Category: Morality

Tiggers

America, Economy, Education, Entertainment, Family, Finance and Investments, Government, Headlines, Health Care, Morality, Politics, Reason, Religion, Science, Society & Culture, Technology, Uncategorized, Values

The stock market has crashed. Unemployment is skyrocketing. The number of confirmed Wuhan Virus (that’s what I call it) cases is growing exponentially. Grocery store shelves are bare. Gun sales are going through the roof. Office buildings in Manhattan are empty. People are walking around with masks. Schools are cancelled. The internet is bogging down because so many people are home its vaunted capacity (bandwidth) is proving to be inadequate for the demand. California is “locked down”. Hell has broken loose.

However… “The wonderful thing about Tiggers is, tiggers is wonderful things. Their tops are made of rubber, and their tails are made of springs. They’re bouncy, flouncy, trouncy, pouncy, full of fun, fun fun. The wonderful thing about Tiggers is, I’m the only one.” Substitute Americans for tiggers and you’ll have a hint as to why despite the misery and impending doom I’m optimistic for the future.  

My thoughts…

1.            As bad as the pandemic is, it’s not as bad as you think. Simple arithmetic coupled with basic critical thinking points to the conclusion that greater than 99% of everyone who contracts the disease will recover, and we don’t know of course how many people WILL or WILL NOT contract it. Thousands get sick and many die each day from heart disease, cancer, jaywalking, ‘regular’ flu and chronic lung disease from smoking, etc. As of this morning, ~a quarter of a million people WORLDWIDE have been confirmed to have the virus, ~10,000 people WORLDWIDE have died from the virus, and ~86,000 have recovered. These numbers are DWARFED by regular flu.  In the U.S., ~15,000 people have confirmed cases and ~100 people have died. This flu season alone (roughly from October 2019 to the present) 31MM people IN THE UNITED STATES (!) have had the flu. Somewhere around 275,000 give or take have had to be hospitalized, and as many as 30,000 (vs. 100) have died from run-of-the-mill flu! (See  https://www.health.com/condition/cold-flu-sinus/how-many-people-die-of-the-flu-every-year for a plain language discussion.) Translation – this isn’t anywhere near as bad as the media and politicians would have you believe.

2.            Despite what you hear or see, the government is doing the right things. They may not in all cases being doing things right, but the medical, logistical, economic and societal response is “gettin’ ‘er done”. I expect the response is even overdone if you look at the statistics in the previous paragraph. So, for example, NOT EVERYONE NEEDS A TEST! If you get sick, sure, go get a test. But it’s self-centered, selfish and “looking out for number one” just to confirm you’re NOT sick, and may deprive someone who really needs to be tested from getting the help they need. Testing is NOT a cure, and satisfying statistical number crunching is nowhere near as important as preventing and treating the actual disease. Mobilization and coordination among all the health care agencies, departments and the private sector is exactly what is needed, and again, no matter what you hear, there are very competent people who care about others and this country hard at work on the problems. Have some faith in them!

The backstopping of employers in various ways and the anticipated support given to individuals and families is being matched by lenders, landlords, tax collectors… you name it. Everyone’s in this and making accommodations following the lead of the federal, state and local governments.

Just remember that “the government” is made up of people who have the same hopes, dreams, fears, constraints, problems as everyone else in the country. The vast majority are working their asses off to help and do what’s right within their on organizations and spheres of influence. I had to go to the department of motor vehicles the other day. Everyone there had taken a large dose of patience pills and I was both shocked and thrilled to see how both the people behind the counter and in front of it were behaving.

The government, of course, is damned if they do and damned if they don’t, but on balance, its response to this crisis has been overwhelmingly appropriate and helpful. Its communications, despite the handwringing and teeth-gnashing of a “if it bleeds it leads” media has been solid, optimistic, informative and suitably cautionary as to get virtually the whole nation (except the Florida beach Spring Break party animals) to respond as it should. This all happened in a matter of days, unlike the responses during the H1N1, SARS, MERS and other pandemics.

3.            Gas prices and interest rates are falling. The one commodity everyone needs is fuel, and the stimulating effect of a drop in gas prices to the ~$2.00 – ~$2.50 level is incredibly impactful on regular budgets. This will benefit us all, except of course for oil producers. But Washington is on to the Russian and Saudi’s game to try to destroy our energy-independent status and crush our shale industry, and are NOT going to let them get away with it. Similarly, we’re not standing idly by while China spews its propaganda and stomps its feet and blames our military for what they caused or worse, threatens us with withholding drugs such that we become “awash in a sea of Coronavirus”. We’ve thrown the bull#%*& flag on that already and will continue to rub China’s nose in the mess they’ve created and left on the world’s floor. Xenophobic? No, just highlighting the truth in the face false accusations.

4.            One of the silver linings in this mess is the awakening that has occurred among government, industry and the American people that we must no longer be held hostage by foreign manufacturers and suppliers. The Globalist agenda has been thoroughly trounced by this exposure of its flaws, and bringing our manufacturing and supply chains home may result in higher priced goods, but we’ll all benefit in the long run.

5.            Kids are getting educated again. Home schooling is exposing the inadequacies, biases and absurdities of the current state of our education system. Parents are waking up to what is being taught, and what is NOT being taught to our children. I predict that for whatever time period home-schooling prevails, our kids will get a BETTER education than what they’re getting at school, and teachers will be astonished when students return at how far they’ve advanced. You heard it from me first.

6.            Neighbors are helping neighbors. Our little local email chain is lit up with offers of help and assistance. People are getting outside and checking on each other from afar (i.e. more than six feet). Kids are teaching parents and grandparents about Facetime, Skype and Zoom. And Animal Planet is running shows about carefree kittens and puppies. Come on…how much better is it to watch than the gloom and doom on broadcast tv?

7.            People are learning who their leaders are. Not the ones with the titles, but the ones who are true leaders as opposed to managers and demagogues. True leaders step up in times of crisis and go to the front of the crowd, carry a light and turn back to shout encouragement and instill confidence in others. People who may have labored in the shadows or punched well below their weight are now emerging as the shepherds of our society. This separating of the leaders from the followers can only be a positive development.

8.            The Silent Majority is silent no more. Having to adapt to the situation, conservatives and the Right who normally are head down working and caring for themselves and their families are speaking up and speaking out. They are not just throwing the BS flag on politically correct nonsense, they are ignoring social engineering and all its related evils and practicing true philanthropy and real, beneficial community activism.

9.            Complacency is evaporating. It’s amazing what being forced to rely on fundamentals and things that matter will do to a spoiled and coddled population. In the face of what’s going on, do people really care what the Kardashians think?

10.          Faith is making a comeback. It’s sad but true that there are no atheists in foxholes. We’re rediscovering our faith despite not being able to attend Church. And whether it’s one religion or another, it’s the common principles of right and wrong, goodness versus evil and a belief in a set of universal truths that are moving back into the public consciousness. This is a good thing.

11.          Families are getting to know one another again. Yes, we’re cooped up and hunkered down. And things get testy at times as we bumble around in each other’s way. But for many of us, we’re forced to seek virtue: patience, understanding, caring for one another, and learning anew about each other. It doesn’t take a village, it takes a family, and families are binding together out of necessity and love.

And finally, THE MOST IMPORTANT REASON I’M OPTIMISTIC ABOUT THE FUTURE is that America has the most natural and other resources of any nation on earth. We can produce enough of EVERYTHING to take care of ourselves and help the rest of the world to boot. We have the smartest people. We have a spirit of “can do” that is unparalleled on the planet. Many nations think we’re brash, loud, obnoxious, overly proud and nationalistic and hate us for our bad manners and profligacy. So be it. I’d rather live in the United States than in any other country. We will not only get through this, but emerge stronger than ever and once again, we’ll be the city set on a hill letting our light so shine as to be a beacon of freedom and prosperity to the entire world.

I’m a pragmatist, and I recognize the challenges that lie ahead to recover from this mess. But I believe with every fiber of my being that things are going to be better than ok, and sooner than the so-called experts predict. I’m not suggesting we all go Hakuna Matata on this, but let’s put things in perspective shall we?

May God continue to bless us. And may God continue to bless America.

Guns

America, Family, Morality, Politics, Society & Culture

In the coming months there’s going to be a lot of talk about the 2nd Amendment right to bear arms, the NRA and “assault rifles”. The limp-wristed Leftists who think a gun magazine is something you read will stomp their feet and gnash their teeth crying “we have to get guns off the streets” and “Republicans want guns so they can kill our kids” and similar nonsense.

The ignorance on the subject of guns is truly astounding. Hollywood has had much to do with creating false perceptions, and hypocritical, power-hungry politicians, many of whom have armed bodyguards, try to use this to their advantage. It’s a subject that can and will be discussed far beyond this election cycle, and there are so many facets to it, from the constitutional to the economic, to the ethical and moral, to the pragmatic…this article is only a tiny toe-in-the-water attempt to dispel some of the more glaring falsehoods and mis-characterizations of both guns and gun owners that permeate the airwaves.

First of all, guns are only one means to either inflict injury or death. In the hands of a determined killer a gun is actually one of the least efficient ways of carrying out an evil act. A bomb or driving a car into a crowd is far more deadly. Just ask Timothy McVeigh or Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

Similarly, guns are only one means of self-defense, but they’re an equalizer. A trained, 115 pound gun- wielding mom defending her children against a threatening 250 pound home invader has a far better chance of protecting them with a gun than without one. Yes, locks, alarms, pepper spray, a fireplace poker or baseball bat and “retreating to a safe place” are all possible defensive alternatives, but they’re hardly as effective as a gun against a perpetrator intent on harm.

The constant whining about “assault rifles” is sickening to responsible gun owners and enthusiasts. From Colorado Democrat Representative Diana DeGette’s idiotic statement that if there is a ban on magazines eventually the number of bullets would diminish “because the bullets will have been shot and there won’t be any more available,” to Nancy Pelosi’s bill to ban “assault magazines”, I could go on and on but I’ll simply point you to this article entitled “Top Ten Most Idiotic Anti-Gun Quotes from Politicians”.

For those of you who are NOT knowledgeable about guns, a magazine is the part of the gun that holds the bullets or shells, and is continuously re-used, so banning magazines doesn’t ban or reduce the number of bullets! And, by the way, the difference between bullets and shells is the difference between rifles and handguns and shotguns. Shotguns use shells, the others, bullets. Magazines can hold either but each is specific to the precise ammunition used!

Another common absurdity spewing from the mouths of Leftists is the suggestion that the AR in AR-15 stands for “Assault Rifle”. In fact, it stands for ArmaLite, the company that has been around since 1954 and that designed all kinds of rifles, each named with the prefix AR.

An assault rifle is a weapon that is capable of ‘select’ or in other words, fully-automatic fire…essentially, a machine gun. That’s what the police and soldiers have hanging from the straps around their necks. The Left would have you believe that ANY gun that looks scary, i.e. one that looks like a military rifle such as the AR-15, or the most widely available gun type in the world…the AK-47 and its variants, is an assault weapon. No!  Fully-automatic, true assault rifles are already illegal. The kind of AR-15 or AK-47 that can be bought and used are semi-automatic. The difference is that pressing the trigger of a real assault rifle when in fully-automatic mode will cause it to shoot bullets continuously until the trigger is released. On a semi-automatic rifle such as the kind owned by hundreds of thousands of gun-owners, the trigger must be pressed once for each firing of a bullet. The infamous “bump stock” used by the Las Vegas shooter was a device that allowed a semi-automatic rifle to simulate a fully-automatic one, but such a device could be used on lots of different semi-automatic rifles, including ones that don’t look scary!

Ironically, the M-1 Garand – the principal rifle used by the U.S. military during World War II, seems to be ok with the Left because it doesn’t look like scary but rather more like a classic hunting rifle. However, just ask many a dead German or Japanese soldier whether they considered the M-1 to be an assault weapon!

The justification for owning an AR or AK style rifle should not be, as some pro-gun advocates suggest, for hunting. Sure you can hunt with one, and many do, but for pure hunting purposes, a specific hunting rifle like the Winchester Model 70 with a scope on it will likely fill your freezer with venison more efficiently than an AR-15.

No, the justification for owning an AR or AK “assault-style” weapon is that they are dual-purpose – they are effective both for hunting AND self-defense. As the Winchester Model ’94 (the lever-action saddle “Gun that Won the West” featured in Western movies) was the dual-purpose rifle of the late 1800 and early 1900’s, the AR-15 and AK-47 are the dual-purpose rifles of today. Can any of these be used in a mass shooting incident? Yes, and so can a pressure-cooker bomb!

Under the heading PROPAGANDA, you may have seen a spot on television from the Ad Council where a little boy talks to his dad about the handgun hidden under the sweaters in the father’s closet. The clip is intended to shock the viewer into thinking “Oh my God, the child has access to a handgun and could do so much harm to himself or others! We simply have to ban guns.” What’s so ridiculous about this portrayal is that no responsible gun owner leaves a gun in a place accessible to children! And while there may be some irresponsible gun owners who have an easily accessible loaded gun in the house, they take other precautions, of which there are many, to ensure it doesn’t get into the wrong hands.

But this is but one example of the ignorant bias of such “public service” depictions. The barrage is continuous and serves no-one save the felons who would like nothing more than the assurance that they won’t encounter an armed citizen when they perpetrate their crimes.

I once sat at dinner with a conservative Englishman with whom I agreed on just about every topic except guns. “How could you allow so many guns in America and pass legislation supporting their ownership? That’s absurd”, he said. In reply I calmly pointed out, “Let’s say we were instantaneously able to get all 350 million plus guns in the hands of American residents off the streets on a Monday. How many guns do you think there would be on the streets by Friday, and in whose hands would they be?”

The suggestion that all guns are inherently dangerous is analogous to saying that all cars are dangerous! It is a true statement, irrespective of whether it’s uttered by the NRA or an individual gun-owner, that the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. And while rarely publicized, the number of times annually that guns in the hands of responsible gun-owners have stopped crimes dwarfs the number of times guns are actually used in the commission of a crime. What is never reported, because it can’t be, is how many times the presence of a good guy with a gun DETERS a crime, or the times a criminal abandons a crime and flees when confronted with the barrel of a gun in the hands of a good guy.

In summary, it is absolutely true that “guns don’t kill people, people do”. In the U.S. there are far more responsible gun owners than criminals with guns, and that in and of itself deters many more crimes than might otherwise occur.

So demagogue politicians can and will denounce guns, and fracking, and cow farts and whatever else comes along that is the “cause du jour”. Their stupid memes and crusades aren’t going to help anyone but those who live off the grant money and donations of people trying to “feel good” about “doing something”. 

There, I feel slightly better now. Someday I’ll tell you how I really feel!

Despicable Them

Morality, Politics

With apologies to the producers and directors of the cartoon movie hit “Despicable Me”, the label “Despicable Them” aptly applies to politicians in general, but to Leftist politicians in particular. As always, it’s a question of degree. The degree to which the Democrat leadership (note I say leadership, not ALL Democrats) exhibits despicable behavior and spews despicable rhetoric dwarfs, as Jupiter dwarfs the Earth, anything the Republican leadership has done or said.

Examples abound but probably the best one is that of Nancy Pelosi ceremoniously ripping the State of the Union speech in half and claiming it was all lies. As regards despicable rhetoric: Chuck Schumer, Adam Schiff, Jerry Nadler, Bill deBlasio, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, Maxine Waters, Sheila Jackson Lee, Louis Farrakhan, Al Sharpton, Linda Sarsour…the list of those with verbal diarrhea goes on and on. Every time any of these people open their mouths, nothing but despicable falsehoods and bile emerge.

How do they get away with this? Edmund Burke had the answer: The Fourth Estate. In Thomas Carlyle’s book On Heroes and Hero Worship he attributes to Burke: “Burke said there were Three Estates in Parliament; but, in the Reporters’ Gallery yonder, there sat a Fourth Estate more important far than they all.”[i] He was of course referring to the Press, or in today’s language, the “Media”.

The term “fourth estate” and “fourth branch” are both used to describe what used to be journalism, which clearly doesn’t exist anymore. Someone I know with a degree in Journalism from Columbia University, arguably the pre-eminent journalism school in the country, grudgingly admits that the principles taught there are violated continuously.

Fourth Estate as a term is meant to emphasize the independence of the Media, while the related term “Fourth Branch” suggests the Media is an extension of the government. In my opinion, it’s hardly the latter, but the Media’s ability to influence (i.e. brainwash) inattentive or non-critical-thinking minds is obvious. Abandonment of journalistic principles such as three-source corroboration or the vetting of sources to ensure reliability, coupled with the power of the internet to broadcast the most salacious lies and twisted arguments, has fostered an environment where despicable behavior and rhetoric thrives.

Given that the professional Media is predominantly Leftist, as are the indolent with too much time on their hands to do anything productive but tweet and post (I hasten to defend that the reason I have the time is that I’m retired after working hard for fifty years), the Left are provided with overwhelming covering fire. The saturated with Leftist garbage airwaves thus leave little room for any reasonable debate or reflection. That same cover gives impunity to the most despicable, even immoral Leftist behavior in both the commercial as well as political realms.

The Left is guilty too of what I think is one of the most despicable behaviors: Projection. Albeit in its weak-mindedness much of the Left doesn’t even see it, or its hypocrisy, it’s axiomatic that if they are whining about something, accusing the Right of something, falsely claiming credit for or denying culpability for something, it is precisely what they are guilty of. Just today Chuck Schumer sent a letter decrying Attorney General William Barr’s throwing of the BS flag on the Roger Stone sentencing. Said the spotlight-hog/grandstander/demagogue Schumer: “This situation has all the indicia of improper political interference in a criminal prosecution.” Sure, and the Left has NEVER improperly interfered in a criminal prosecution…Schumer’s statement is stupid as the President and Attorney General are empowered to intervene ex officio, and the public knows damn well the prosecutors are piling on a Trump ally. (But put a microphone and a spotlight within a hundred miles of Schumer and he will RUN to it!).

Projection.

Thank God we now have pro-justice leaders like Barr who are willing to wade into the Swamp with a flame-thrower to destroy the truly despicable, poisonous rot of the Left that has festered for so many years.  

[i] Wikipedia: article – “Fourth Estate”

Would That Be So Bad?

America, Economy, Family, History, Morality, Politics, Reason, Religion, Society & Culture, Values

With the world falling apart in front of us and Leftists assaulting every sacred and historically treasured traditional value while asserting that the dismantling of our culture is “progressive”, what if we challenged the notion that “there’s no going back”?

What if we were to withdraw our troops from all of our foreign bases and let Russia and China fight it out for hegemony and see what it’s like to be the world’s policeman, getting bogged down in endless wars and, unlike us out of largesse, squandering their resources on attempted world domination?

What if we were to perfect Reagan’s original Star Wars Strategic Defense Initiative, i.e. reproducing the Enterprise’s “shields up”- and photon torpedoes capabilities so as to negate or obliterate anything our adversaries could throw at us?

What if we were to withdraw to secure borders and become completely self-reliant and self-sufficient as we have with oil? Suppress the horror and revulsion that leaps to mind when a 55” flat screen television suddenly but temporarily costs $3,000 again instead of $500. Instead, imagine “Made in the U.S.A.” instead of “China” or “Mexico” on just about everything we buy and consume. And Bass Weejuns were once again made in Maine.

What if we were to withdraw from the United Nations and establish a new organization of free, democratic countries and emerging nations that subscribe to our federalist-constitutional-‘meritocratic’  approach to government and society?

What if we were to roll back the welfare/nanny state and restore an “everybody needs to pull their weight” culture? What if we were to dismantle the safety nets and nanny protections that have made all of us soft-in-the-belly and turned Millennials and Gen Z into snowflakes? How bad would it be if they had to actually work hard and produce things of real value?

What if we were to reduce the size of the Federal government by half? Would we miss having six different departments massaging the same numbers and producing meaningless (and misleading) reports that cast them in 6 x 6 different ways?

What if we were to eliminate abortion-on-demand, restore marriage to what it is and has been for thousands of years, and truly “eliminate welfare as we know it”? Would families matter again? Would “taking care of one’s own” be so bad as they, and their communities, came together to help one another out of necessity because the government handout offices would be closed?

What if continence and self-control, a restored respect for one another in male-female relationships were restored. What if the natural consequences, including stigma attached to divorce, abortion, broken families, of immorality were to come back? Would these constraints on our “anything goes so long as it feels good or doesn’t interfere with what I want at the moment” approach toward life be destructive or beneficial?

What if were to eliminate tenure and “retire-after-twenty-years-with-rest-of-life pensions-and-100%-healthcare-benefits-coverage” and restore the teaching profession to the noble one it once was? What if we taught kids to read using common sense phonics instead of “whole word” recognition. What if we went back to teaching arithmetic and insist there are right and wrong answers rather than “good tries”? What if we only gave real winners trophies? And what if we could once again celebrate victories instead of falling over backwards to ensure that losers’ feelings weren’t hurt? What if we were to show the movie “Rudy” to kids instead of some documentary on turning algae into fuel?

What if we once again started the school day with the Pledge of Allegiance, and allowed assemblies and the start of sporting events to be opened with prayer? And allowed the Star Spangled Banner to be sung at public events?

What if we didn’t reprimand kids for sitting “indian style” on the floor instead of “criss cross applesauce”?

What if we were to celebrate nuclear families again instead of “non-traditional” families? And what if we were to put the “boys” and “girls” or “men” and “women” signs back on bathroom doors?

Would that be so bad?

As I’ve mentioned in previous posts numerous times, our society seems so hell bent on meeting the needs of the few that we overlook, neglect and harm the many.

Lies and Damned Lies

Morality, Reason, Society & Culture, Values

Failing to convince half the country that its ideology is replete with “progressive” truth and right, the Left now bypass nuance or even lip-service to honesty and just outright lie to our faces.

I’ve previously railed against economists and statisticians, so I’ll leave off the last third of Mark Twain’s famous statement: “There are three kinds of lies in the world: lies, damned lies and statistics.” I’m going to focus on the first two, which are rampantly manifest in virtually every form of media: print, radio, video and social medium.

It used to be called “spin”. In business schools around the country is was called “creative misrepresentation”. In its most benign form, it was called “casting the facts in the best light”.

Today it’s unvarnished, unsubtle lies.

The Left, masters of form over function, appearance versus reality and impression-creation, use media to touch the heartstrings and sensibilities of “root for the underdog” -fundamentally-good-people, convincing them that their causes and crusades are fair and just, and anything that opposes them are immoral.

It’s not just political theater. It’s mass manipulation.

With great drama and conviction, the Left proclaims as facts things they themselves know are false.

By repeating the lies over and over again, progressively (.sic) increasing the volume level and saturating the media with them, the Left seeks to steamroller their ideology over truth. Even truths that would be obvious and clear to any thinking human being are crushed by the onslaught.

I’m not going to a provide a laundry list of examples…to anyone reading this who has half a brain, the lies are obvious. Rather, I’m going to suggest two approaches for dealing with them depending on whether a) one just wants to be left alone to do what he or she knows is right or b) be an aggressive defender of and fighter for the truth.

For those of us who are simply too busy working hard, raising our families, supporting our neighbors and communities, and who aren’t news junkies suffering continuous blood pressure spikes, here’s my simple advice. IGNORE it all! Just keep doing what’s right, teaching your children the real truth, gently (if possible) correcting the nonsense they’re being taught at school, keep the tv turned off, and to the extent possible, ban all forms of social media from cell phones, tablets, laptops and other conduits to the superhighway of falsehoods called the internet.

For those of us who want to fight…put on the strongest psychological armor you possess, arm yourself with anecdotes, quips, one-liners and witty rejoinders (remember, facts will get you nowhere), and learn how to manipulate THEIR sensibilities and tug on THEIR heart strings. Take acting lessons if you have to, because you’re going to have to clothe yourself in sheep’s clothing while masking the disposition and determination of a wolf. Better yet, become strong enough to be a lion, afraid of no-one, impervious to the slings and arrows that will come at you from a hundred directions. Be prepared to see friends turn into enemies, family members shun you.

Join with others of like mind. There are closet conservatives and traditionalists everywhere…you just have to seek them out. Avoid the temptation to participate in rant sessions. Although the therapeutic value and catharsis of being able to speak freely, condemning with gusto what you know to be Leftist drivel, is great, it doesn’t get us anywhere.

Rather, by word and example cling to, espouse, demonstrate and exude traditional values and principles. Tell the truth. Mind your manners. Speak softly but carry a big stick (something like the guy called Negan had in The Walking Dead) in case you need it. Dress not to impress or to draw attention to yourself (that’s what the Left in its desperation for attention does) but in such a way as to say, “I’m not a fashion hound, I don’t care what the latest and greatest label is”. I also urge you to flee from the slavery of tech…pull out your handheld device only when absolutely necessary, and insist that your kids put a governor on their use as well.

Finally, I urge you to pray to whichever God you know for guidance, wisdom, strength and the ability to fight.

One step at a time…it’s a long way back up the slippery slope.

Celebrating the Male Chauvinist Pig

America, Family, History, Morality, Politics, Reason, Religion, Society & Culture, Values

Compared to “misogynist”, “racist”, “homophobe”, “angry white male”, “supremacist, “PSM” (Pale, Stale, Male)… these days excoriating a traditional man as a “Male Chauvinist Pig” seems kind of quaint!

Back in the 60’s, while some of us were working our butts off, obeying the laws, seeking to get ahead, providing for our families, treating everyone with respect irrespective of their color, creed, religion, and holding doors open for women, others shed their steel capped shoes for birkenstocks, grew their hair long, wore tie-dye with beads around their necks and smoked dope. With the latter celebrated in song, dance and Hollywood, it’s no wonder that women eventually began to look with derision at limp-wristed washouts and loser men abrogating both their responsibilities and, well, their manhood.

Forced or at least compelled to pick up the slack, women, many whom really were discriminated against, took what has always been a battle – the “Battle of the Sexes” from a cold war to a kinetic one. What started in the early 1900’s as a demand for voting rights has now turned into vicious misandry.

Look up male chauvinist pig and you find it refers to men who think that women are inferior, objects to be used or kept like pets. The definition is now used by militant feminists as depicting ALL men, but particularly white men. And while we old white guys can laugh it off much as we do all the other Leftist hysteria and political correctness, the assault on men has now permeated pre-K and elementary schools, where normal boy behavior is denigrated and labeled “toxic masculinity.”  

Nicholas Chauvin, of course, was a legendary soldier in Napoleon’s army who was famously supportive of his emperor and his country. Chauvinism, therefore, meant patriotism but in the 60’s morphed into a pejorative label referring to bigotry or bias on the part of any man.

I believe actual MCP’s in our society are few and far between. Of course one can always find examples of men who treat women as inferior and exhibit truly reprehensible behavior, but the vast majority of men whom I’ve seen and encountered throughout our country, (and I’ve traveled widely) treat women with respect, dignity, sometimes even reverence, and always have!

Does the row of hard-hat construction boys with open lunchboxes ogle and smirk and occasionally whistle at the women walking by? Yes, and it’s more than just bad manners, but it isn’t male chauvinist pigism! Do the vast majority of them head home after work, help their wives get dinner on the table and the kids with their homework afterword? Yes, in my experience, that’s precisely what they do.

Boyhood is and has been under attack for some time. “All boys, especially white boys, are rebuked for their masculinity. They watch as girls are told they are special. They are told they are privileged, guilty, and must atone for their sins as if they are themselves were white supremacists. The expectation for white boys is that they should get in line behind girls, children of color, and illegal immigrants.” – Noel Anenberg, August 16, 2019, American Thinker, “Ideology, the Schools, and Murder: The McInerney/King Case“

Should women look at every man as a potential rapist or molester? Should men never again compliment a woman for any reason? Shall men allow themselves to shrivel up and just sit quietly in a corner while feminazis (my preferred term for the small minority of loud, bitter, militants who have hijacked the noble feminist agenda),  foment their warped ideology and escalate a battle that has resulted in anti-patriotism (e.g. the Women’s Soccer Team) and, for example, female quotas for football teams and military combat units?  

I think not.

Not too many years ago I held open a door for a woman who nastily said as she came through, “I can open it myself.” Should I have slammed it in her face? I felt like it, but no, in fact, we traditional men are going to have to suck it up and ride out this war, picking our battles and alternating between fighting and diplomacy, between stiffening our spines and quietly acquiescing, between speaking out against the male-bashing drivel and just staying quiet and letting the feminazis spew their venom. I’m heartened that traditional women are increasingly throwing down the BS flag on radical feminism and pushing back with “You don’t represent ME!”

In short, if holding to traditional views of gender roles, civil, polite and well-mannered manhood is being a Male Chauvinist Pig, please feel free to call me one!

Courtesy Matters

Family, Morality, Society & Culture, Uncategorized, Values

It’s tough to be courteous to vile people, and the Left are becoming increasingly, unbearably vile.

Yet, we need to try. If we’re ever going to restore civility and traditionalism to our country, we need to respect what our parents taught us about courteousness.

I have a complete repertoire of lawyer jokes and have more than once repeated the old joke about how 5,000 dead lawyers at the bottom of the ocean is, “A start.” But there’s one thing we can learn from lawyers, particularly trial lawyers. Watch any law-themed series on television or better, attend a jury trial in a real courtroom, and you’ll see the attorneys act (99% of the time) with professionalism and courtesy towards the jury, the plaintiff, the defendant, their counsel and the judge. How they do it in the face of the distortions, spin, deflections, etc. that are thrown around by each side; how they can be civil when the integrity of witnesses, particularly, are impugned so viciously albeit courteously, is extraordinary. The performances may be part of the theatrics of litigation, but they’re instructive nonetheless. Often, the attorney who makes the best impression is the one who wins the case, and courtesy is an integral part of the act and how they make that impression.

Many years ago I was recruited to serve as the CFO of an obscure tech company. Seeking a ground floor opportunity in the post Y2K, burgeoning tech world, I responded to the offer to talk to them. One bright, sunny morning I visited its headquarters in Manhattan and was ushered into a conference room to await the CEO.

As I stood looking out the window over the Manhattan skyline, a young fellow came in and began gathering up some used styrofoam coffee cups and arranging and stacking some coasters that sat on the highly polished conference room table. He had on an open collar, rather wrinkled plaid shirt, jeans, and he had hair down to the middle of his back tightly pulled back on his head and gathered in a pony tail with a rubber band at the nape of his neck.He went about his business sheepishly, almost furtively, without speaking.

Having turned to see who had entered the room, I offered a pleasant “Good Morning” and then proceeded to help him gather up the cups and tidy up the room. He held open the garbage bag while I tossed in some of the debris from an earlier meeting, and he thanked me as he completed his task and left.

The whole incident took no more than perhaps 60 seconds, and I thought nothing of it. A minute or two later the CEO came in, dressed in a suit as was I, and we sat and had a straightforward and frank conversation about the company’s needs, my qualifications, etc. – everything you’d expect from a standard executive interview.

And then the CEO said, “You know, I’d like you to meet the President of the Company who is really my partner and co-founder. Do you have a few more minutes?” I of course replied, “Certainly,” and the CEO left, returning a couple of minutes later with, you guessed it, the man who previously had come in to tidy up the room.

I am convinced to this day that the judgment about hiring me to become the Company’s CFO was made in that two minute interval when the CEO left to fetch the President. And I am also convinced that the pivotal trigger moment which sealed the deal had nothing to do with the interview, but everything to do with the simple courtesy I extended to the President in that little interchange before the interview started.

A wise man was once quoted as saying, “The true greatness of a person, in my view, is evident in the way he or she treats those with whom courtesy and kindness are not required.” Joseph B. Wirthlin

Most of the time, simple courtesies aren’t recompensed with a job offer, or even acknowledged. Yet, a kind word, treating others with respect and dignity no matter what their station or role in life, is the right thing to do.

Courtesy matters.

Don’t Just Do Something, STAND THERE!

America, Government, Morality, Politics, Reason, Society & Culture

The hyperventilating politicians can’t help themselves. Doing something, ANYTHING whether it makes sense or not, is not only predictable, but to every thinking American, laughable. We see this in children desperate for attention, except these are supposed to be adults. “Never let a crisis go to waste.” Insidiously true!

First come the cries of “We have to have a serious conversation…”. Almost immediately thereafter comes the search for a scapegoat, “It’s the [fill in the blank]’s fault!” Then come the condescending vituperations and finally, if enough celebrities jump on the bandwagon, come the protests and sometimes riots.

For example, let’s take the current “mass shootings”. Even though it’s been said a dozen times over that all the legislation needed to enforce gun laws are already on the books, and nothing being proposed would have made any difference in the great majority of the incidents, the theatrics are omnipresent. The 2020 presidential candidates’ hand-wringing, eye-rolling, blame-their-opponents, gnashing of teeth, weeping, wailing, demands to “do something”… it’s all unadulterated nonsense.

Why? Because if every gun in America were eliminated on a Monday, how many guns would there be on the streets by Friday, and who would have them? Of course, the answer is hundreds, if not thousands, and it’d be the criminals and the madmen! And then we’d have to defend ourselves with baseball bats. I submit you’d have to have a hellavu swing to knock out of the park a 9MM bullet shot by a determined gunman threatening your family.

But on the Left, the rhetoric is tantamount to “confiscate all guns and America will be a safer place”. More nonsense. It’d be like giving everyone in the country a tee-shirt with a target on it and the words, “shoot here”.

“We’ve got to get the guns out of the hands of the people who shouldn’t have them,” is another familiar cry. Enacting legislation that tries to do this would create more injustice to responsible gun owners. Whether a responsible gun owner goes to jail or not would then be dependent on how good the victimhood act from the aggrieved party is. “He (or she…let’s not be sexist here) is an angry old white man who’s threatening me!” Of course, the spouse making that allegation may have just had his or her belongings destroyed by that baseball bat or some other infliction, and the threats were made by the non-gun-owner party. Who gets arrested?  

No, the solution to the mass shooting problem is not more legislation. The solution is easily described but terribly difficult to achieve. It is the return to and practice of traditional values in society. Fundamental morality has to become popular again. The teaching of right and wrong has to be the norm. Heroes have to be good rather than evil, and the Golden Rule has to prevail. In the late sixties, before the pendulum swung completely to the left, it would not have been such a herculean task. Today, with the pendulum so far left it’s near the 270 degree mark, it is.

We are repeating the mistake of history. Every great civilization: Egypt, Athens, Rome, Western Europe and now America, has gone through the same pattern: growth, prosperity, indolence, moral decay, the rise of deviant, destructive hedonism and demagogues, challenges from envious nations, the crumbling of traditional family units, the celebration of evil and immorality, the eventual decline of the culture, sovereignty impugned until its demise and replacement by another civilization in an earlier stage of the cycle.

Where do you think we are in this continuum?

The rampant demagoguery we’re witnessing is the sad symptom of a great civilization that is very ill. Is our situation fatal? Absolutely not. There are many among us who are speaking out and trying to push that pendulum back the other way. We do so by word and deed. In public we no longer speak in whispers or hushed tones about the rabid and caustic influence the Left is having on our society. When we walk our dogs, we don’t just pick up after them, we take an extra bag along and collect wrappers and cans and plastic water bottles along the street as well.  

Sadly, but inevitably, it takes an outside shock like a world war, a natural disaster, a pandemic or some other cataclysmic event to wake us up and propel us to pay attention to the basics again. And by basics I mean the STUFF THAT MATTERS.  

But the one thing we need more than anything to turn our civilization around is MORAL LEADERSHIP. The fact that so many would scoff at the previous sentence is symptomatic of how great the need is.

The 2016 presidential election was a cataclysmic event and it indeed caused us to reflect on what matters. Now we need to pick up the pieces of our society broken by the events of the last 11 or so years and MAKE GOOD COOL AGAIN.

And we have to somehow get rid of demagogue politicians and replace them with serious adults who ACTUALLY care about our country and its future rather than power, influence and money – ones who will sometimes stand there and do nothing instead of making things worse.

“When the Left Snatches our Kids” – Verbatim Repost of an Exceptional (!) Article

America, Education, Entertainment, Family, Government, History, Morality, Politics, Reason, Religion, Society & Culture, Values

I pray it is not too late. I pray there are still places in our country where traditional values still prevail. But the other day I read an article in American Thinker: “When the Left Snatches our Kids” by Sally Zelikovsky, to whom all credit is due, that so closely reflects my fears that I’m going to “retweet it”, i.e. reproduce it in full. It is precisely the kind of alarm I’ve been trying to raise for my own children and grandchildren. It isn’t so much prescriptive as a call to arms. It succinctly rifles to the crux of all that’s going wrong with our society.

While I’ve been careful to distinguish between Conservative and Traditional in my writings, one could do a cut and paste, replacing the word Traditional with Conservative in the article and it would remain spot on. The italics are mine.

“I am skeptical that our efforts as conservative parents to produce conservative offspring will materialize.  Even with the best of intentions, the odds are not in our favor to successfully counter the Democrat-Media Complex, the educational system, and pop culture. That doesn’t mean there aren’t success stories (some in my own family), but I hear more about the failure and the disaffection it engenders in conservative families.

Conservative parents have learned the hard way that how your kids turn out depends on a host of factors that, at some point during the maturation process, are way beyond our control — friends, personal experiences, a particular book or documentary, brain chemistry, friends, a teacher/professor/boss, personality, a romantic relationship, college activities, pop culture, hobbies, and…friends.  Usually, it’s not one but an amalgamation of several factors and presto chango!  The kid who was once the lone conservative arguing at the lunch table, now thinks David Hogg and AOC are bitchin’. 

We see them everywhere — the emaciated college-age vegans working at Starbucks, hysterical young girls pounding on Supreme Court doors, attractive anti-Semites leading the charge in Congress.  I’m sure some of them had conservative upbringings — you cannot assume they were all raised by liberals.  Yet, in her reporting about out-of-control liberal college students some time ago, I heard Laura Ingraham link their behavior to their upbringing.  Only a parent whose children hadn’t yet attended high school could make such an absurd connection.  We can try but we cannot guarantee what our children will believe.  

Once again, I find myself referencing Red Scare movies like Invasion of the Body Snatchers. It resonates.  We have to be vigilant, stay informed, understand the arguments of the other side and how to combat them.  If we don’t, eventually the pods take us over.  I graduated high school a Reagan Republican whose political arguments were admittedly my Dad’s.  When I arrived at a competitive college filled with smart, often private-school educated Merit scholars, I lost every political debate. I just didn’t have the breadth of information and understanding of history to counter their arguments.  Thus, I graduated college…a Democrat.  In time, I fell back on those critical thinking skills my parents instilled in me.  A desire to understand more as I graduated from law school and entered the work force, led me to self-educate and, eventually, return to my conservative roots. 

That was also in the ‘80s and early ‘90s when life was simpler and more balanced: when “gay marriage” was still an oxymoron; before triggers and safe spaces, the internet, social media, doom and gloom “climate change,” and legalized pot; before we had an alphabet of sexualities to choose from and the ability to change sexes; before blended families became the norm; before hatred became the quintessential reason for all of society’s ills.  

Not all teachers and professors were proselytizing progressives, the media was less corrupt, and your politics were not a factor in getting or retaining a job.  Because of the deep societal changes since then, not every Millennial or Gen Xer has the wherewithal, the background, or the backbone to recognize and then punch back against the forces of propaganda, fess up to and toil with their own ignorance, or simply engage in respectful debate with those who have another point of view — no matter how steeped in conservatism their childhood. 

I am not suggesting we stop lecturing our children about competing points of view, stop teaching them to be skeptical about what they learn in school or from their peers, or stop challenging the false orthodoxies they are barraged with on virtually every topic from sexuality to climate, energy to food, and national security to border security.  We should continue to bang the drum.  We must.  And we must remain hopeful that someday those we lost will return to the conservative fold because they see the wisdom of conservative principles.  But for all of you young parents out there who think you’ll do better than those before you, be prepared for disappointment. 

The conservative path is littered with the bodies of well-intentioned parents who are devastated when their formerly straight kids come out of imaginary closets, transition to the opposite sex, or demand to be called “they”; when their Jewish Day School educated children announce their support for the BDS movement; when their evangelical  children support blatant infanticide; when their happy, well-adjusted kids go off to college and return believing weed is innocuous, struggling with drug addiction, or suffering from mental illness. 

These cultural maladies affect liberals and conservatives alike, but are unusually bitter pills for conservatives to swallow because they are packaged in a lifestyle and value system antithetical to everything we teach our children — resilience, pride, integrity, honesty, open-mindedness, self-reliance, individuality, taking responsibility for our actions, doing right when we screw up, and teaching a man to fish.  Liberals cast us as hypocrites whose principles clash with reality, but what they don’t understand is that we believe in taking responsibility for and learning from our missteps so we constantly evolve into better beings (and don’t get mired in unbridled, misplaced hatred and lifelong victimhood).

Secondly, conservative parents are treated by their children with a level of hostility that doesn’t seem to afflict liberal parents with conservative children.  Loving, nurturing conservative parents find themselves catapulted to Holocaust-denier status and demoted to homophobic, intolerant, racist, privileged, religious zealots.  Relics of an oppressive past. It is painful when your kids reject everything you raised them to value. Despise you. Scoff at you. Turn against you. Align with your political foes. Resent you for brainwashing them with yourhateful, 1950‘s agenda.

Now, some of that is typical teenage/young adult angst and rebellion.  When frontal lobes are soothed by the right combination of hormones and our insecure little monsters segue into more confident adults, those nasty side effects often dissipate. But much of the antipathy they are exposed to is encouraged by “the man” in the liberal camp — we’ll call him “the burning man.”  He instructs us to hate authority, hate anything established, hate tradition, hate the moral code you grew up with, hate anyone who is white or successful, and hate those who embrace any of this. Hence, hate your parents.  Hate your old neighborhood.  They are the problem.  And while today all you have to do is oppose them, someday you might have to actively go against them, even “turn them in.” The burning man says this is okay because you are right and the end justifies the means. I’m not being paranoid. Our entire educational system is based on appropriating the minds of our children and undoing all they have learned at home, turning them into weapons of mass societal destruction in the burning man’s toolbox. 

We have all participated in holiday dinners and family vacations ruined by dissension and door-slamming.  Family harmony devolves into family discord, function into dysfunction, and closeness morphs into estrangement.  Parents are instructed to just shut up already! Politics and religion are off the table.  Dinner conversations revolve around silly cat videos and trivial drivel.  Soon there is little left to discuss.  After all, everything is political now — from your sneakers to your bus commute during Pride Month. 

Once upon a time, we could fall back on cultural interests like music, movies, theater, travel, and sports to avoid potentially explosive conversations at family gatherings about politics and religion.  Now, virtue signaling is so ubiquitous that everything seems to fall into the Realm of the verboten.  It becomes more and more difficult to find common ground.  Constructive input I like your haircut and simple questions Did you decide on a major?  What are you doing for break? How do you like your job? are potential triggers.  Family get togethers are so contentious there is an increasing tendency to minimize interactions.  Even life’s big “hatching, matching, and dispatching” events are often fraught with tension — relatives who couldn’t be seated together because of some family squabble are now separated because one has a worldview the other finds detestable.

Some parents give in. They don’t want politics or values to stand in the way of their relationships with their kids, so they re-visit their Weltanschauung.  Constant pressure from your 20-year-old bubelah goes a long way towards re-educating Mom and Dad. Senator Rob Portman was against gay marriage until his son came out and then… he evolved.  I’d rather fight than switch is a paean to another time. 

This is nothing new.  Many parents drank the Kool-Aid and became part of the 60s counterculture their children brought home.  Ironically, many of their hippie children became yuppies and did the unthinkable — morphed into their conservative parents.  Hmm.  I suppose we can be clear-eyed about the transformative societal and political forces pulling our children away from conservatism, at the same time we cling to the hope that our liberal progeny will switch and fight for conservative principles and maybe even cling to their bibles and the Constitution, too.”

Wish I could have said it like that!

Comment by DOC DURACOAT August 3, 2019:
“All you people should move to Boca Raton, Florida! Our public high school has been rated A for the last 10 years straight. We have a very active ROTC program, and it is routine to see these kids in the halls wearing military uniforms. The flag is respected, everyone stands for the pledge of allegiance, even the minority students. Graduation rates and college acceptance rates are very high. 

Discipline is enforced, disrupting class is not tolerated. My kids and their friends all graduated as sports playing, modest dressing, great conservative kids. Come on down and bring your guns and bibles! Your kids will graduate with a great education and strong conservative moral values.”


Traditional Values, Traditionalists and Traditionalism

America, Government, History, Morality, Politics, Reason, Religion, Society & Culture

Attributed to the American author Samuel R. Delany is the phrase “Words mean things.” Hijacking words and phrases is a powerful tool in the arsenal of the demagogue. And the twisting of usage and meaning into pretzels has always been a favorite device of politicians and pundits. With this in mind, I thought I should explain what I mean when I refer in my writing to Traditional Values, Traditionalists and Traditionalism.

Look up Traditionalism and you’ll receive a panoply of descriptions and definitions. One of the first articles that comes up from a search is: “a school of thought promulgated by a group of 20th and 21st century thinkers who believe in the existence of perennial wisdom, or perennial philosophy, primordial and universal truths which form the source for, and are shared by, all the major world religions.” Look further and one goes through the looking glass and into a rabbit warren of definitions in the context of societal norms, religion, philosophy, economics, culture, etc.

In 1964 Supreme Court Justice Potter Steward famously described obscenity (or rather, what it is not) as follows:

“I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description [“hard-core pornography”], and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it, and the motion picture involved in this case is not that.”

Jacobellis v. Ohio 378 U.S. 184 (1964)

Borrowing on that phrase, I will suggest that Traditionalism may be defined in a variety of ways, but in the end, Traditionalists know it when they see it.

However, a shortcut to how I define Traditionalism is: that body of ideals, values and mores that we were raised on by the Greatest Generation.

Speaking of the Greatest Generation, one of the definitions of Traditionalists refers to those who were born between 1900 and 1945. I believe it is precisely because of their espousal of Traditional Values that they were Great!

We Baby Boomers born between 1946 and 1964 on the other hand, are split into two camps: a) those of us who listened to what our Greatest Generation parents taught us, who were grateful for the peace and prosperity they bequeathed to us and who have tried to live our lives by their example and rules; and, b) the prodigals, the “Me” generation of the sexual revolution who grew up to be the radicals of the 70’s and the yuppies of the 80’s, a few of whom have come home to Traditionalism and the balance of whom have become today’s Leftists.

So what do I mean by Traditional Values? Often the term is conflated with “Family Values.” They are similar, but Traditionalism goes beyond Family Values. To me, Traditional Values include support for:

  • individual freedom to live as we wish within the basic constraints of Judeo-Christian principles;
  • the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights as they were intended for then and all future generations;
  • fundamental patriotism, including honoring our Flag, national symbols, anthems and emblems;
  • a strong military and national defense and protection of our sovereignty;
  • the right of self-defense and to keep, bear and utilize arms to ensure that right;
  • obeying the Law and supporting those who serve in law enforcement;
  • marriage defined as between one man and one woman (including acceptance of the biological fact that men and women are different!);
  • support for nuclear families consisting of a father and mother and their children;
  • freedom of worship and expression;
  • the Golden Rule;
  • support for and defense of free-market capitalism;
  • equal opportunity, not equal outcomes; and,
  • separation of powers within a limited, and republican government.

Traditional Values also include opposition to: 

  • social engineering and bad (many wouldsay EVIL) social, economic and political ideologies such as socialism and communism;
  • crony capitalism;
  • ‘free love’ and promiscuity;
  • abortion on demand and in lieu of contraception;
  • gender confusion;
  • LGBTQ militancy;
  • fascism masquerading as liberal or progressive free expression;
  • violent protest; and,
  • collectivism, globalism, cultural marxism and so-called “progressivism”.

The Greatest Generation didn’t have to think about or debate these principles – they lived them. They were part of the fabric of their society.

Today, these principles are under constant assault.

I used to teach a lesson in Sunday School using a glass of water and a dropper full of black ink. The water represented our souls. In the context of this article, it represents the reservoir of societal values. The black drops of ink I slowly added to the water represent, for purposes of this article, Progressive/Leftist ideas, norms, habits, values. Add one drop to the water and nothing seems to happen. As successively more drops are added, however, the water starts to turn grey, then greyer, murky, and finally black.

The metaphor aptly describes what’s happening to our country.

I hope and pray I’m joined by the Silent Majority of our Boomer generation and budding Traditionalists of succeeding generations in fighting for a return to the Traditional principles that made us the greatest nation on earth and in the history of the world.

Copyright © 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 - All rights reserved - Terms and Conditions - Privacy Policy