense of just cause got blurred. All of the burned draft cards and other little illegal acts of defiance morphed into a culture of perpetual violence, destruction, and openly flouting the law (when it suits them).
I know a lot of liberals. How could I not, having graduated from America’s flagship Quaker school? Our high school class grew up together and we are like a big family, so we stay in touch. And of course I continue to maintain relationships with as many liberals as will have me as their friend (apparently not easy for PC people, a subject for another essay).
I look at these otherwise great people about whom I care a great deal, and I wonder, did they willingly and consciously allow their nature to become corrupted and lawless? Did they get here by habit?
Are their goals so pure that any means are justified, no matter the unfair high cost, the immorality, the injustice, the personal loss by innocents? That was a Lenin and Stalin thing. Not that American liberals would ever follow in those paths….nahhh.
I cannot answer this question, and I wish liberals would.
A question and a wish
First the question. Is there a reasonable explanation for Brooklyn lawyer Dan Goldstein’s aggressive harassment of Donald Trump’s daughter yesterday?
After all, the young mother was sitting in a plane with her three kids, minding her own business. Bystanders credited her with being cool under fire, while Goldstein and his partner were escorted off the plane for their disruptive behavior
Goldstein’s partner, Matt Lasner, joked about it on Twitter, then deleted his Twitter account altogether.
What is it about two gay Jewish guys from New York that they have missed out on the meaning of life, the meaning of the holidays, and the joy that comes with treating people nicely?
These two guys are a minority of a minority of a minority. You’d think they would be the most sensitive to not bullying other people. They’re highly educated (which actually probably explains some of this event, given the low quality of most PC academia). They’re financially secure. Where did they leave their manners?
I have a theory: So many urban elites are so completely cut off from the rest of the populace that they really cannot relate, and their disdain simply pours out when they do make contact. After decades of indoctrination by academia and liberal activist media, these folks are so filled with acid hatred for others that they cannot control themselves. In short, they are bigots.
If you want evidence that liberalism is failing, this is a good example. If your beliefs cause you to behave in inhumane ways toward innocent people, then you have bad beliefs.
Dan Goldstein and Matt Lasner are most likely atheists, so it’s tough to say what their core beliefs are or could be. But they make their aggressive liberalism clear to everyone, and that includes being vile and disrespectful to moms with kids minding their own business.
Gentlemen, Daniel and Matthew, if I may be bold enough to call you gentlemen, maybe you can take a hint here for how to treat everyone you meet over the next week, if not your lifetime: Merry Christmas, happy Hanukkah, and have a wonderful New Year!