Our Newest Op Ed
November 30, 2005 | Filed Under Uncategorized | No Comments
Keeping John Lennon in perspective
- By Michael M. Bates
It has already started. With the 25th anniversary of John Lennon’s death approaching, the adoration of the rocker has begun anew.
I was a Beatles fan like just about everyone else. Bought all their albums and have many of their tunes on CD today. I preferred their earlier stuff and didn’t think Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, while an innovative concept album, was as good as what they’d been doing.
The release of the White Album, which included barkers like “Everybody’s Got Something To Hide Except Me And My Monkey, “Savoy Truffle” and “Revolution 9,” made it evident the magic was fading.
I thought it was interesting that John, who was often viewed as the “smart Beatle” and the musical driving force behind the group, had a rather mediocre solo career. Maybe it was changes in his personal life or drugs or boredom or something, but the quality of most of John’s work after the Beatles’ breakup was unexceptional.
Lennon became active in the antiwar movement. His liberal views conferred on him an intellectual patina as well as a widespread sense that he spoke for most, if not all, young people. ………………..
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Our Newest Op Ed
November 29, 2005 | Filed Under Uncategorized | No Comments
A Brief Guide to Reforming Education
- By Rudy Takala
Opponents of public education will often hold beliefs that, while seemingly consistent, will paradoxically work against each other. It must be understood that effectively opposing an institution as immense as public education is going to require a coalition commensurate in influence. We must further understand the only means by which that coalition is going to come about.
It may be true that schools are, in effect, similar to prisons. (1) Unfortunately, they’re probably too similar. For the particular people to whom they are host, it’s a navigable, enjoyable environment. Telling them that they must associate with others, “who may be bullies, violent, or emotionally disturbed,” will not be an effective tactic. In public schools, everyone is emotionally disturbed. Most would tout that label with pride.
Convincing others to join your side is a difficult, time consuming task. That’s why politicians don’t try to convince people of anything. Politicians simply try to figure out what things a majority of people want to have, and then they formulate a convincing plan to give those things to everyone. No one’s basic premises change, but the politician will hopefully win……….
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Our Newest Op Ed
November 28, 2005 | Filed Under Uncategorized | No Comments
Every Vote Must Count, Unless the Liberals Win
- By Justin Darr
Every have that feeling there is something missing, but you cannot quite remember what it is? The weather is getting colder; did I forget to check my washer fluid? No. Check the tire pressure? No, it is fine. Any anniversary, birthdays, or doctor appointments I might have missed? No, all are up to date. Oh, now I remember, we just had an election cycle and I am still waiting to hear the hysterical screams of the left claiming that voters were disenfranchised by the cruel and heartless Republicans.
So where is it? Where are the wild conspiracy theories? Are you trying to tell me the oil industry was not purposely inflating the price of gas to make it harder to reach the polls? Every single voter in the United States knew exactly where their poll site was located and its hours of operation? Every poll opened and closed on time with adequate staffing, no chads where found to be hanging, every voter clearly understood the ballots and filled them out in an unambiguous manner? And, what about absentee and provisional ballots? Are you actually trying to say that the Republicans let a chance to thwart the will of the people through fraud and intimidation slip by? ………….
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Our Newest Op Ed
November 27, 2005 | Filed Under Uncategorized | No Comments
Mything The Point On Purpose (How The Media Takes Control)
- By R.A. Hawkins
I wondered how long it would take for the media to try to take control of the war in Iraq. It really didn’t take all that long for it to happen and one of the people I work with commented on how the media worked it. He said that they get in there and run with the herd and then try to redirect from the inside. I told him that there was a phrase that put a nice name and face on it. It is called the Hegelian Dialectic. But what we’re really looking at is the face of Karl Marx. He really didn’t have any use for that religion stuff, but he saw an opportunity to put the concept to use. What Marx actually did was do a dialectic of the Hegelian Dialectic. If you will read the first link provided below you might begin to see other examples of this concept in the media and in their fair-haired boys, the left-wingers.
As the war ramped up and became inevitable, the liberals realized that what they had been saying all along was actually going to be acted upon. When that occurred even the media had to sign on. They had no choice but to get in there with the rest of the herd. ‘To be heard, join the herd’ if you will. It was the same thing it has always been with them. They joined in so they could merge with the common voice, all the while waiting to regroup and take over the wording of all arguments and discussion. The only way to control a thing is to control the dialogue and that is what they have finally done…………..
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Our Newest Op Ed
November 26, 2005 | Filed Under Uncategorized | No Comments
King Of Fools The Easily Led Should Never Lead!
- By Resa LaRu Kirkland
We have a contingency of hippy hold outs who believe that surrender and the subsequent slavery to totalitarians is preferable to fighting for freedom. I know, I know, they are a smelly, ridiculous bunch…trouble is, they are in positions of power called Congress, and backed by another position of power called Main Stream Media.
It is very hard to overcome these groups when you have no power other than logic, reason, and truth. After all, they can’t be expected to waste their time with such nonsense.
We have that waste of DNA Bill Clinton who has stated that “the war was the right thing to do” but also claims it “was a mistake.” To those of us who think first and feel second, this makes no sense. How can something be right and a mistake? And why the 180 degree change in direction?
Oh wait…it’s Bill Clinton. OK, that explains the “blow with the breeze” change in direction, but still leaves unanswered the “right thing and mistake” comment ………
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Our Newest Op Ed
November 25, 2005 | Filed Under Uncategorized | No Comments
Chicken-hawk talk is UnAmerican - Murtha’s Astonishing Lack of Knowledge
- By Warner Todd Huston
On November 17th, Representative John Murtha (D, PA) called for the USA to prove that Osamma bin Laden is right with his contention that Americans are cowards. He proposed that the US immediately pull its troops from Iraq.
Shocking as it may seem, Murtha was not only in the US military himself, but he served during the Vietnam War. Earning a Bronze Star and two Purple Hearts in Vietnam, you’d think he would know better than to propose that we turn tail and run from battle today. Especially when, after having done so in 1975 at the end of our involvement in Vietnam, so many millions of the Vietnamese people were slaughtered with even more imprisoned by the Communists we left unopposed. And it happened just as anti-Communists here then warned, just as Conservatives warn that a pull out of Iraq would doom many to unnecessary death today. It is one of the few true parallels between Vietnam and Iraq.
Apparently, however, Murtha is not very well informed about history, even that through which he lived……….
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November 24, 2005 | Filed Under Uncategorized | No Comments
No new Op Eds today as we take the holiday off.
But, here is a little essay on the day we celebrate…
Though the “First Thanksgiving” by name was in the Virginia Colony in 1607, our Thanksgiving heritage has its roots with the Pilgrims’ three-day feast in early November of 1621.
After years of their colony failing and families suffering in want, the colonists made a radical change in their philosophy. Instead of the communal arrangement they originally thought would work, an arrangement where everyone contributed their work and crops to the the colony as a whole, they parceled out the land to each family allowing them to keep their own crops and, thereby, work for their own betterment and support.
The Plymouth Colony’s first Thanksgiving to God was celebrated during the summer of 1623, when the colonists declared a Thanksgiving holiday after their crops were saved by much-needed rainfall. The reorganization of their labors toward ownership and property rights set them on the proper path to reaping continual rewards. Families working together primarily for their own betterment were freer—and were better able to pay off the investors.
By the mid-17th Century, the custom of autumnal Thanksgivings was
established throughout New England. Observance of Thanksgiving Festivals spread to other colonies during the American Revolution, and the Continental Congresses, cognizant of the need for a warring country’s continuing grateful entreaties to God, proclaimed yearly Thanksgiving days during the Revolutionary War, from 1777 to 1783.
Our new nation’s first official Thanksgiving Proclamation, issued by the revolutionary Continental Congress on 1 November 1777, expressed gratitude for the colonials’ October victory over British General Burgoyne at Saratoga. Authored by Samuel Adams, the man the other Founders turned to for reasoned statements of liberties as God’s blessings, it read in part: “Forasmuch as it is the indispensable duty of all men to adore the superintending providence of Almighty God; to acknowledge with gratitude their obligation to Him for benefits received…together with penitent confession of their sins, whereby they had forfeited every favor;
and their humble and earnest supplications that it may please God through the merits of Jesus Christ, mercifully to forgive and blot them out of remembrance…it is therefore recommended…to set apart Thursday the eighteenth day of December next, for solemn thanksgiving and praise, that with one heart and one voice the good people may express the grateful feeling of their hearts and consecrate themselves to the service of their Divine Benefactor…acknowledging with gratitude their obligations to Him for benefits received… To prosper the means of religion, for the promotion and enlargement of that kingdom which consisteth ‘in righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost’.”
Washington set his signature to the first day of thanks for the liberties enshrined in our new Constitution, by writing as follows:
“Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor…
“Now, therefore, I do recommend and assign Thursday, the 26th day of November next, to be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being who is the Beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people of this country previous to their becoming a nation; for the signal and manifold mercies and the favorable interpositions of His providence in the course and conclusion of the late war; for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty which we have since enjoyed; for the peaceable and rational manner in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national one now lately instituted; for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed, and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and, in general, for all the great and various favors which He has been pleased to confer upon us.
“And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplication to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations, and beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions; to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually; to render our national government a blessing to all the people by constantly being a government of wise, just and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed; to protect and guide all sovereigns and nations (especially such as have
shown kindness to us), and to bless them with good governments, peace, and concord; to promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the increase of science among them and us; and, generally, to grant unto all mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as He alone knows to be best.
“Given under my hand, at the city of New York, the 3d day of October, AD 1789.”
After 1815, there were no further annual Thanksgiving proclamations until our country was imperiled from the Civil War, when Abraham Lincoln declared 26 November 1863 a Day of Thanksgiving, calling for prayer and thanksgiving for the nation, and saying in part, “[It is] announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations are blessed whose God is the Lord… It has seemed to me fit and proper that…[God’s blessings] should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged, as with one heart and one voice, by the whole American people.”
For the following 75 years, every subsequent president repeated that proclamation, until 1939, when Franklin D. Roosevelt moved Thanksgiving Day to a week earlier than had been tradition, to lengthen the growing pre-Christmas consumer frenzy. Two years later, Congress returned the celebration to its traditional date and permanently set the fourth Thursday of each November as our official national Thanksgiving. Alas, we’ve come to commemorate the holiday with a near-perfunctory acknowledgment.
As this season comes upon us, we have one more thing to be thankful for; that our men and women in the armed forces are once again there to protect our freedoms and assist the downtrodden of the world.
Have a happy Thanksgiving, everyone.
(edited from the Federalist Patriot email message)
A Big Welcome To Our Newest Contributor…
November 23, 2005 | Filed Under Uncategorized | No Comments
Chavez and Venezuela
- Krystle Russin
Venezuela used to be famous for oil, tourism and Miss Universe contestants. Now it is known for its communist wannabe leader. A frequent critic of American politics, Chavez has an obsession with wearing the socialist color red, provides financial backing for Fidel Castro now that Cuba isn’t receiving anything from the USSR, and according to televangelist Pat Robertson, he should be assassinated. I suggest that everyone who thinks President Bush is the worst thing to happen to the United States should be forced to stay in Venezuela for the remainder of Chavez’s term.
Last week at the Summit of the Americas in Argentina, Chavez held a protest attended by 20,000 people to explain why he is better than President Bush, or as he refers to him, “Mr. Danger, the owner of the world.” He said that all of South America should undergo socialist revolutions and kept his same old theme about the war in Iraq and how “imperialist” America is economically unjust. He also claims Mexico’s Vicente Fox acted like a “puppy of the empire.” Most importantly, who is Hugo Chavez to criticize Americans, President Bush, fellow Latin leaders and just about everyone?…………
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