Posts Tagged → Josh first
Relishing the win over GOP machine politics
Four years ago, I ran in the US Congressional Republican primary for the Congressional seat held by then congressman Tim Holden. It was a four-way race, between me, state senator Dave Argall, Frank Ryan, and Baptist Pastor Bob Griffiths. From the get-go, different Republican leaders tried to get me to bow out. Dave himself met with me at GOP headquarters and asked me to step out (Ah, the irony…I had asked him to chair my campaign). Lots of heartache along the campaign trail as GOP insiders tried again and again to give Dave an artificial boost, an unfair advantage, and unequal opportunity. Lebanon County GOP tried to endorse him, and the committee disintegrated as a result of the infighting that ensued. Schuylkill County GOP did endorse him, and immediately afterwards lost its chairman and underwent radical changes.
It was a great race, we did very well (26% overall in a four-way race, with about $20,000 spent, and the highlight being the 51% we got in rural Perry County, which has my kind of people), and we got kudos all around for the excellent pick-up campaign we ran. Dave went on to win that primary by a few hundred votes, and then he got crushed by Tim Holden. All of the smart GOP consultants and insiders who told me that Dave would win, and that I should get out, well, they never called me to acknowledge they were wrong. Apparently losing races is OK so long as it is a GOP insider, but the consultancy insider class is terribly afraid of grass roots candidates losing.
In 2012, I ran in the GOP primary for the PA 15th state senate district, but only after I had cleared a bunch of artificial hurdles the GOP set up to keep me out of that race. First, the new district was not released until very late in 2011, and only then after former state senator Jeff Piccola had retired one week into the one-year residency requirement period (imagine that!), so that I could not get an apartment over the new district line just a mile from my house and thereby qualify as a resident of the district.
In January 2012, the PA state supreme court threw out the GOP redistricting plan, calling it unconstitutional and deeply flawed, and I found myself back in the old district. But even then, we were several days into the ballot petition process, with no volunteers, no committee, no paperwork, no money, up against two establishment candidates, one of whom was hand picked by the party, John McNally, our Dauphin County GOP chairman.
We got 850 signatures, got on the ballot, and started campaigning, grass roots style. Within weeks, the GOP-controlled PA senate had developed a new redistricting map and presented it to the court. Not surprisingly, I was once again outside the senate district. Making things worse, the GOP establishment staff began telling voters that I might win, but then be outside the district, and therefore unable to serve the people who had voted for me. Thankfully, the PA supreme court rejected the map as just as flawed as the first one, and the GOP had to live with my candidacy, which proved to be incredibly popular.
In other words, I know exactly what senator-elect Scott Wagner went through until this week.
What was refreshing to me as I worked Wagner’s district’s largest poll (Manchester 5 & 7) was the voter sentiment that came pouring out as they poured in to the polling place to write in Wagner’s name on the ballot. Voters were vociferously rejecting the contrived hurdles that the GOP had arranged to stop Wagner, they rejected the artificial support the GOP had thrown behind milquetoast career politician Ron Miller, and they strongly opposed the $700,000 in negative ads run against Wagner. That was $700,000 that the GOP could have spent, should have spent, to beat liberalism.
I do intend to run for the 15th state senate district again in two years. And I guess I will be facing a GOP hand-picked cookie cutter empty suit of a candidate, someone the party expects to be a rubber stamp, who will not pursue right-to-work legislation. And folks, I intend to win this one. Hope to see you there with me at the barricades.
Questions you’re not supposed to ask #3
Why is Penn State University exempt from state open records laws?
Yes, PSU lobbied for this exemption, but who cares? Who would actually grant that?
And I ask as a faithful, loving, loyal PSU alum.
Questions you were told not to ask, #1
Why does global warming feel so record-setting cold?
Dickinson College – always good to visit
Thank you to Professor Anat Beck and her very interesting students, for hosting me today. I know it is not easy to hear ideas you do not agree with, and you all did a marvelous job of listening and asking questions, and seeing photos of hunting and trapping. It was an honor to be with you. Just remember: Your entrepreneurialism cannot succeed with more onerous government regulations and requirements, like ObamaCare. When there are more takers than makers, the system collapses. Capitalism has generated more liberty, freedom, and opportunity than any other approach.
Last year I spoke to Dr. Andrea Lieber’s class, also at Dickinson, and we had an excellent dialogue on “climate change.” What surprised me was how little the students knew about the politicization of “climate change” “science.” It is to Dr. Lieber’s credit that someone like me was invited to address her students.
Dickinson has a fascinating, really neat environment and hands-on sustainability program, replete with a new green house/ lab. I hope I am invited back again, because, I like it a lot. The students are inspiring.
Some observations on knives sold at the Great American Outdoor Show
Knife production is reaching an apex, it appears. Never before in one place have I seen so many higher quality production knives as I have seen at the Great American Outdoor Show. Many booths selling hundreds and hundreds of better quality folding knives, with some custom and semi-custom knife sellers sprinkled around.
Oddly, you can’t find a sharpening stone in the entire Farm Show complex to save your blade’s life. No one is selling sharpening stones. Blades out the wazoo, yes. Ways to keep them functioning, no. Whether it is a sign of the throw-away society meeting Pleistocene Man, or too much optimism about modern steels’ edge retention capability, it is an odd sign indeed.
Once the purview of expensive custom knives, Damascus blades are now ubiquitous, although most are probably made in Pakistan and India, so their quality cannot be real high, and you’ve got no idea of their cadmium, arsenic, or lead content, either, although I am willing to bet these blades are positively toxic to human health. They do look nice, though.
[Damascus steel is a mix of different types of metals that when folded over and over and then hammered out reveal an appealing variety of patterns. Because metal types used in Damascus steel vary widely, quality varies widely. I use only Alabama Damascus in my knives]
Clearly, there is a bleeding over from the custom knife market into the high production market, where quality used to suffer badly. Knife buying Americans evidently have improved tastes and higher expectations for their over-the-counter knives. That’s a good thing. But do they have to be made in those rainbow colors? They hurt my eyes. Camo handles are humorous – drop your knife, never find your knife, lose your knife. Maybe those rainbow colored handles work, after all.
One other observation is the high number of bug-out bags being made. Man, Americans seem ready for the apocalypse. After seeing so many of these grab-and-run packs, I now realize that I need one, too. No, my oh-so-1970s Kelty backpacks do not seem up to snuff, even though they have served me well on rugged wilderness trips for many years. Nope, camo is de rigeur here, too.
Come on by the PA Federation of Sportsmen’s Clubs booth and buy a raffle ticket for our Bushmaster AR-15 M4. Just ten bucks gets you a lot closer to having your bug-out bag fully equipped with a state-of-the-art rifle.
Good show! JRJ Knives sells out at Great American Outdoor Show
Want the sign of a good show? Watch the vendors sell out of their items only a couple of days in.
JRJ knives of New Buffalo is my go-to source for top of the line custom knives. John uses ATS-34 steel and stock removal (with a little welding and hammering now and then) to make any knife you want or need. He and I have several knife projects under way, mostly using Alabama Damascus steel and hippo tooth, and although the wait can be longer than you’d like, the results are always better than you could have imagined. JRJ makes high quality knives.
Well, last Sunday I stopped in at the JRJ Knives booth at the Great American Outdoor Show, and John was nowhere to be seen. He was back at the shop, his wife Jodi said, because they had sold out of nearly all their knives. That is, they had sold more knives in the first 24 hours of the show than they expected to sell during the entire week.
Today I was shopping around for old fashioned whet stones. You know, the old fine-grained novaculite Arkansas sharpening stones that were once a staple in every American kitchen. You’d expect to find lots of them for sale at the Great American Outdoors Show, especially given how many knife vendors there are. Nary a one, oddly. Either modern newfangled steels have become self-sharpening, or even rugged outdoorsmen no longer sharpen their own knives. Something odd is afoot. One knife vendor said that he had sold out of all of his premium knives, and had to order more; he hoped they would arrive by tomorrow.
But back to the main point here: All this selling out of items in a day or two is a good show. So far, it is a big success. If you haven’t yet visited, you should. It has a whole new look, feel, and energy. And yes, there are AR15s on display everywhere.
Wile-y Coyote, knows the way
On my way out the door this morning, a call came in: “I think you have a coyote,” he said.
Knowing how wiley those coyotes are, I was skeptical and hopeful.
Surely enough, when I arrived the sets were undisturbed, and a second call went like this: “Yeah, we figured out he was mousing, you know – pouncing on mice under the snow,” and then eating them with great pleasure.
So what had appeared like one behavior was in fact something else, entirely. The coyote had not been trapped, but rather had merrily and quite freely zig zagged his way across the snowy field, chasing tasty mouse morsels. Human perception has misunderstood things of far greater consequence before, and will again, but the symbolism was instructive.
Once again I am surprised to see how entrenched most people are in a single perspective, as if their own living place, their own community, their own home, their own food, whatever surrounds them, is in fact (and must, must be) a true reference point for everyone else. As if rural citizens relate to land the same as city slicker flatlanders, whose use for open land is a place to casually watch for deer as they serenely drive to their next appointment. As if the flatlanders exist for the sole benefit of the rural folks….
How often do we hear activists and religious leaders invoke “peace,” as though what they are doing will actually bring peace, or that they would even know what someone else would call peace. The take-away for me today was how entrenched in self most individual people are, and how they often (mistakenly) believe that their world view is dominant, “normal,” and correct. And I’d say that this applies across the board, to all people, and most assuredly to me.
Hunters United for Sunday Hunting @ Great American Outdoor Show
Hunters United for Sunday Hunting will be in booth 4511 in the Outfitters Hall of the Great American Outdoor Show. Come see us.