Dear America
Many believe God blessed you and because of that you became a great nation. In the history of mankind, you are arguably the greatest ever. Among your citizenry are people who firmly believe and are quite vociferous in their belief that God had nothing to do with it. In fact they do not believe in the existence of God and to that are too quite vocal. But that is part of your beauty. People can believe as they choose on such matters and express their thoughts as they see fit. It is called freedom.
In too many cases that freedom to speak your mind is becoming a bludgeon. For too many people or groups, that cherished freedom of thought and expression is morphing into a demand that others must accept what they say and believe as they do or be labeled as some sort of phobic.
Among your people there is no longer clarity between what is good and what is evil. What one group holds to be good another holds to be evil and evil to one is good to another. And each group busies themselves insisting the other group believe as they do. Your people are hopelessly divided and the leaders chosen by them relish the division. Your house is divided and if the division is not bridged as any divided house, it will fall.
The captains of your ship of state have steadily steered you away from your charted path of liberty. For generations, your people have responded with apathy. For their lack of concern they have been keelhauled into submission lifting nary a finger in opposition. Instead they forfeited their freedom.
You were the champion of free markets, making you the wealthiest nation on earth. But your free markets are long gone replaced by crony capitalism. Now you are the champion of that. It is not even capitalism. It is where powerful and well connected are able to grow their wealth. In return for that politicians grow wealthy. The corporate powerhouses insist that the people should be taxed more, while your high corporate tax rates push smaller companies and the people they once employed to the wayside or force them to build factories in other countries. In all of this, it is your people who suffer.
Your charter declared your government to be by the people and for the people. No. It is now a government by the corrupt and for the corrupt. The corrupt govern to benefit themselves and the corporate cronies who make them wealthy – on a civil servants salary. Your vaunted political system and government of the people is now nothing more than a wealth producing industry for those able to play. This is as far from your founding charter as one could possibly travel in such a relatively short period of history.
You were once a mighty nation, one with character and trust. Your enemies feared you and your friends respected you. Troubled nations could look to you for help. Now, you are led by people who openly sympathize with the deadliest enemy you have faced since your last great war. Your leadership, elected by your people, has forged an agreement with an enemy sworn to your destruction. This same leadership has been a wrecking ball in relationships with your most trusted friends while seemingly embracing your most heinous enemies. This reckless leadership moves along its path of destruction while people elected to confront it close their eyes and ears and sit on their hands. So where do your people turn.
I believed God blessed you. I believe God will also judge you. I believe you should be on your knees asking for his mercy.
© 2015 J. D. Pendry American Journal All Rights Reserved
Category: Politics
Who in hell let this guy out of the cage???????? I don’t understand what he’s trying to tell us, but for my money I would say he’s going in the wrong direction. enough said.
Where the tall corn grows
Uncaged. I like it. Will add that to stupid and sanctimonious.
K
High corporate tax rates pushing smaller companies to build in other countries?????? Don’t think so, not in my mind. Considering the government gives tax breaks and incentives to build in third world countries where labor is as little as 5% of labor costs in this country. No, they are encouraged by the greedy, to hell with the loss of American jobs.
Don’t get me wrong, I am neither a dedicated Repub. nor Dem., and proud of it. The non-thinking idiots who vote straight tickets are just as responsible for the mess we are in. Same for those voting to return the same fools to office over and over.
If you want to start talking about greed, here goes. Remember when prices at WalMart started going through the roof…..sure you do. Remember WalMart telling a gullible public it was due to the high cost of gas and diesel fuel…sure you do. Have you noticed even a tiny drop in overall prices now that fuel prices are in a big decline? Sure you DON”T. Once Madelyn Murray O’hair announced the importance of her convoluted line of thinking, the importance of God to this country began to take a back seat. Remove prayer from schools, coins, gatherings such as football etc., from all things public and there you go. What’s God got to do with it anymore? How could HE have any influence on today’s chaos? Forget HIM, avoid HIM, and shun HIM……not a problem now is it? And we wonder why.
Americans are a hopeful people and usually turn away from negativism, however truthful and accurate it may be. Sam is a good example of that in action. Every year, NFL fans are hopeful. Then, for all but a few teams, losses mount and reality bites them in the butt. Some of the disappointed fans blame the manager or coach. Others blame a player or two. Still others blame the owner. No one blames the cheerleaders. They keep cheering win or lose. They are not oblivious to the losses: nor are they are not responsible for them. In a sense, they are like the masses of Americans who, despite the truth, despite the reality, cheer on when they they should be turning over tables and kicking chairs, demanding change.
Yeah, we’ve become tolerant of a certain level of corruption, feckless foreign policy, and cults of demagoguery.
Welcome to planet Earth. Do you have any fruits or vegetables to declare, other than the ones in your skull?
People generally don’t care until it effects them in a profound way so kicking and screaming about it is just going to make you sound like a pompous, tinfoil hat wearing, Paulian, and one one likes that guy.
Don’t be that guy.
(Cracks a cold one and turns on the football)
*No one likes that guy.
I’d blame my equipment, iPhone, but it’s in my damn hand.
I tend to think on that type attitude as Asleep on Watch.
well, wtf are you going to do?
I sure as fuck have no plans nor desires to be a sniveling bitch and mock those who are at least trying to do something.
First of all, the article isn’t really going to ‘do’ anything. Opening a letter of condemnation based on one’s own faith is a great way to get people to turn people off. I gave the article a chance and other than the screaming about how everything’s really, really bad I don’t see one solution. Yeah, ok, we’re talking about the article and that’s a good thing (maybe). Some of us are dismissive and some of us want to lick this guys boots for stroking our inflated sense of self. Still my, yours, this guy’s pretty words are echoes into the abyss that are capable of nothing. By asking a question or raising criticism my intent is to define the missive.
I congratulate you on your plans, I wish you luck on that heady mission.
First off,I don’t think God blessed America, any more than he blessed Canada or Rhodesia or Britain. The idea of God blessing any man made political construct is somewhat incompatible with Christian beliefs, as is the notion that he would judge any of them as a whole.
I do believe, however, that He will judge the individuals that constitute America, Canada, etc., on their own merit. You are spot on regarding the greed and profit over people. Of course the country wouldn’t have any of the power it does to help people, defend credo, etc, if we weren’t a capitalist nation built on the profit motive (not the prophet motive).
That said, why would God pick one man-made political construct over another? It can’t be because we were founded as a Christian nation (we weren’t), whereas there have been several other no kidding Christian nations throughout history that God didn’t seem to have blessed. Some of them still exist.
BTW, which enemy are you referring to as the deadliest enemy? Russia? That’s who our next Chairman thinks it is. If you think it’s Iran, you are a bit off I think.
Of cours, if they get a nuke things will change, but they will still be second in terms of instability and insanity to the Pakistanis, and way behind both China and the Russians who have a particularly bad recipe (for us) of nukes, a reliable delivery method, and a reason to use them against us instead of Israel or Saudi Arabia. I know we love to hate Iran, but they are a relatively stable nation state that acts rationally. It’s just that their national interests and ours haven’t aligned for a long time (maybe it was the coup).
Finally, who do you think you are, anyway? I mean that metaphorically- your piece was written with the voice of someone a bit lower than God but on a level with an entire nation. Are you like a prophet or something?
Another Chicken Little.
OK, Clong, you have to explain the ‘chicken little’ remark, because that is completely out of context with what Reddevil said.
I think he was answering Redevil’s question, in that Pendry is another Chicken Little. Each time Pendry writes something here, it’s a broken record. I expect him to go full Jonathan Edwards any day now and unleash his version of “Sinners in the hands of an angry God.” Come to think of it, he’s sort of already done it.
Yes sorry, the quotation didn’t copy over.
Ok, that makes it more clear.
Lick my unmentionables!
Yeah, a quote right out of the bible!
The “bible of GFY”.
I was the best I could do … Long week end.
I downloaded the Iran nuclear deal text, and have gone through parts of it as I hammered the knuckleheads that think it’s a good idea. The way this text is written, the Iranians made out like bandits. What’s missing from the text is this statement:
“The United States shall immediately provide Iran with kitchen sinks, Iran shall promptly inform the United States the number of these kitchen sinks desired.”
Alex Horton thinks it’s a good idea. He and a few others from the lefty-but-pretend-otherwise Truman National Security Project enjoyed an intimate meeting with oBaMa and Kerry at the White House a couple of days ago. I don’t know whether alcoholic beverages were served or whether Horton found the guys with guns objectionable. He posted a nice big pic of himself outside the White House. I’m sure Horton followers can look forward to more of his writings about how wonderful the Iran deal is…
Yeah, that disappointed me, too. He was there with Jon Soltz and Kate Hoit. I thought he had outgrown the VoteVets thing.
Ugh. THAT is a disappointment. WTF, Over?
I have been accused of “fear mongering” to equal “negativism” being touted here. I get what JD is trying to say. I’ve been a might tired myself of trying to be “PollyAnna” and glossing over the unpleasant bullshit of Clinton’s email/Benghazi lies, The Iran Deal, IRS liars, the cop killings, murder rates up everywhere, economy in the shitter… and what I see as the impending bigger picture of some cultures disappearing and being taken over by others. Sigh. But I don’t have any answers.
I want to believe in our Country and the resiliency of the people and Christianity for that matter. I don’t want to give up and yet, I am despairing. Meh. I suck for that. I’m going to read a couple of books and see if I can get some mojo back…The Original Argument and Liberty’s Secrets.
Don’t you think it’s awfully convenient that Iran announced the ‘discovery’ that they have much, much more unmined uranium than they had anticipated, just AFTER they think they got their nukes deal?
I think that’s interesting, like they didn’t really know that before? Yeah, okay, and I have some nice poisoned red apples they can buy, too.
I would be more than happy to send them even more uranium. One missile at a time.
Geez, Pendry! Lighten up, would you? I don’t know where you’re getting this stuff, but I hardly think a company that started in someone’s father’s garage and is now a mega-corporation is a product of crony capitalism. Oh, wait! Crap, I forgot – there’s at least two of them. Three and – well, gee whiz, lost more than that, if I count some that YOU never heard of but I know about. First of all, this country was founded on kicking buts and taking names. We’ve been through this kind of thing a lot more than once since 1776. The last time before this one was the 1960s. I was alive back then, so I kind of remember it. Maybe you weren’t and don’t, but I DO. The uncertainty is probably even worse in Europe right now. Frankly, there isn’t any place on this planet RIGHT NOW that is NOT seeing some of the spillover. Here’s a clue, so pay attention. This cycle comes in irregular episodes, but it occurs repeatedly. If you want a historical reference, try looking up Pope Urban’s potboiler speech in 1095 at the Council of Claremont. That started the centuries-long period of warfare commonly known as the Crusades. There are plenty more episodes like that. I’m sure that the French have a few things to say about political disturbances in their country, too. After all, their king was decapitated by Robespierre’s political machine, and not too much later, Napoleon took advantage of the turmoil to run roughshod over most of Europe. Oh, that reminds me: Robespierre got the guillotine, too. This particular period of history is just another episode of turmoil that will begin to come to an end in December 2017. It’s kind of like shaking the rugs outside the house to get the dust out of them. Meantime, every the butt-hurt, self-righteous, easily offended snot on both sides of the political fence here, and elsewhere in the world, will have a high time running their big, fat mouths until then. People do, after all, have the freedom to be as self-centered and obnoxious… Read more »
Shaggy Dog, Darby O’Gill, Sleeping Beauty, 3rd Man on the Mountain, and a re-release of DUmbo – whaddya got against 1959?
You left out Summer Magic, Pollyana and The Music Man (not a Disney, but still fun).
It’s a lot different when you’re a kid, you see.
Putting the corporate business aside, somebody please identify why the Pendry piece is objectionable. I went through it line by line and, aside from some of that corp business which I find unclear, I agree with his take. he never says what some are ascribing to him. Yeah, it’s a heavy piece but tell me where it’s false.
Okay. Here’s my view: it’s a piece of tunnel vision on the part of the author. He says things are all falling apart. I don’t see it that way, so I disagree and I’ve seen worse than what goes on now. His stance is negativism, as if there is no end to a downward spiral into some undeclared Vortex of Doom. Well, since we aren’t living in Syria or northern Iraq where the infrastructure has been nearly completed destroyed by ISIS (never mind the ancient stuff), I don’t see no Vortex, nohow. I just see the 1960s all over again, but without the draft card burning and the hippies dancing naked in public parks. MCPO NYC might have some disagreement with me on that last part, being that naked people are now protesting in NYC at times. And just because Iran appears to be having its own way in the world about nukes and stuff, that does not mean that they have them yet, does it? It takes time to build and test one of those big bombs. And anyway, by the time Iran actually has one it can use, that country may need to use it, all right – AGAINST ISIS. Did any of you think about that? Last, JDPendry tends to be down in the mouth about nearly everything. I am NOT that kind of person, so I simply disagree that things are falling apart here, or that big companies are terrible things that employ hundreds of thousands of people, especially since we are all using the software and machinery originally put together by three guys who had a disagreement on which machine language to use to make personal computers work. Yeah, that would be Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Steve Wozniak. Jobs and Woz had a falling out with Gates over ASCII code. So now we have Apple Corporation and MIcrosoft. I remember when MCI (Microwave Communications, Inc.) filed an antitrust suit against Ma Bell, that broke up AT&T into Baby Bells. I remember it distinctly because I worked for a company that mad the AV presentation… Read more »
Ma’am I hit report by accident since I’m reviewing this by phone.
I appreciate your input to this conversation. I don’t want to beat Mr. Pendry down as that seems to have been done already and it’s not right anyways. I keep thinking of my father when I read this (whom I assume is the same age as the author) and I see tunnel vision. It’s damn sorrowful to read the same sentiment over and over from Mr. Pendry because I think he could offer much more than the same song and dance. I do not like what I see in the Middle East regarding the future years and our safety, but I do see the opportunity for love growth and success for this country and all the others if we can collectively rid the bullshit groups and ideologies that run the people who cannot fend for themselves. Regardless I appreciate the post as it gives me the chance to learn how he feels about the way things are going in his minds eye.
Well, Derek, as my history teacher said when I was in high school, if you don’t have radicals on both sides of the political fence in a free society, then you do not HAVE a free society.
There is nothing wrong with a little shake-awake now and then. It wakes people out of their complacency. Being complacent is much worse than being threatened by bad guys.
We take a lot for granted here and we shouldn’t. So when someone rattles the cage door, some people get upset by the rattle.
Others of us deal with it and move forward.
Using it against ISIS wouldn’t be practical for them. They’re mixed within a population that they don’t want to also harm. Also, the radiation would end up blowing over Iran. I don’t think they’d use it against Israel either, as the Muslims have a stake in Jerusalem and in other Israeli cities. Their chosen method of attacking Israel is by proxy… their terrorist beneficiaries.
They may be nuts, and shady, but they’re not stupid. Their Supreme Leader and his cohorts hate the United States far more than they hate Israel, ISIS, Al-Qaeda, Saudi Arabia, etc.
This video surfaced shortly after the deal was made:
“…somebody please identify why the Pendry piece is objectionable.”
I got nothin. None of his opinions offend me. As far as I know, the author spent a career upholding and defending the Constitution, and is now fully entitled to state his opinion “unleashed”. For some unknown reason, people seem to get their panties in a wad over his posts. I don’t really get it. Rock on CSM Pendry. Your posts encourage me to think outside my own perspective, and I appreciate them. Rock on.
It’s not objectionable to me either, it makes me think and encourages me to offer an observation, sometimes to confirm what he writes and sometimes to offer a counterpoint to his outlook.
This is a discussion board, anything that encourages discussion whether about posers or anything else that interests us is a positive thing. CSM Pendry is just as opinionated as the rest of us, that makes him interesting to me and someone I suspect whose company I would surely enjoy even though we won’t see eye to eye on everything.
vive la difference
And before I find myself in a pitched battle I cannot win, my comment about “panties in a wad” referred to non-gender-specific panties. 🙂
GDC, my undies are not in a wad.
We just see things differently.
His view is a Vortex of Doom sucking everyone and everything into it, with no hope in sight. It’s like he’s given up.
Mine is exactly the opposite. I have not given up, nor is the Gloom of Doom all that I see.
Okay, Ex-, put a happy face on abortion, cop hating, history erasing, oBaMa’s foreign policy (if appeasement and capitulation is a policy), our stature in the world community, our friction with traditional allies, his bluffing about red lines and his idiotic and deadly April Spring, his idiot vice president, the economy, the bulging numbers on social services, the open borders, and obamacare,to name a few off the top of my head. The institutional changes he and his have made are irreversible and cannot be undone by the most conservative of presidents. Russia does what it will with the Ukraine and Biden can’t get a call answered–literally. Kerry? Clinton? Rice? Characters all. Our servicemen shot on our land and what? Debate and discussion about whether to arm our people for their self defense. I could dedicate about a ream of paper to the state of our Constitution, thanks to Congress, the SOB in the WH, and the agenda-driven progressives on the Supreme Court. Rose-colored glasses don’t change a thing. We are in deep shit and the country seems to be largely oblivious to it. The best that we can do seems to be to discuss Donald Trump’s latest outburst.
You think abortion is a modern invention? If you bothered to dig into history even a little bit, you’d know better. Women have been doing that for as long as history exists. If you think it is something new, you are sadly mistaken. It was as common as daisies on the lawn for prostitutes, peasant women and women in royalty to use abortifacients like Queen Anne’s Lace to get rid of unwanted babies. If that didn’t work, they could find an old crone with a twig who knew the trick to doing it. IT IS NOT SOMETHING NEW. Neither is birth control. The amazing things that women used to do to avoid pregnancy would make your hair fall out. Cop hating is nothing new, either. Roman soldiers stationed in foreign countries were nothing more than cops sent by the government of the Roman Empire. If I really want to go further back, I can bring up Cyrus the Great, the King of Persia (one of several) who, it is said, made Persia so safe that a virgin covered with gold could walk anywhere unharmed. And I’m sure the locals hated Cyrus’s cops just as much as these idiots do today. Furthermore, the police in many, many places are just as out of control as the people who hate them. The most recent evidence of that is a NYPD cop blindsiding Hames Blake, a retired tennis player, who was standing outside his hotel. Instead of trying to find out who he was, the cop went flying up to him, knocked him down and cuffed him, without any inquiry. You know that part about ‘assume’? The cop is suspended not. And then we have the charming incident of an off-duty Chicago cop who beat the crap out of a female bartender one-third his size because she wouldn’t serve him any more liquor. He didn’t just hit her. He punched her, knocked her down and kicked her and stomped on her. And none of this is something new, as I said. Or must I remind you about the riots in Watts and Chicago?… Read more »
Actually, there were a few valid reasons for Sherman to go scorched earth. It was a strategy in two parts at a basic level. As the Union Army advanced south into Georgia, it had over-extended its supply chain to where it both needed to rely on what was available from a local supply, and wanted to deny the same supply to the Confederates. In some ways, the second part was not that much different from bombing ball-bearing plants and oil fields in 1944.
Point being, to bring things full circle, that I wouldn’t beat up on J. D. too much for his latest Sunday sermon. Sometimes this stuff is like the blind guys trying to describe the elephant.
As to your first reply, that’s just too weird. I began a response by addressing your strawmen (as if I ever wrote or suggested that abortion and cop hating were new) but gave up, seeing it is, as I do, to be a useless exercise. As to your second regarding loss of freedom, you say you are as free now as you were 50 years ago. That’s great. Enjoy.
And you, Air Cav, have not described just how it is that you have been deprived of freedom of any kind.
If you are unwilling to do that – to answer my question:> What do YOU mean by LESS FREEDOM?< then you have no argument to support.
You're just complaining for the sake of complaining.
It only seems like that because we are living it, not reading about it.
There were no Good Old Days, and the Greatest Generation was made up of normal people that rose to the occasion (just like a relatively few do today).
Believe it or not, the world is far less dangerous than it was in the ’70s and ’80s, and orders of magnitude less dangerous than it was in the ’50s and ’60s.
We do not face an existential threat, and we still have the freedoms that make this country great.
In the end, we are confusing what the price of this freedom really is. Constant vigilance and casualties of war are only part of it. The part that we pay every day is that we would rather see a guilty man go free than an innocent man be punished. And that bugs us, because it runs counter to our sense of justice.
reddevil. “In the end, we are confusing what the price of this freedom really is.” The cost of freedom from an external threat is only paid by our service members and their families. Not having to focus our aggregate national resources on such a threat leaves us free to make choices. What choices are denied us by the government impinges on and limits those choices. Too, people can relinquish their freedoms as well as have them taken away. They can do this knowingly and they can do it ignorantly. The latter comes into play with ‘going along to get along’ and, off course, being careful to self censor in homage to the pc god. I’m not sure what you have in mind when you use the word freedom but, unlike justice and beauty, it is not an abstract concept to me. In many ways, I have fewer freedoms than I used to have and, consequently, I am less free.
You’re going to have to define what you mean by ‘fewer freedoms’, AirCav.
I don’t see it. No one is asking for my identity papers when I want to go some place. No one is checking my grocery list, or taking the ‘bad stuff’ out of my grocery cart, or telling me I can’t spend more than $XXX per month or that I have to stand in line for six hours to get a pound of chicken. No one is telling me I can’t hike the trails in the forest preserve, or that I can only drive my car on certain days of the week, or for that matter, how far I’m allowed to go in one day. No one is telling me I’m required to share my house with a family of six, or billet soldiers in my home. No one is telling me I can’t have pets.
No one is telling me I’m only allowed to say, think and write certain things.
No one is censoring what I read, eat, watch on TV (I wish some of that garbage was NOT on TV, but I don’t have to watch it), see at the movies, listen to on the radio, or any of the rest of that stuff that we take for granted.
I still have the same choices I had 50 years ago, 40 years ago, 30 years ago, 20 years ago – in fact, last week’s choices are the same as or better than they were 60 years ago.
So what, specifically, do you mean by LESS FREEDOM?
I think freedom and justice go hand in hand; you cant really have one without the other. Neither one is an abstract for me either.
I am not really following you here. Obviously, the soldier and their family pays a very high and very concrete price for our freedom. However, everyone pays something.
America is relatively secure; we have no existential threats and the terrorist threat, although real, is low compared to much of the world. Yet, we live in an environment of fear that makes most Americans willing to give up some of their freedoms.
The idea that only the military pays a price for our way of life is both ludicrous and arrogant. Even in cases of “external threats”.
Clong. To whom are you replying? It can’t be me.
It can’t?
No. So who?
Of course, I should qualify that with it can’t be me unless you were having a flight of fancy with what I wrote.
The cost of freedom from an external threat is only paid by our service members and their families.
Was that not you?
Yes, it was I who wrote that. And you wrote a non sequitur in response, to wit: “The idea that only the military pays a price for our way of life is both ludicrous and arrogant. Even in cases of “external threats”.”
Haha ok man. Be careful not to trip on your tiptoeing back.
What the hell are you talking about, Clong? I have many skills but mind reading isn’t one of them. I wrote one thing. You wrote a reply that was non-responsive to what I wrote. And I am skulking away? I just don’t get it.
Sure man, sure.
That’s cute. Thanks for the explanation. I guess you are accustomed to getting away with inane responses. You remind me of the little kid who says, “Because! Just because!” when he is asked why he did or said something.
Uh huh.
Okay, then, no TV for you tonight. And no video games either!
I said, if you had bothered to read it, Air Cav, that the people who were part of the Civil Air Patrol in World War II were CIVILIANS. Their voluntary contribution was just as important as anything the military did, and they were ALL here in the US.
“Their [ Civil Air Patrol’s] voluntary contribution [during WW II] was just as important as anything the military did…”
Thanks for the laugh. You are kidding, right?
No, I am not kidding. The threat by Germany to invade the US by air was considered very real.
Maybe it has declined into something of a joke now, but it was NOT a joke then.
You are getting very strange. Whether or not Germany was a threat is neither here nor there. When you say, as you did, that the contribution of the CAP was just as important as anything the military did during WW II, that’s just silly. What’s next, that the war could not have been won w/o the CAP?
Yes, CAP and CONTRACTORS!!! Come on man, why the no love?
You’re playing semantic games. While it’s true, for example, that the indirect costs of facing an external threat are funded by a civilian population, it’s not the same thing as the direct cost of winding up in one of the more wretched shit-holes in the world to risk coming home in a zip-lock bag.
Fundamentally, it’s not an arrogant or ludicrous distinction.
Ie one brand of suffering is worse than another?
Those “indirect” costs are not physical, as 7,000 dead soldiers and 100,000+ injured in life altering ways can attest. But they are still monumentally expensive and will be a debt load that your great grandchildren will bear and will negatively impact their incomes….
Moving forward, as a society that funds the cost of such conflicts it’s wise for all of us to consider what exactly did we just pay for over the last 14 years?
It wasn’t freedom, you are no more or less free than you were on September 12, 2001 after 14 years of expensive conflict paid for with lives and dollars.
No one here believes the country is in a better place today than on September 12, 2001…unless they are lying to themselves. If you factor in the Patriot act and the increased militarization of the police one might successfully argue we are far less free than we were on September 12, 2001…
So what was the point of the last 14 years? Stabilize the Middle East? If so that’s turned out to be an abject failure…keep us safe from terrorism? A better job screening entrants into the US and building a couple of giant fucking walls would have been a better investment than 7,000 dead Americans and thousands upon thousands of wounded….Iraq is less stable now and will continue to be less stable for decades to come, Afghanistan is less stable now and will continue to be less stable for decades to come. Virtually every nation in that ME corridor is less stable now….
We spent 7,000 lives and tens of thousands wounded and a trillion dollars to fuck things up worse than they were before we were attacked…it’s a good thing that Bush/Obama weren’t in charge of running WW2 or we’d all be speaking German on the east coast and Japanese on the west coast….
VOV, I’m not having a problem wrapping my head around the financial and societal cost, I’m merely pointing out that it pisses me off to hear it’s “arrogant and ludicrous” to make a distinction between some guy reaching into his pocket, and some kid wounded in Fallujah and having to spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair.
We can debate the causes and merits of the conduct of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan until the cows come home, but I would first ask the following questions:
In 2001, a group of radical jihadists killed 3000 people for the crime of being our countrymen. What were we supposed to do about that? Nothing? And what would have been the real eventual cost if we actually had done nothing?
Understood Perry, no offense was intended on my part, and I get your position. My apology for not being clearer.
Obviously nothing isn’t the right answer, but the question regarding invasions has to be what are the long term goals and how do we achieve those across multiple presidencies?
Doing nothing is never my motto, much of my writing involves unleashing a total war against our enemies, but a half-assed effort such as the last 14 years that did nothing and actually might have made matters worse with respect to destabilizing an entire region allowing even worse actors to step in and take over is the current apparent outcome.
Under that scenario one wonders if a stricter isolationist policy would have been just as effective in minimizing future risk.
I’ve read your words and I respect them, I doubt you believe we’ve done good work in minimizing our future risk with the debacle known as the GWOT in the ME…
That was my point, I am sorry if it was not as clear as I had intended. I do agree that the terms arrogant and ludicrous were unnecessary…as well as rude…
No one is saying that reaching into your pocket is the same as serving in the military.
What we are saying is that first responders, hospital workers, other non military national security and defense workers, diplomats, and the victims of terrorist attacks at home and abroad have paid a price as well.
Right. There is more than one way to serve your country and few limit themselves to just one. Even in cases of “external threats” there are civilians on the front lines.
Freedom? Censor myself? Why should I censor myself any more than Nicki does on her blog? She doesn’t hold back. I do get tired of trying to hammer a valid point into the heads of some of you (lovable) lugs, because you’re so DAMNED sure you’re right about everything (and so am I), even though it’s mostly an unwillingness to see someone else’s point of view. If I can see your point of view, why can’t you see mine? But I’d like to remind you that there is plenty of non-PC stuff on this blog and on plenty of others. So where are YOU being censored? If you’re talking about good manners, I have yet to see the so-called PC crowd demonstrate them. They’re mostly just sucking up to get brownie points and nothing else. There are VERY few of them who have been in existence long enough to have any kind of mature judgment or know the difference. Frankly, when you’re afraid to say something because you might offend some unknown someone, that’s even more offensive than being non-PC. There are people who would complain for the mere sake of complaining. It’s the fashion to be politically correct now. Has it occurred to you that the pendulum swings the other way, too? Do you realize that there are people who are simply looking for a chance to be offended and let everyone know how offended they are, just to get attention for it? There is a vast difference between being politically correct and having simple good manners. As I said, most of the PC crowd isn’t far enough from their birth date and time to have a clue about the difference, and most of their whining and shouting is to be the center of attention, not much else. In regard to the cost of freedom being paid ONLY by service members and their families, the Civil Air Patrol was started before you were born, to give civilians a chance to act as aircraft spotters during World War II. They weren’t in uniform. They were all unpaid volunteers. Their job… Read more »
@ J. D. PENDRY, Et Alii:
AMEN, Brother ! ! !
The Holy Bible plainly warns of the day when that which is evil will be called good, and that which is good will be called evil.
The Book of Mormon tells us that America is the “Promised Land”, blessed above all other nations on Earth, a land of freedom and prosperity where no king shall rule.
The Book of Mormon teaches that Jesus Christ is the God of this land, and as long as we obey His commandments and continue to worship Jesus Christ, who is the God of this land, we in America shall always prosper and be blessed above all other nations on Earth.
But, if we turn against Jesus Christ, who is the God of this land, and reject His teachings, then we will forfeit our blessings and be swept off this land, and this land will be given to a people more worthy than ourselves.
So, J. D. Pendry, despite all of these other posted comments which mock and revile against you for stating your opinion, I stand with you, for you speak the harsh, unpleasant truth.
We are cursed.
Those millions upon millions of murdered babies have cursed us.
The acceptance and promotion of homosexuality has cursed us.
The rejection of Jesus Christ has cursed us.
Again, J. D. Pendry, I stand with you, and express my profound gratitude for your words of warning.
Thank you, and AMEN ! ! !
Preach it, Brother!
Sooooo….it seems like you’re lumping all Americans into one pile; we have all rejected Jesus. Correct? So we are ALL screwed even if people accept Jesus?
If legal abortions and acceptance of homosexuality is all it takes to damn ourselves, then I guess the rest of the actual wrong-doings are just extra credit.
After reading this and your comments below about women, should I lump you in the pile of people who are narrow-minded, discriminatory and just goofy? You make it a habit to mention your mormon affiliation on most posts, your boy scout experiences, and your past life of other-than-ideal living circumstances. At this point, it is non-value added fluff. Please provide something of substance.
I wonder what you would do if a gay person gave you a hug…..would your version of Jesus curse and spit on them, or maybe, would the true love of Jesus be shared by the both of you?
@ DEREK, Et Alii:
What is “accepting Jesus”?
Does that include obeying His commandments?
Sure, individuals may still follow the Lord, Jesus Christ, but our elected national government has long since officially rejected Him and His teachings.
You didn’t really address my post. But that’s fine, usually I skim past your comments without giving them much thought due to your “way” being “THE way” in your mind’s eye.
Cheers.
“a land of freedom and prosperity where no king shall rule.”
The Book of Mormon is full of kings and last time I checked, except for 1 Nephi, the Book of Mormon is set in the New World.
This is my most recent homemade amateur video recording, somehow appropriate for this discussion thread:
https://youtu.be/GauWTZxKrE0
“THERE’S A STAR SPANGLED BANNER WAVING SOMEWHERE”
Original Words And Music By:
PAUL ROBERTS And SHELBY DARNELL
1942
VERSE # 01:
There’s a star spangled banner
Waving somewhere
In a distant land
So many miles away.
Only Uncle Sam’s great heroes
Get to go there.
That is where I also want
To live someday.
There’d be Davy Crockett,
Washington, and Perry,
And Nathan Hale and Bernie Fisher, too.
There’s a star spangled banner
Waving somewhere,
Waving o’er a land of heroes,
Brave and true.
VERSE # 02:
In this global war
That threatens the destruction
Of our Country, fair,
And our sweet liberty
By evil Jihadist leaders of corruption,
Can’t the U.S. use
A mountain boy like me?
God gave me the right to be
A free American.
And for that precious right,
I’d gladly die.
There’s a star spangled banner
Waving somewhere.
That is where I want to go
When I fly.
VERSE # 03:
Though I realize I am crippled,
That is true, Sir.
Please don’t judge my courage
By my twisted leg.
Let me show my Uncle Sam
What I can do, Sir.
Let me help to bring
The Moslems down a peg.
If I do some great deed,
I will be a hero,
And a hero, brave, is what I want to be.
There’s a star spangled banner
Waving somewhere.
In that Heaven,
There must be a place for me.
That Boy Scout song means a lot to me, because I almost didn’t get to serve in the Armed Forces, having spent my adolescent years locked up with criminals in a maximum security unit of the insane asylum, tortured, abused, and terrified.
But, in spite of all obstacles, I finally did get to serve in the United States Army, and I did get to go to war in the old Republic of Viet Nam.
For that, I will be eternally grateful.
And THAT is why the lyrics of that Boy Scout song mean so much to me.
J R M, nice try, but continue writing and keep your day job.
Yet ANOTHER sign of the deterioration of our United States of America:
I just now saw a photograph of ten (10) female soldiers in the United States Army, stationed at Fort Bliss, Texas, publicly breast feeding their babies while wearing their camouflaged uniforms.
http://www.people.com/article/soldiers-breastfeed-their-children-in-uniform?xid=socialflow_facebook_peoplemag
The numerous comments were unanimous in their enthusiastic support, and their garrison commander officially authorized it.
I, alone, posted what was probably the ONLY negative comment, i.e., “It is irresponsible and immoral for mothers to serve in the United States Army.”
To: 2/17 AirCav: No. I won’t accept that response on your part. You dropped in those two terms, abortion and cop-hating, as if they ARE something new, when they are not. They’ve been going on for centuries. I did not present a ‘straw man’ response. You brought them up. I did not. In fact, everything you included in your comment is nothing new, so I have no idea why you expect me to relieve your angst over any of it. If you don’t want CSA memorials and universities removed and/or renamed, then YOU do something about it. If you don’t want ancient sites destroyed by ISIS, then YOU go do something about it, because the UN only sits on its thumbs and whines. If you think that attention hog Kim Davis was right, then you go join the circus of Oafkeepers surrounding her. More and more, I think she’s a self-serving idiot. I had some sympathy for her in the beginning, but now, I do not. She did what she did to get media attention, and nothing else. The so-called Social Justice Warriors are as ridiculous and almost as out of control as ISIS. They are just as obnoxious and dangerous, too, but you seem to forget that IN THIS COUNTRY, you have the right to stand up to them. So far, I haven’t run into any of those morons, but most of the people in my VERY mixed area get along pretty well with each other. In the Middle East, if you stand up to ISIS, you get beheaded, burned alive or buried alive. I believe with the Nazis, it was the death camps, and with the Bolsheviks, it was pogroms and gulags. With the Khmer Rouge, it was the killing fields in Cambodia. With the French Terror, it was Robespierre, his spies and cronies, and the guillotine. A fanatic is a fanatic, no matter which continent he’s located on or what century we happen to be in. We will see a lot more fanaticism about a lot of things for a while. As I said before, you seem… Read more »
So, don’t accept it. You got on your high horse about the history of abortion and cop hating AS IF I had said they were new when I did not. You made the points you wanted to make. I only wish you had not clothed them as if they were responsive to mine.
You sure like to split the same kind of hair don’t you? At least you are consistent.
“Yea I said that but it’s not what I meant\I didn’t say that.” Bwhahhahaha
To borrow a phrase from you: weak.
Still pulling the same old line, C. Long?
And still proving my point.
Clong. When I address my comments to you, you pull the 6-year old act. When I address them to someone else, you manage to squeeze something out of your ass in response. You and the woman you are hiding behind took issue with the same item; thus, I responded similarly.
Don’t sweat it, 2/17. That is all he has got.
A handful of idealism in one hand and not much of anything else in the other.
Dude has the staying power of a weak (his word) fart. You walk into it, smell it, grimace, wave it away and move on. Soon and easily forgotten.
My response to you were on par with yours to me. That is to say childish. Keep splitting hairs, crying and bitching for no reason. This isn’t the first topic, nor the last probably, where you say one thing then try to retreat when challenged. Be right or be wrong but at least have the backbone to stand by what you say. Otherwise keep your mouth shut.
WTF are you talking about twit? Keep my mouth shut? Well, fuck you. This is another non-responsive sideshow of yours. I have backed off of nothing, you SOB. Show me and I’ll show you where you are wrong, you thumb sucking little shit. Oh, and have a nice evening.
You ignore blatant challenges to what you say and I’m non-responsive, haha ok. You say one thing and then try to reel in what you “really” meant through the tired ignorance routine while still ignoring the most basic of questions that if answered would give you a possible way out. “Yea I said it”‘ becomes “show me where I said it” You were given the opportunity to explain what you meant multiple times but you haven’t…probably because you can’t. Oh and now the tantrum….boohoo. Wipe your tears and move on, you are now just embarrassing yourself.
Hey, YOU don’t get to tell anyone to shut up, clong, you fuckstick. Keep it up, you arrogant ass. You just look more and more ridiculous.
I’m pretty sure I can say what I want. Being correct doesn’t always equal arrogance.
Thanks for playing though.
“I’m pretty sure I can say what I want.”
Typical of your game but I will bite.
My turn.
Yo, C. Long, I want you to C. how Long my Johnston is hanging in your face.
Any issues? Or just the norm?
Any arrogance on y
Looks like I missed all the fun yesterday….I’m thinking you read too much Aristotle, who said “Republics decline into democracies and democracies degenerate into despotisms.” The reality is instead this, what people are truly uncomfortable with is a change to their acceptable status quo especially those like you, our christian fellow citizens. Any time change disrupts the current conventional wisdom a great many people get upset, often times in the US those people turn out to be the ones on the wrong side of history…you know the people I am talking about, the ones who got upset when blacks were freed from slavery, or the ones who got upset when women were allowed to vote, or the ones who got upset when black fighter pilots were allowed to eat at the same lunch counter as white fighter pilots, or the people who were upset when women’s sports were required by law to be resourced at the same level as men’s sports in schools and colleges….we have a name for those people in the United States and it’s not very flattering… I’m always fascinated at my christian friends who suddenly feel they are somehow under attack, as if no longer being the sole voice of power in the US means they’ve lost the nation. That’s the problem with christians, as open minded as they think they are the reality is somewhat different, and now that some of the views held by their fellow citizens are allowed to openly diverge rather radically from their christian world view they somehow think they are being oppressed. I’m reminded of a quote by AC Grayling (paraphrasing because I don’t remember it exactly), When you christians were in charge you didn’t argue with us, you burned us at the stake…now what we are doing is presenting you with some arguments and challenging questions that make you uncomfortable and you complain you are somehow being “attacked” or “oppressed”… There’s no war on christianity, there’s just a lessening of the overwhelming oppression by christianity on the rest of our society and christians don’t like it much because they… Read more »
And do me a freaking favor, will you? Bone up on REAL history occasionally. When you said the entire burden of US security is born by the military, that flies in the face of REAL work done by civilians during World War II IN THIS COUNTRY. I am NOT referring to civil service, either.
You are basing your entire complaint on the past 6.5 years of the bimbo-brained current administration.
You are conveniently forgetting a hell of a lot of stuff that people do now as individuals in response to real internal threats, AS WELL AS those episodes in 2013 of removing barriers at national monuments and throwing roadblocks into the ditch, when bodaprez decided to shut down all the national monuments.
If those people can stand their ground, why do you conveniently forget all of that? Is it so that you can complain allover again?
Sorry, this was addressed to 2/17 Air Cav, NOT VOV!
No worries m’lady….I kinda assumed it wasn’t addressing my rambling thoughts.
I know, but I wanted to be clear on that.
“When you said the entire burden of US security is born by the military, that flies in the face of REAL work done by civilians during World War II IN THIS COUNTRY.”
I suppose that would be a valid point if I had written that “the entire burden of US security is born by the military” but I did not. Once again, you are writing a ream in response to something I did not say. Here is exactly what I wrote: “The cost of freedom from an external threat is only paid by our service members and their families.”
You are entitled to your opinion, you know. If you don’t want to accept my argument, fine, but I’ll tell my dead mother that her volunteering for CAP as a plane spotter in Chicago was a waste of time.
You still have not answered MY question: So what, specifically, do you mean by LESS FREEDOM?
And it was Bertrand Russell who said ‘Most people would rather die than think; most people do.’
Yes, that was A.C. Grayling, whom you paraphrased. It was what he said about religious apologists.
He also said this:
‘Perhaps worse still is what liberal societies might do to themselves in the face of this new and different threat [of terrorism]. They begin, by small but dangerous increments, to cease to be as liberal as they once were. They begin to restrict their own hard-won rights and freedoms as a protection against the criminal minority who attempt (and as we thus see, by forcing liberty to commit suicide, succeed in doing) to terrorize society.
A.C. Grayling
If you present a problem and don’t at least include suggestions for its solution, you aren’t helping. You’re whining.
No one here has brought up the point of how resilient Christianity truly is. Under decades of hostile, overt oppression in the Soviet Union, it flowered back into practice as soon as the old Soviet empire began to crumble. In Communist China, where it had much less of a presence than in the Soviet Union, it still managed to survive and is thriving today under a less hostile Chinese government.
A freethinker, myself, I still have to admire that sort of tenacity. My thinking is more aligned with that of VOV, that Christians may be losing some of their formerly absolute control over this nation, yet they are still firmly in the majority. The amount of control they retain in their schools and their governments is entirely dependent upon how hard they are willing to fight the determinedly atheistic Left for their beliefs.
Myself, I think a stalemate somewhere in the middle of the battleground is a comfortable place for those like me.
I once sheepishly asked a prominent Evangelical apologist, with his PhD in New Testament, if he had ever chanced to read Strauss’s Life of Jesus Critically Examined. He had not. Things began to become clear to me. He didn’t know that all his trusty arguments had been thoroughly refuted many decades before he was born.
The aforementioned is indicative of faith without critical thought. It is a sad fallacy held by some of the faithful that all is lost if not rendered through their lens.
The world with all its drudgery and trials is still a wondrous place. I have stood under the Aurora Borealis, knelt in the burial chambers of the Pyramids on the Giza Plateau. I have marveled at the Sistine Chapel. I have experienced the sensory deprivation of Lechuguilla. I know the solitude of being at sea alone.
Those experiences imbue me with a sense of wonder than can not be thwarted by cynicism. We all have a right to simply ‘Be’, not less than the trees or the stars.
I will rage against the dying of the light. I will cower before no man, I will beg before no God.
Indeed Dave, one of the things the faithful often state is that the non-believers have nothing to live for…nothing could be further from the truth in that statement.
We non-believers have nothing to die for, thus life is to be enjoyed to the fullest now, while we live and breathe and experience as much of those wonders as you have. Creating memories and experiences to treasure.
Hi Ex-Ph2
I’ve been following this blog ever since I made my remark quote, “Who in the hell let this guy out of the cage” and so farI would say you have held your ground very well. Give em hell gal.!!!!!.
Where the tall corn grows
Hi, Sam. Just seems to me that some people give up too easily. They find it easier to complain than anything else.
I do not feel that way. We’re going through a rough patch now. We’ve been through worse and still came out on top.
Ex-PH2
I just don’t read the defeatism in the original post that others seem to. His post (to me) reads like a Sunday sermon (what little experience I have of them). But other than his choice of wording and perspective, it seems like any other critique of the status quo one would read at this site. I.E. Obama’s a asshole, Wall Street is rigged, State Dept. is fucked up, elected representatives do not represent, and the USA used to be a greater nation than it now is. I have seen most if not all of these themes articulated here before but I don’t recall them necessarily being offered with practical solutions. Frozen pineapples notwithstanding.
Might have been that whole part about being on your knees America begging for god’s mercy that made some folks think he’d given up the ghost….
It’s that whole ‘used to be’ theme running through his essay. That, and no solution to what he sees as a problem, or even a reference to a possible solution.
Just the Vortex of Gloom and Doom, like those dodos in ‘Ice Age’: doom on you, doom on you.
Hogwash.
For the love of all mankind, do not encourage her! Hold her own? Who the hell is going to protect the rest of us from her?
(It will be snowing soon)
I’m sorry, Dave.
I can’t do everything for you.
Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer, do.
Ex-Ph2
Maybe someone can explain to me what Hardin is trying to tell us, I’ve heard alot of soap box chating in my life time, but his takes the cake, one thing for sure you can say about his blog, he never attended Bible school in his younger years, maybe he should try reading the second part of the bible, it might just educate him on whats going on in this world today
Where the tall corn grows
Sam, he’s just having some fun.
Ex-PH2, where the butterflies flock
I want to have some fun. Been a bit busy on a working party gathering straw for your men. Oh my, I often ponder if some comprehend cognitive dissonance.
Being an Atheist Conservative is often like being an Army of One. I too am often confronted with the accusations of Straw Man arguments. I don’t believe they understand that in making the accusation, they have constructed a Straw Man of their own.
I have to go, its late, I am going to cuddle up with the second part of that book I should read.
I believe you wrote a good article which strongly shows your view on the current events happening.
That being said, I think “corruption” as some call it or any shady event that people think America is involved in, for the most part I look at it as whatever we have to do to remain a Superpower, then do it. Because in the long run if we don’t make the decision someone else will, and they may have worse or bad intentions versus what ours would be. Also, I think that religion has no place in the Government. It is people freedom to believe what they want, but it should not have any say so in anything political. Some of our forefathers seemed very outspoken about this. I don’t think friends can remain friends forever, nor enemies remain enemies forever, because things change (Like ISIS who pretty much everyone hates). With that, you are forced to become at least less hostile with other countries to get rid of something even worse then them, even if it is only for the time being. I had more I wanted to say but I better get back to work before I get in trouble haha.
Freedom comes in two flavors: freedom from and freedom to. Freedom from usually comes in the form of security and protection while freedom to comes in the form of liberty, the absence of constraints and restrictions. Government grants us nothing that is not all ready ours. In the absence of government, we are at liberty to do what we will. It is government, with its regulations, its statutes, its binding court decisions, and its numerous enforcement arms that coerce and control us, that forces us to do what we otherwise would not and not to do what we otherwise would. This arrangement is commonly called the social contract, a consent agreement entered into by the governed that requires the governed to surrender some of its natural freedom (freedom to) in exchange for protection and security (freedom from.) None of this is news and political philosophers have stated it much more artfully, but it sets the stage for my answering why I am less free today than I was some decades ago. When I was young, I was taught (rightly or not) that government officials, elected and appointed, were public servants, that government existed to serve the people and not the other way around. I do not believe that is true today, if it ever was. Mountains of laws and regulations that encroach on my personal space, from the size of my toilet bowl, to the type of light bulb I may purchase, to whether or not I sort plastic and paper garbage, to whether I have mandated health insurance and, if yes, a wellness visit (!) once a year, to whether there is soda and candy or water and fruit in vending machines, to whether I may purchase a particular firearm at all, or ammo for it, to whether I may carry a handgun and, if so, where, to whether I can tree my own property or fill-in swampy land, to whether I can fire up my charcoal grille, my gas-powered lawn mower and edger, to whether I can smoke out of doors or even in my own car, to… Read more »
This is just one example of dozens that you can find, of the expectation that we are expected to give up our rights at the behest of our government officials — at all levels. And if you dare to argue…they WILL attempt to ruin your day.