Nations Have Seasons
This was written by someone else, who’s been gracious enough to allow me to post it here. I might not have written it, but the thoughts mirror mine and possibly yours. Leave your feedback in the comments.
Imagine a Roman of the 2nd century contemplating an empire that stretched from Britain to the Near East, thinking: This will endure forever…. Forever was about 500 years, give or take.
France was pivotal in the 17th and 18th centuries; now the land of Charles Martel is on its way to becoming part of the Muslim ummah. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the sun never set on the British empire; now Albion exists in perpetual twilight. Its 96-year-old sovereign is a fitting symbol for a nation in terminal decline. In the 1980s, Japan seemed poised to buy the world. Business schools taught Japanese management techniques. Today, its birth rate is so low and its population aging so rapidly that an industry has sprung up to remove the remains of elderly Japanese who die alone.
We’ve gone from a republican government guided by a constitution to a regime of revolving elites. We have less freedom with each passing year. Like a signpost to the coming reign of terror, the cancel culture is everywhere. We’ve traded the American Revolution for the Cultural Revolution. The pathetic creature in the White House is an empty vessel filled by his handlers.
At the G-7 Summit, ‘Dr. Jill’ had to lead him like a child.
When we were young and vigorous, our leader was too. Now a feeble nation is led by the oldest man to ever serve in the presidency. We can’t defend our borders, our history (including monuments to past greatness) or our streets. Our cities have become anarchist playgrounds. We are a nation of dependents, mendicants, and misplaced charity.
Homeless veterans camp in the streets while illegal aliens are put up in hotels.
The president of the United States can’t even quote the beginning of the Declaration of Independence (‘You know – The Thing’) correctly.
Ivy League graduates routinely fail history tests that 5th graders could pass a generation ago.
Crime rates soar; we blame the 2nd Amendment and slash police budgets.
We slaughter the unborn in the name of freedom, while our birth rate dips lower year by year.
People who fight racism by seeking to convince members of one race that they’re inherently evil, and others that they are perpetual victims. A psychiatrist lecturing at Yale said she fantasizes about “unloading a revolver into the head of any white person.”
Our ‘entertainment’ is sadistic, nihilistic, and as enduring as a candy bar wrapper thrown in the trash. Our music is noise that spans the spectrum from annoying to repulsive.
Our culture is certifiably insane!
Our national debt is so high that we can no longer even pretend that we will repay it one day. It’s a $31-trillion monument to our improvidence and refusal to confront reality.
Patriotism is called insurrection, treason celebrated, and perversion sanctified.
A man in blue gets less respect than a man in a dress.
We’re asking soldiers to fight for a nation our leaders no longer believe in.
How meekly most of us submitted to Fauci-ism (the regime of face masks, lockdowns, and hand sanitizers) shows the impending death of the American spirit.
This is the nation that took in my immigrant great grandparents, whose uniform my Grandpa, my father and most of my uncles wore in the
Navy & Military.
During Britain’s darkest hour, when its professional army was trapped at Dunkirk and a German invasion seemed imminent, Churchill reminded his countrymen, “Nations that go down fighting rise again, and those that surrender tamely are finished.” The same might be said of causes. If we let America slip through our fingers if we lose without a fight, what will posterity say of us? While the prognosis is far from good, only God knows if America’s day in the sun is over.
I don’t want to imagine a world without America, even though it becomes increasingly likely.
I believe that we in America are at the moment in time to stand up, or let it fall! We now may soon be at the next step in our country’s future.
I believe that it might be closer than we think.
“A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves.”
Edward R. Murrow
We Need New Experts
I believe in meritocracy. The concept that the best and brightest among us should be making the important decisions that affect everything and everyone. Certainly, they’ll be wrong on occasion. That’s human nature. But the odds are they’ll be right far more often than not and we’ll all be better off for it.
The nation was founded by experts in political theory. The documents they created, our Declaration of Independence and Constitution, have proven to be guiding lights not only for the United States but the world. And they were smart enough to recognize that their first attempt at a national compact was not working and hammer out something better.
Throughout our history, our reliance on meritocracy has worked well. There have been fits and starts, but the country has inexorably become more just. Our living standards have continuously improved and the opportunities our meritocracy created lured the world’s best to our shores.
Our meritocracy reached its zenith in the Cold War period. Experts in every field of human endeavor made breathtaking creations that made the USA the envy of the world. All of the technological marvels of our time, all of the medical breakthroughs, the 20 year Pax Americana all resulted from the effort of those experts.
But something has happened over the past 25 years. The experts have been wrong far more often than they’ve been right. What’s worse, they’ve been wrong about the Very Important Things, and that’s led to public policies that have diminished the nation as a whole. From failing to recognize the threat of Islamic extremism (and actually funding it!) to WMD in Iraq through “2 weeks to stop the spread,” I’m hard pressed to think of a single thing our current crop of experts got right.
Now our current experts have gone from simply being terribly wrong to being dangerously misguided. They tell us boys can be girls. The coastlines will be underwater – 10 years ago. That experimental medications are safer and more effective than fully tested ones. That people who can only afford to put a side of poor meat at dinner three times a week can spend 2 years of earnings on a car you can’t drive in large swaths of the country.
I’m waiting for the day they tell us the sky is green and grass is orange.
The simple fact is that for a generation, our meritocracy is less a society led by the best and brightest as much it is led by the politically connected. It’s time to put all of them – in government, in academia, in medicine, in science, in engineering, in every field and every occupation – out to pasture.
An Ode to My Wife
The Bard famously wrote, “How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.”
Growing up, we’re taught this line from “Romeo and Juliet,” the tale of star-crossed young love gone horribly wrong. Well, today I want to use it to tell a much happier tale. It’s the story of the most amazing woman God has put on this planet since Mary. A woman so incredible that even Shakespeare would have trouble doing her justice. While my skills with a quill are no match for his, I’m about to try.
Nearly a quarter century ago, Linda came into my life, a visage of beauty that left me so awestruck I couldn’t find the words to say “Hello.” But something (God? Fate?) gave me the courage. After a few minutes of conversation, I asked her to dinner. Except, in classic fumble tonguededness, I think I might have asked her to take me to dinner.
No matter. She turned me down cold.
It took two more attempts before she finally said yes. By the end of that summer, we were engaged. And married the next. That was 22+ years ago and in that time, my love for this woman – a love I thought bottomless on our wedding day – has only grown.
But why? What enchantment has she weaved over my heart, my soul, my being that could do this? Oh, I could recount the times she’s stood by my side when things looked black. The times businesses failed, the times my health failed. If you’re reading this, chances are you already about some of these events. While all of those have made my appreciation of her steadfastness grow, they don’t explain the love in my heart.
Could it be her beauty? The years have dulled that shine, as it has to all of us. Despite that, she is still a beautiful woman, in many ways more lovely than that first time I saw the setting sun dance through her hair. Others fade with maturity. Linda has become an ever more wondrous sight to behold each morning when I wake. That beauty may have drawn me like the proverbial moth to a flame, but it doesn’t begin to explain the way I love her today.
Is it her charm? Her wit (and if you’ve been on your receiving end of one of her barbs, you won’t soon forget it)? Is it her ability to put others at ease when uncomfortable?
No. None of that explains it, either.
In the end, it’s inexplicable. I don’t think it needs explaining. You see, what matters – what truly matters, above all – is this one simple fact:
My wife loves me for who I am. All she’s ever asked of me is to be me. All I’ve ever asked of her is to let me love her, as best I can, for as long as she’ll have me. 22+ years later, she’s still ok with that bargain. And with more love than I ever thought I had to give, so am I.
Now for a bit of news: today is Linda’s birthday, and I nothing would make me happier than for all of you to wish her a happy one!
Rain
I’m sitting here on a rainy Saturday afternoon in mid-July. I’ve spent the day as follows:
- I managed to get out of bed and get dressed. This has become a chore. I tend to wake with legs that are simultaneously numb and in excruciating pain. It takes a half hour (at least!) of massaging my calves and feet before I can stand up. (To give you an idea what it feels like, cut off the circulation to a leg so it falls asleep. Then hold your sleeping leg over an open flame. Keep it there. Yep. Not fun.)
- Eat breakfast. Thankfully, I have a wife who’s willing to cook, since I can’t properly grasp a spatula. Or a knife. Or any other cooking tool. Heck, I can’t even use the microwave. Or pour a cup of coffee without spilling half the pot. Have I mentioned lately that I married the greatest woman in the world? I should probably devote a post to her one day.
- Shave. I don’t know whether it was Mr. Remington or Mr. Norelco who invented the electric razor, but God bless them. I would resemble the wolfman without their invention.
(In case you haven’t noticed, mornings are no longer my most enjoyable part of the day)
- Take my daily walk. I’m up to about a half-mile now. For a guy who used to bike 20 miles just to warm up, it doesn’t seem like much. But 3 months ago I was still stuck in a wheelchair. Small victories!
- Get through my email. Even though I haven’t worked in over 2 years now, I still get around 150 of them a day.
- Take a nap. I do that more than I ever did. I guess I’m finally catching up on all that sleep I missed in my 20s🙂
- Read.
Reading is something I’ve always enjoyed. Today I finished “Aeon Rising” by Michael Mather. I’m also reading a tome on argumentative thinking -essentially, relearning how to argue all sides of a position intelligently. While I’ve applied that type of thinking throughout my adult life, I’m still picking up a few pointers.
Mather is a decent author, generally creating post-apocalyptic worlds with a hard science fiction underpinning. In this one, an apparent supernova explodes in Earth’s backyard, creating all kinds of disasters, melting the South Pole, stranding a spec-ops force in the Amazon. Only… Is it really a supernova? He blends in AIs (both good and not so good), a couple of mad scientists, a rogue senator and colonel, a Chinese spy/astrophysicist, the NSA, and a shadowy tech terrorist group.
Rereading that last part makes me realize it probably sounds like a bit too much to jam into one novel. Hey, I mentioned Mather is a pretty good writer. He not only gets it all in, but they’re essential to what is a tightly wound story.
So, I got off on a tangent. This was supposed to be post about rainy days, and somehow it turned into a book review. Anyway, back to my original subject: rainy days SUCK. They especially suck when you spend most of your day trying to ignore pain. See, not only can’t you do things outdoors which helps alleviate the pain. The damp, cool air makes everything hurt more than usual, as well.
Anyway, the sun is supposed to make a reappearance tomorrow. Here’s to better days ahead!
Hello Again! (And Thank You, Jesus)
You might have noticed I’ve only posted twice over the last 18 months. Well, thrice if you include this one, I suppose. There’s a very interesting story that explains why.
In February 2021, as we were entering week 48 of “two weeks to stop the spread,” I was told the blood clots in my lungs needed to be removed ASAP. The procedure would be difficult but not especially dangerous. Oh, and for good measure, there were only two hospitals in the country capable of doing it. Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia, and UCSD in San Diego. We opted for Temple since flying cross-country during the pandemic was virtually impossible. Thus began 7 intense weeks of testing, doctors appointments, consultations, a couple of minor procedures to prepare for the actual surgery, and more tests.
Finally, the day for the actual surgery arrived. April 7, 2021, was the day my life changed. Due to the pandemic, my wife wasn’t allowed to come with me, but the doctors had assured me I would awake the following day and they would try to arrange a visit. I was apprehensive, my wife more so. But I needed the operation or I would be dead within the year, so I arrived ready for the surgery at 6AM that morning.
Only, I didn’t wake up the following day. Or the day after that. Or even the week after that. Instead, I slipped into a coma and didn’t wake up until June 26. I was awake for two days but then slipped back into a coma for another ten. I didn’t finally come about earnestly until July 7 – a full three months after the surgery.
Now, I obviously don’t know all that happened during that three months. Nobody even knows why I went into a coma.* But there are a few things I do know. While I was asleep, I suffered a series of trans-ischemic events (mini-strokes for the rest of us). I know at one point, the doctors were certain I was dead, only being kept alive by machines. My wife, knowing that wasn’t how I never wanted to live in that condition, made the heart-rending decision to terminate life support. I can’t imagine the emotional turmoil she was going through over those days. Only 3 years prior she had been tasked with making the same decision for her brother; he died within minutes. Now she was tasked with making the same decision for her husband.
Thankfully, I survived. They “pulled the plug” and expected me to expire. God had other plans – I just kept right on breathing. That brings up another thing I discovered about my time in my coma. When my wife announced on social media that she had to make an impossible decision, she asked for prayer. Boy, did you all respond! I have heard from literally hundreds of people, including a whole bunch of you I’ve never met, who told me they spent time pleading with the Almighty for Him to allow me to live.
I spent another 2 1/2 months in rehab. I had to learn to eat and talk. When I first awoke, it was as if I were paralyzed. I couldn’t even move my arms and legs. It was a difficult process that I again went almost alone. Almost, but not quite. Even though I was despondent and begging God to just let me die, he gave me the strength to push through. Finally, 25 weeks after going in for a difficult but not particularly dangerous procedure (except, you know, for the almost killing me part), I returned home. I still couldn’t walk, or even stand up. My left hand was virtually useless. I could barely grasp a spoon with my right. Even sitting up for a few hours exhausted me. But I WAS HOME. And alive.
The past 8 1/2 months have been difficult, to say the least. It is, I hope, understandable that I haven’t posted much recently. My rehab is going well. I can walk some – up to a half-mile, although it is slow and painful. The neurological damage from the strokes and, as we’ve since discovered, very poor care while in the coma forces me to wear a leg brace. It’s also badly disfigured my hands and wrists, so even common tasks like shaving and using a fork and knife have required many hours of therapy and experimentation. My speech is a little more slurred than it used to be unless I concentrate.
I’m not complaining, though. Quite the opposite. I’ve had people ask me how I can be actually happy with all the last 18 months have brought me. I think the answer should be obvious.
I AM ALIVE!
In His infinite wisdom, God has seen fit to give me another chance at life. I don’t know why. It may simply be to strengthen my faith. If that’s the case, He’s succeeded.
Anyway, I’ve mastered the two-fingered typing method. Sort of. I hope to be posting more frequently, although a daily post is probably out of the question. And a final thought: I noticed almost 1400 of you are still following this site, despite not very much content lately. I thank all of you. You are a big part of the reason I’m trying.
There are two other reasons I’m going to attempt returning to blogging. They are two fellow bloggers. First is Beauty Beyond Bones. She has gone through more than I, yet her faith remains strong and her voice, stronger. The other is Peter Venetoklis at Roots of Liberty, whose views don’t always align with mine but whose positions and arguments are always well thought out and reasoned. These people have inspired me to metaphorically pick up my quill and inkwell and get back in the game.
After all, we have a lot to discuss and I can’t wait to get the discussion started.
*My doctors think the coma was a result of systemic shock, but they aren’t sure. If you’re a long-time follower, you’re probably aware I’ve dealt with Crohn’s Disease for 30+ years. The doctors think the combination of being weakened from a few years of pulmonary hypertension and Crohn’s may have left me so weak that the coma was my body’s attempt at shielding me from the pain of the surgery.
Not All Police Are Racist Pigs
Welcome to 2020, the Year When Ridiculous Reductionism Reigned.
As our latest example, let’s take a look at the recent example of George Floyd. At this point, while only the most dense among us think his death was in any way justified. There isn’t much doubt that a white police officer, Derek Chauvin, crushed Mr. Floyd to death while three other officers not only looked on, but actively participated. There is no doubt that this is a clear case of murder, and caught on videotape from three different angles, as well.
As mentioned, only the very obtuse are disputing these facts. But another narrative is forming, pushed by far left divisionists in the media. In a fit reminiscent of the days after Ferguson, once again they have taken the widest possible brush imaginable and painted every police officer in the nation as a racist. Of course, that narrative blew up in their face when Michael Brown was revealed to have attacked Officer Darrin Wilson prior to being shot.
But this time, there is no doubt that Derek Chauvin had no earthly reason to kill George Floyd and once again, the “all police are racists” song is playing. This is reductionism at its very worst.
It’s possible race played a role in this tragedy. But (hold on to your hats) it’s also possible it isn’t a factor. We have heard nothing about motive or state of mind. We have no clue why Chauvin did what he did. We only know he did it.
I understand that as a white, middle-aged guy I might not be the best to speak to these facts. But as a white, middle-aged guy who lived for over a decade in an all black neighborhood in a majority black city, I can speak with certainty that the same biases towards the black community you find in the suburbs exists towards white among the residents of the inner city. Undoubtedly, as with any stereotype, there are justified reasons for that.
But what happens is the grifters and race hustlers feed on that stereotype and then feed into it, inflaming tensions and raising passions. They sublimate righteous protest to fear and anger. Next thing we know, a city is in flames.
What those race hustlers understand only too well is that the images of cities put to the torch by black mobs only serves to reinforce the stereotypes they purport to fight. Nothing is accomplished. The community is devastated. The supposed cause (in this case, finding justice for George Floyd’s family) gets lost in the hullabaloo.
Now, here’s the thing: the one outcome that lasts, that becomes reinforced in minority communities, is that the police are racists. Just stop and think about the absurdity of that statement. Are black cops racist towards other blacks, too?
Make no mistake: those hustlers and grifters do not want any sort of reconciliation. They do not want a better understanding of inner city woes by the rest of the nation. They want those residents to feel oppressed. It is only then that they can increase their power, which is what their game is all about. The lives that get destroyed are secondary to that Machiavellian goal.
In any organization, 5% of the employees should not be in that profession. This is about as hard and fast a rule in human resources as exists. The key is to identify those employees and help them move into a career better suited to them. It might be a lateral move. Or it might be a move out the door.
Policing is no different than any other business in this regard. To pretend the 95% of police officers who take pride in their profession and their mission are the same as the 5% who have no business being a police officer is silly. It is encumbent on any department to identify that 5% and address the situation before something as tragic as happened to George Floyd occurs.
In the case of Officer Chauvin, there was enough evidence over his career to demonstrate he never should have been in the Minneapolis Police Department. The “why” he was never removed from his post needs to be investigated as thoroughly as the circumstances of the murder itself. If it’s found race played a part in his motivation, the prosecutor would be negligent in not upgrading the charges to include a hate crime charge.
But such a finding wouldn’t “prove” that all cops are racists. It behooves all of us to remember that.
In Memoriam: Lt. Robert L. Ledbetter, USN
Today is Memorial Day, 2020. It is the day our nation has set aside to remember those who gave the ultimate sacrifice in service to the country. While I have had the honor of knowing far too many young men who gave the last measure of devotion, I want to take this opportunity to remember one in particular, Lieutenant Robert L. Ledbetter.
Lt. Ledbetter was the chaplain when I first checked into 3rd Battalion, 4th Marines in April, 1984. Now, something you may not know: the Marine Corps doesn’t have their own chaplains. Like our corpsmen, we get them from the Naval Chaplain Corps. You may have heard that Marines are hell raisers. Well, that’s true as it goes, but the chaplain’s job is to not only try and redeem the souls of those hell raisers, but act as a counselor for those Marines who find themselves troubled by their profession.
In this respect, Lt. Ledbetter was a giant of a man. He made it a point to know every Marine in the battalion. He treated everyone, regardless of rank or religion, with the utmost courtesy and respect. What’s more, he didn’t patronize us because of our youth. He understood, probably better than we did, that we had chosen a rough business to be part of and what that business could do to a man’s soul and his humanity. He had a unique talent for being able to talk to you, man to man, and letting you walk away from the conversation not only feeling better about life, but better about yourself. No matter what trouble you came to him with, whether the most intimate or the silliest, Lt. Ledbetter seemed to always know what to say.
3/4 was designated Battalion Landing Team 3/4 and assigned to the 26th Marine Amphibious Unit for a Mediterranean expedition. We were all excited. We would be spending the winter of 1985-6 in the sunny Mediterranean, and our months spent undergoing training to become Special Operations capable meant we would be the very pointy tip of the spear.
Before we sailed north to Norfolk to join up with our escorts, we were to take part in a “dog & pony” show. That is, we were to stage a mock amphibious assault on the beach at Camp Lejeune for the benefit of the media. It was the sort of thing we had done dozens of times. Nobody expected any trouble.
The morning of October 15, 1985 was chilly and foggy. Before boarding my CH-46 for the beach landing, I heard Lt. Ledbetter call out, “LCpl Rothfeldt!”
My primary MOS (that’s your job title) was Radio Repairman. Now, there’s not much radio repairing happening out in the field. You might be able to patch up a broken switch or rig up something to attach a cracked antenna, but if the radio is kaput, it needs to wait until the unit returns to the rear to get maintenance. So what does the Marine Corps do with their radio repairmen when in the field? They train them up to handle other jobs. So I was assigned as an auxillary radio operator for field operations with Company K (Kilo Company). That meant I was to fly with elements of Kilo’s headquarters staff, instead of Headquarters & Service Company.
The reason Lt. Ledbetter was asking for me was simple: he wanted to fly in with the line company, to show his solidarity with the grunts. He had already cleared it with both the colonel and the company commander, so who was I to say no? I stepped out of the “stick” and moved on to the next helo, while Lt. Ledbetter took my spot.
What happened next will remain etched on my mind forever.
Almost immediately after lifting off, the CH-46 Lt. Ledbetter and 15 other Marines were flying in began flying erratically. Before anyone could say “what happened,” the helicopter pitched over, nose first, straight into the water. Time seemed frozen for a moment, a heartbeat, a second that felt like a lifetime. And then all pandemonium broke out.
The alarm klaxons on the USS Guadalcanal began sounding. Marines from India Company (which was our boat assault force) redirected their boats to the area where the helo went into the water to search for survivors. There was only one, the copilot. 15 men, including our beloved chaplain, were killed that dreary morning.
In the 35 years since that fateful day, I’ve often found myself asking why. Why didn’t I ask the Padre to switch with someone else? Why did he pick me to switch with? Why was a fine man, a man of God, a man everybody respected and admired, the one to die and not me? And there’s one more thing I want to know.
I want to know why Lt. Robert L. Ledbetter isn’t here to answer these questions. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t wish he was.
Fair winds and following seas, Padre.
Injecting Bleach Is a Bad Idea, ok?
Apparently, there’s a hubbub around whether the President suggested people should inject bleach and other household disinfectants to ward of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. I did not watch the press conference live, so I didn’t hear the comments or the context at the time. I was, like millions of other Americans, getting ready for the NFL draft. In fact, if I’m being totally honest, I probably haven’t watched a full briefing in two weeks – I find most of it to be a tedious bore, with reporters springing “gotcha” questions in attempts to sow division and hatred, instead of asking real questions about policies or findings.
Anyway, President Trump seemed to suggest injecting household cleaners would be worth studying. Or he was, once again, thinking out loud – which is one of his more notable (and regrettable) traits. Regardless, he did say something that could be misconstrued along those lines.
So here’s where common sense comes in. I think most of us learned by age 4 or so that ingesting chemicals is a really bad, not good, horrible idea (except for those of you on YouTube eating laundry soap, y’all came to that knowledge later). But if you didn’t, here’s a protip: DO NOT INJECT YOURSELF WITH BLEACH OR LYSOL.
I can’t believe I’m taking time out of my day to write this, but here we are. By the way, if you’re one of the select who think every suggestion by the President carries the same weight as the Gospels, now might be a good time to do a little self-reflection. As with all politicians, their words should be measured against what they actually do. But never, ever lend credence to anything they say in a vacuum.
Now, if the President decides to inject himself with bleach, then you might consider it. Despite this president’s notable germophobia, I don’t think he will be anytime soon. And neither should you.
What Now?
I spent the past two weeks worrying aloud that I thought literally slamming the door on the US economic engine was nearsighted, silly and an idiotic move. Sadly, the economic news over the last 72 hours exceeded even my worst projections – along with those of almost every economist. Most figured the US economy would teeter at around 6 or 6.5% unemployment through April, with growth shrinking by about 10% for Q2 after zero growth in Q1. Instead, we now know that we’ve already bled almost 10 million jobs and the unemployment rate has already zoomed to 9.5 or 10%. We also know the economy contracted by about 0.8% in Q1. Along with those (now rosy) projections about how the economy was doing in March, we can also expect the similarly anticipated “V-shaped” recession is about as unattainable as the Ark of the Covenant.
I could sit here and angrily type my frustration that the government decided to shut everything down in the middle of the best economy I had experienced since I was in my mid-20s. (Trust me, I’m tempted!) But as my grandmother loved to say, “There’s no sense crying about the spilled milk. Better to get a mop and clean it up.” So how do we clean up the mess we created?
When I first started writing this yesterday, I planned on including lots of charts and tables, relying on data to drive my points home. But nothing seemed to grab my attention. Then I remembered something when I first started in sales all those decades ago. People rarely make decisions based on data. Oh, we all love to pretend we do. We convince ourselves that we are supremely rational beings. Reality is different: we are emotional creatures first and foremost. When confronted with a decision, even the most clear and concise arguments will get overwhelmed by our strongest emotions: love, hate and fear.
Especially fear.
Last week, I wrote “How many people will end up dying from COVID-19 vs. how many people will die from starvation and other diseases of poverty if the economy slips into another massive depression?” That is still the question we should be focused on. People are afraid. They’re afraid of dying. They’re afraid of their parents dying, they’re afraid of their children dying, they’re afraid of their spouses dying. But the narrative spun by both the media and the punditry is that because of COVID-19, the deaths we fear are more immediate. They’ve taken everyone’s fear of death and added the element of immediacy, and then told us the only way to eliminate the immediacy is to wall ourselves off in our homes.
This is as much a political crisis as it is a medical and economic one. As much as the media is distrusted these days (and for good reason), it’s important to note that they are getting their cues from the political class. When the governor of New York is on television daily, declaring he needs tens of thousands of non-existent ventilators or else people are going to start dying in the streets, we sit up and take notice. When the governor of Pennsylvania takes to the airwaves to declare that this is the gravest crisis we have ever faced, people heed his words. When the President of the United States begins a daily briefing by reciting the litany of the dead, we are left with the impression that our lives are about to be snuffed out.
Now, imagine if our political leaders were to go back to the original premise of “which is worse: the deaths that will result from an economic depression plus COVID-19, or just the deaths from COVID-19?” Well, then we still understand the immediate effects of COVID-19, but we’re also asked to consider the long-term effects. Why? Because unless we’re completely irrational our psyche is now forced to realize this is a life-and-death decision no matter which way we decide. People, maybe even people we love, maybe even ourselves, will die. The only question then becomes how to balance the equation so that as few people die as possible.
It’s rare that a moral question can be summed up with an equation, but this one can:
Cnm ⸫ Cm+D
Where C stands for deaths from COVID-19, D for deaths from an economic depression, and m for mediation. What is the relation between those three factors? How do we mitigate the number of deaths in each scenario, and at what point does Cm+D cross to become less than Cnm?
(Sorry. The old data guy couldn’t resist throwing mathematics into the pot.)
We know our current approach is definitely going to result in D, and we also know the human toll of D – in famine, malnutrition, abuse, and exposure – will be dreadful. Here’s what else we’re finding out: countries that shut down even further than the US and then tried to “return to normal” – like China, South Korea and Singapore – have had recurrences of COVID-19 that are even worse than their initial outbreaks. So does that combination mean we’re just screwed? We can’t restart and try to to return to normal without killing more people, and we can’t stay in our current stance without killing more people?
No. Not at all.
The key is we can reopen our businesses, pray they return to solvency and that replacements for those that disappeared come alive quickly, but with a couple of caveats.
- First, we need to understand that normal has changed. Medical science has shown that coronaviruses are, in general, highly mutable: that is, they make up for the fact they are not difficult to destroy by mutating, often quickly, meaning most treatments are not terribly effective. It’s why the “flu shot” is rarely more than 50% effective, and why nobody has yet come up with a cure for the common cold. The mediation efforts we put in place now are likely to remain with us for a long, long time.
- Second, those most at risk from COVID-19 should be isolated from the rest of the population as much as practicable. If you have bad lungs or a compromised immune system, you should stay at home as much as possible. When they fall ill and require hospitalization, they should be moved to separate wards from the remainder of the population.
- Third, the nature of white-collar work should change. I understand many jobs require you to be onsite in order to perform your tasks. Most white-collar work does not. I never understood the resistance to telecommuting; I was doing it 15 years ago and hardly ever “went to the office” for the last 6 years of my career. I think most companies are now realizing that the phobias they had about telecommuting were not well founded and having already put in place the systems that allow remote work, will stick with the model going forward.
- Fourth, the nature of school should change. Just as white-collar workers don’t need to be in a cubicle to do their job, students needn’t be tied to a desk in a building to successfully learn. Yes, there are details that would need to be worked out so far as socialization goes. Yes, it might impose a secondary hardship on families that think both parents need to work. But in an era when school districts across the country are spending billions on trying to maintain crumbling school buildings, buildings often inadequate to meet current needs, continuing with teleschool only makes sense.
Finally, our society needs to accept that some portion of the population will contract the COVID-19 disease each year. It is the nature of the virus. Every time I hear a politician, doctor or commentator talk about “defeating coronavirus,” I cringe. It’s not that eradicating the virus isn’t a worthy goal. It is, however, ridiculous to set that condition as a benchmark for returning to living.
This will probably be the hardest adaptation for our society to make. After all the hype, the shutdowns, and the panic, the idea that this is a new reality – one with yet another dangerous disease – in our midst will be difficult for many to accept. We like to think man is invincible and master of his environment. The idea that nature sometimes refuses to be tamed is a concept that we haven’t truly dealt with for nearly a century.
But if we don’t, we will have destroyed the economy that powers modern civilization. And we will have forgotten that most important of American traits: liberty. A free people do not willingly chain themselves and they are not willingly chained. It’s time we remembered that which makes us strongest and unique, and put those principles into action.
Pandemic Panic
Isn’t that a refreshing scene? There’s nothing quite so calming as a tropical island, with gentle surf caressing a sun swept beach while warm breezes sway the palm fronds in a relaxing rhythm. If you squint carefully, you can almost see the natives roasting a swordfish over a crackling fire and smell the heady aroma of fresh island vegetables.
The island also represents what the medical community wants for America. They want us all to hunker down in our homes in hopes of extinguishing the Wuhan Flu, much as we would be isolated and alone on a South Pacific isle. Numerous government leaders have taken them up on this advice. Sadly, they haven’t given each of us our own tropical paradise. While they aren’t actually calling it an enforced quarantine, the lack of the correct verbiage doesn’t make it any less so. If you think otherwise, try leaving your house after 8pm.
Of course, we’re just starting to deal with the fearmongering that resulted in mass panic, and nearly mass hysteria. The national economy is virtually shut down. The stock market almost collapsed,with losses not seen in nearly a half century. Nobody is certain of the damage done, but estimates range as high as perhaps a 40% reduction in GDP and 30% unemployment, numbers not seen since the Great Depression. Social structures have been irrevocably altered, in ways we cannot begin to understand. The very nature of work has been altered, with more white-collar employees working remotely than ever before. When we do get back to work, to school; when the centers of culture and learning do reopen, we have no idea how the changes that were suddenly thrust upon us will reverberate in the future.
The biggest problem with all of this is that the data about this disease is profoundly unreliable. It has been said there are lies, damned lies and statistics and no common experience drives home that truism more than the current situation. From the beginning, statisticians and epidemiologists were dealing with incomplete (and even falsified) data from China, India, Italy and South Korea. As a result, modeling – which government leaders relied on to predict how deadly the COVID-19 pandemic would be to the general population – has been terribly inaccurate. The noted epidemiologist John Ioannidis recently remarked that “the fatality rate could plausibly lie between one in 100 and one in 2,000 cases.” Mind you, he is merely referring to death rate for those who are infected. Nobody has yet put forward a reliable model for the infection rate, because the data simply doesn’t exist. This is a problem that was anticipated. On March 17, Ioannidis wrote, “we lack reliable evidence on how many people have been infected with SARS-CoV-2 or who continue to become infected. Better information is needed to guide decisions and actions of monumental significance and to monitor their impact.“
“But,” you say, “what about the rapid rise in cases in the United States I keep seeing on the evening news?” Ah, a fair question. Consider: since the United States started testing, it took us 17 days to administer the first 100,000 tests. It took another 11 days to administer the next 100,000. It has taken only 5 days to administer the last 320,000 tests. At current rates, the United States will be testing over 1 million people per week by mid-April. As the number of tests administered increases exponentially, the number of confirmed cases will also increase exponentially. The key evidence to look at is whether the number of positive cases is increasing at the same rate as the number of tests – and that answer is a resounding no. While tests have increased at a logarithmic rate, the increase in positive tests has followed a gentler curve, suggesting that the infection and lethality rates are lower than first anticipated.
One other note on testing: we have only been testing people showing symptoms. Yet the positive test rate is only about 15% of those tested for COVID-19. This is because what the media refers to as the “coronavirus” is actually a mutated form of the same virus that causes the common cold, multiple strains of influenza, SARS and MERS. Those are all corona viruses. As a result, the symptoms of COVID-19 fall into the same generalities as those other diseases: cough, fever, fatigue. That only feeds into the panic, especially as those are also symptoms of hay fever – and large swaths of the nation are entering spring allergy season.
For a doctor, the choice facing the nation is an easy one. They are worried about immediacy, and their immediate concern is to keep everyone alive and healthy. So recommending that everyone stay hunkered down in our houses and apartments is an easy choice. But for the rest of us, the choice is far from being simple. The president, and all 50 governors, have to weigh the importance of preserving lives now vs. the effects of leaving the economy in a downward spiral. How many people will end up dying from COVID-19 vs. how many people will die from starvation and other diseases of poverty if the economy slips into another massive depression? We can roughly extrapolate from available data that around 130,000 people will die from this disease. We cannot make even a haphazard guess about what the death toll from an economic depression that last months or even years might be, because while we know one is inevitable on our current course, we don’t know any of the particulars. We can’t. We’re not fortune tellers.
Without solid data, it is an impossible question to answer. Yet we’re all answering it, from the President to loudmouth Joey you normally meet at the corner tavern. The problem is, both of them – and everyone else – doesn’t really know, no matter what they tell you.
Will this virus be bad for the country? It already is. Will a deflated economy be bad for the country? It already is. But making everything worse is fear and panic. We can’t keep ourselves walled off forever, living in fear of everyone who sneezes. The federal government, between emergency fiscal expenditures and monetary expansion from the Federal Reserve, has already expanded national debt by nearly $8 trillion. That’s about 40% of last year’s GDP, and perhaps 65% of this year’s GDP. In short, that is an unsustainable degree of expenditure. We cannot afford to allow fear to panic us into cowardice, and we cannot afford to to allow fear to bankrupt the nation.
FDR once said “we have nothing to fear but fear itself.” It’s time for the panic to end, and for America to prove that FDR knew what he was talking about.
Happy Mother’s Day!
I’m in awe of the two greatest women I’ve ever known.
It’s sometimes hard to believe that this will be the 28th Mother’s Day without my Mom. 28 years since she passed, 28 years without her sage advice (like ”Don’t follow your heart. Follow your mind and just let the heart make suggestions” and “If you only worry about making the good stuff happen, you don’t have time to worry about the other stuff”). There’s not a day goes by that I don’t miss you terribly. You never lived to see me marry, to find the career success you knew would come my way (even when I doubted myself), to see your grandsons.
Which let’s me seque to the other totally amazing woman in my life. For over 20 years, she’s been not only my rock, but the woman who provides our sons a shoulder to cry on or a swift kick in the ass. She’s mended scraped knees and broken hearts, packed lunches along with a wicked wit and despite being badly outnumbered in a testosterone fueled home, kept all of us in line.
So Happy Mother’s Day, Linda!
And Happy Mother’s Day, Mom!
I’m Back!
Sorry for disappearing for so long. For those who aren’t aware, on March 28th I had an ileostomy performed. As I’ve been recovering since then, I’ve had neither the energy to write nor the physical ability to sit up long enough to do so.
Of course, there were post-operative complications. My lungs, badly damaged by the chemicals at Camp Lejeune during my time there, nearly failed during surgery. To assist with breathing, I was on an interesting machine called a “bipap” for part of my recovery time. I not only had to recover from the surgery to abdomen, but also from the pneumonia I developed on the operating table. Because not being able to breathe isn’t enough of a complication, the part of my intestine that now forms my ostomy developed an annoying habit of expanding 5 to 6 inches from my skin. But that seems to be resolving itself with time; the doctors assured me that while not common it also isn’t unheard of and it isn’t particularly dangerous. Unless, of course, I run into something stomach first while that’s happening. I would prefer not to think of how messy that would be.
Still, as the saying goes, all’s well that ends well. So far, my recovery is on schedule and it’s time to get back to as much of my regular life as I can manage. I won’t be able to lift anything heavier than a milk jug for a few more weeks and I’m still adjusting to not being able to sleep on my right side. I’m not supposed to bend, twist or otherwise torque my midsection until June. On a positive note, this has been a terrific weight loss program. I’m down almost 30 pounds since the surgery.
I would be remiss if I didn’t take a moment to pause and thank the wonderful doctors and nurses at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. In particular, I want to thank Dr. Najia Mahmoud, Chief of Colorectal Surgery and her amazing team for their compassion and expertise. I also need to thank the nurses of the SICU, who managed to keep me comfortable and goad my recovery while also keeping my frightened family reassured and informed.
So anyway, get ready for a blizzard of posts. One of the things that happens when you spend so much time lying around is you think. A lot. Now it’s time to put those thoughts into something more substantial than a Twitter post.
Now For A Word from The Surgeon’s Table
If you follow me on social media, or have read this blog for a while, then you know I have Crohn’s Disease. Well, today is the day I’ve been dreading since I was first diagnosed in April 1992.
It’s time to get something removed.
I had always made it a point of pride that I would leave this Earth with all of my parts more or less intact. But that’s not to be. My terminal ileum (that’s the end of the small intestine, the part that connects to the large intestine) is essentially dead and has been causing me all sorts of problems since October.
So, out it comes. The doctors also told me there is a good chance they’ll need to remove the ascending colon, as well. They just can’t tell from the CT scans, but will know better once they get in there and see.
Now, I’m not so worried about what they’re taking out (I’ve kind of resigned myself to the changes I’ll have to make), as simply waking up. One of the dastardly things Crohn’s has done is given me pulmonary embolisms and pulmonary hypertension. They refer to these as “extra-digestive manifestations.” That doesn’t change the fact that breathing isn’t as easy as it used to be, and general anesthesia is especially dangerous for me. As in, might not wake up dangerous.
I’ve placed myself in God’s hands. If he wants me home, there isn’t much you or I can do about it. I always figured that with all the times I’ve defied death until now that God had a reason for keeping me on this planet. It could be this surgery is that reason. My medical team almost sounds like a bad joke: “a Muslim, a Hindu, a Catholic and an atheist walk into a surgical theater…” It could be my surgery will do more for world peace than all the diplomats at the UN have managed in 75 years of talking.
Anyway, by now I’m on the table and the doctors are doing a thing. If you’re the praying type, I’d appreciate if you would lift up my medical team. Oh, and don’t let the big guy upstairs forget I am still needed down here.
Thanks everyone. See you on the other side!
Is Nathan Phillips Guilty of Stolen Valor?
So I’m doing some reading on Nathan Phillips, the Indian guy who claims to have been harassed by the teenagers from Coventry High over the weekend and I can’t help but think there is a serious case of stolen valor here. He claims to be a Marine Corps Vietnam veteran, but too much of his story doesn’t add up. This is a guy who has been in the news off and on for the past 20 years, but nobody seems to have checked out his background. His first interview, way back in November 2000, listed his age as 45. His most recent interview, from this past weekend, he is 64. That is consistent with someone born in early January 1955. By his own account (again, nobody has seen his DD214), he joined the Marines at age 17, but this was after a period of time working as a lumberjack.
Here’s where his story starts to fall apart. Let’s be generous and say he stepped on the yellow footprints in February 1972, graduating after 13 weeks. Let’s be even more generous and say he did not have leave after basic and reported straight to ITR. So, the earliest he could have been deployed to Vietnam as a 0311 would have been late July or early August 1972.
The last major USMC combat element, III MAF, left Vietnam in April 1971. The last USMC combat unit, 3rd MAB, left in June 1971.
You can see the problem here. Those dates mean either Nathan Phillips was the only combat Marine in Vietnam, he was assigned to the Embassy or he was one of the 60 or so advisors the Marine Corps left with the ARVN forces. The last option is least likely (a boot private without any combat experience isn’t going to advise anyone on tactics). If he were assigned to the embassy, he would likely have clarified this by stating his MOS was an 8151.
Now for where things REALLY get interesting. Phillips also claims to be a Force Recon Marine. In his own words in a Vogue interview in 2018, he actually says “I’m what they call a recon ranger.” Well, knock me over with a feather, but if I had a nickel for every recon ranger I’ve met who never even wore a uniform, I’d be a millionaire. To my knowledge, I’ve never met a Force Recon Marine in the First Civ Div. Do you know why? Because most special forces guys don’t go around advertising their training. They don’t need to.
But let’s suspend all reason and say that Phillips isn’t laying it on thicker than molasses in January. The absolute minimum training time for a Force Recon Marine is 4 months. Let’s also suppose he was selected for Force Recon out of ITR. That puts his earliest arrival in Vietnam as January 1973.
That’s still 4 months after the last US combat unit, the Army’s 3rd Battalion, 21st Infantry, 196th Brigade left Vietnam in August 1972.
I suppose it’s possible Phillips forgot some dates. It’s possible he can’t recall his MOS. Anything is possible, after all, even though I’ve never met a Marine who can’t remember what his job was, the dates of his service and every time he was deployed (and where).
I hate to call him out as a fraud if he isn’t. But considering he has spent the past few years putting himself in the news and is now muckraking to the point of driving hate mobs towards teenagers, it’s time to put his veracity to the test. If you served with Nathan Phillips, let me know. If he is a Force Recon Marine, I’ll gladly retract every word of this, buy him a beer and thank him for his service. But if he isn’t, he is deserving of every bit of scorn and derision we can heap upon him.
Update: On January 23, the Marine Corps released the following statement:
“Nathan Phillips, 64, spent four years in the Marine Corps Reserve and left in 1976 with the rank of private, or E-1. Previously identified as Nathaniel R. Stanard, Phillips never deployed, but served as a refrigerator technician and anti-tank missileman.”
RIP, Ian Long
This is one of the most difficult posts I will have ever written, or ever feel compelled to write. But what I am about to say must not only be heard, but preserved, if only because the topic is of vital importance.
As you’re undoubtedly aware by now, late last night, Ian David Long drove to the Borderline Bar & Grill in Thousand Oaks, CA. For reasons we will probably never know, he arrived with evil intent. He was armed & he was dressed for combat. He began by shooting the doorman with his Glock 21 .45 caliber semi-automatic pistol. By the time he was finished, 11 others lay dead, including Ventura Sheriff’s Deputy Sgt. Ron Helus. 10 more were wounded.
In the hours since we have come to learn that Ian Long was discharged from active service with the Marine Corps in 2013. He served one contract, like most Marines and servicemembers. He did nothing that particularly distinguished his brief military career, nor did he do anything that detracted from his service. He was simply your average Marine, like most of those who earned an Eagle, Globe & Anchor before and since.
When I first heard the news this morning, I remarked to my wife (this was before we knew who the gunman was) that I had to begrudgingly give the shooter kudos for round efficiency. See, as a Marine I appreciate good shooting – even if done for evil reasons. Good, accurate shooting under pressure is a skill that every Marine must master. There is no earning that EGA without it.
Of course, now we know the shooter is a Marine.
The news has devastated me.
On Saturday, our Corps will celebrate our 243rd birthday. Personally, I will be in South Philadelphia to join a few thousand other Marines in raising a mug and joining in the cake ceremony. Of all the things that join us as Marines, it is these traditions that go back to the very beginnings of the nation that are the most important. Every Marine knows we were born at Tun Tavern in Philadelphia on November 10, 1775. Ordinarily, this time of year is only exceeded in anticipation among Marines by Christmas.
Now, that excitement is tempered by the realization one of our own has gone off the reservation. To make matters worse, as a former Veteran’s Service Officer for the American Legion, I know there was no need for it. This was the most preventable tragedy imaginable.
It didn’t take long for the media to begin with the “crazy veteran” stories. It feeds an all too common narrative among the non-veteran community that veterans are damaged goods, this misperception that veterans are incompatible with civilization. After all, we do have higher rates of mental illness than the civilian population, so we must be ticking time bombs. An incident like last night shouldn’t be a surprise, according to the talking heads. The surprise should be that it doesn’t happen more often.
First, stop with that nonsense. Yes, veterans have seen and done things that 98% of you cannot even begin to imagine. Yes, those things leave an indelible mark on your psyche. They also form the basis for a bond among us that those of you who have never served cannot begin to imagine. But that does not make us monsters lurking in the shadows, waiting to pounce on you at first opportunity. For the most part, when we take off the uniform, we lead perfectly normal lives. We are bankers, cooks, bartenders, construction foremen, teachers; you’ll find us doing all of the same mundane things you do. The battles we wage with our personal demons are off to the side, leaving you unaffected.
Whatever drove Ian Long to commit his act of premeditated mass murder, to plan it out with the ruthless efficiency of any Marine infantry commander ordering the clearing of a building and execute it with that same efficiency, we will likely never know. The speculation is that he had PTSD. I’m calling bullshit on that media diagnosis right now.
I should know. I am also a veteran with PTSD, like millions of others.
But I also have two other diagnoses, Explosive Personality Disorder, and Survivor’s Guilt, that would be more likely than PTSD to cause someone to do what Long did. PTSD is not the type of mental illness that leads to violence. If anything, left untreated it is more likely to result in suicide than murder. EPD, on the other hand… anyone remember the old “Hulk” television show? The classic line from that show was David Banner telling the reporter who chased him, “Don’t make me angry. You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry.” Yeah, it’s kind of like that.
But we’ll never know because by all accounts he was not receiving any care for any mental issues. This is despite a visit from a clinician in April of last year, someone I’m certain who was well-meaning but likely totally unsuited to diagnosing a veteran. As mentioned above, we’re expert at dealing with our problems privately. Part of that is learning how to hide the outward signs. I survived for nearly 12 years before a fellow vet convinced me to get help. It was the best thing that could have happened for me, although my fight with the VA to get that care could probably fill a novel.
The VA’s version of care for mental illness is a big part of the reason many veterans, even though they know they need help, do not seek it. I abandoned their treatment regimen not long after beginning it since it basically consists of keeping the veteran doped up on handfuls of pills. But by getting into treatment, I met plenty of other vets who were also dealing with their own issues. Working with them, I found my way back to God and an inner peace. Do I struggle at times? Sure. Do I still wake at night to the sights and sounds of helicopters falling into the water? You bet. Do I still find myself getting melancholy? Sure. Do I still think to myself, “I really should just knock this guy’s block off” a little too often? Probably.
But I don’t just haul off and beat the crap out of the deserving. I was able to get the help I needed. Through my work as a VSO, I’ve helped others get the help they needed. As a veteran, I’ve spent midnight hours on the phone with veterans and their loved ones, defusing crisis situations that most civilians are unequipped to handle, no matter how well-intentioned. The shame of this whole thing is that Ian Long did not get the help he needed, for whatever reason. His demons beat on his soul until finally, he snapped. It shouldn’t have happened. There was no need.
The next bit is for every veteran who made be reading. If you are not a veteran, the language that follows may be a bit salty for your tastes. Bear with me – and please share this part with any veterans you know.
You do not have to suffer alone. In fact, that is the worst thing you can do. Trust someone who’s been where you are, who’s been where you were and who wants you to at least get as far as I have, if not further. Here are some basic life skills for veterans to cope with the civilian world. Don’t get me wrong, I have some great civilian friends. But they will never know the things you do (how the hell could they?).
1: Cultivate and maintain close friendships with at least one older and one younger vet. Your elder has been where you are and can help coach you through it. You can do the same for the younger, and benefit from helping another.
2: Do something creative/constructive. Work with wood, steel, words, music, paint, sculpture, food, whatever you can do. Balance the destructive with the creative. I like woodworking. You might prefer painting. Whatever, just git ‘er done.
3: Have a routine and stick to it. When it gets REALLY dark, stick to it even more rigidly. Concentrate on doing the “next thing.” Even if you have to force yourself. 0700: Reveille is reveille. Make yourself get up. 0705: Your rack must be made…make it. 0710: Wash your nasty ass, etc. Sounds basic, but it works. There’s a reason we spent all those years having our sergeants bitch at us every time we were 30 seconds late for formation, after all.
4: Stay alert when you’re out and about. LOOK for neighbors (anyone in your community) who could use a hand, and help them. Even better if you can do it “on the sly,” and let ’em wonder. You’ll feel better about yourself and your community.
5: Have a couple brothers you can call (and vice versa) 24/7 when it’s REALLY bad, and CALL them. (These can, but don’t have to be, covered in #1…just be sure they’re people who will call you on bullshit if necessary.)
6: When you get the blues, when you start missing friends who will never be coming back, when the bombs are going off around you – when the demons begin whispering in your ear – don’t try to lose yourself in a bottle or some other drug. Go back to the first 5 tips instead. Those demons in the bottle are only going to make you angrier, sadder and start talking to your other demons. Next thing you know, they’re going to be making you say “IT’S TIME TO FUCK SOME SHIT UP” and do something stupid. Like, shoot up a bar full of innocent people, for instance.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go mourn. I’ll be mourning those innocents who lost their lives last night.
But I’ll also mourn the loss of Ian David Long, a Marine left alone to fight an impossible nightmare, on this the eve of the Marine Corps birthday. In many ways, he is a victim, too.
Ian David Long
TRW
Tuesday, I patched holes in walls. I replaced some broken and chipped moldings.
I also voted.
Tuesday night, I watched election returns. I was pretty disappointed in the performance of my fellow citizens in Pennsylvania, How could they possibly vote against their best interests and return that many big government types to office? I was pretty happy with my fellow citizens in other places, though. They were smart enough to realize the Andrew Gillum, Stacy Abrams and “Beto” O’Rourke’s of the world can’t possibly deliver all those goodies without crashing the goody cart. When my local US Representative was declared the winner at 11:30 (praise be to God we’re the one district in this state that kept our sanity!) I went to sleep.
Yesterday, I woke, put on the coffee (I’m always up before the missus), helped my nephew get ready for school, ate breakfast, checked the weather (no rain, FINALLY!), didn’t shave…
Look, the point of all this is simply to say that anyone who reads this blog or follows me on social media knows I follow politics intensely. You know I love a good argument on applied governance, on Constitutional principles, on budgets, on policy. I can go on for thousands of words about the finer points of repealing the 16th and 17th Amendments.
But like most Americans, I have a real life outside these digital dots and dashes, with real people that I care about and who care about me. The entire point of my political life is about securing a better life in the United States, not only for myself but more importantly, for them. Politics is simply one aspect of (what I hope, anyway) is a wide and varied real-world life. Among my fellow conservatives, this seems to be our understanding of how the real world works. You work, you raise your family, you hang out with your friends, you dabble in politics and such as needed to let you keep doing the first three.
This is why we are bemused and confused when we see the mobs of left cultists rioting over an election result. Or rioting because there isn’t an election yet. Or just rioting over politics generally.
Elections happen annually. Sometimes, even more frequently if you’re unlucky enough to live somewhere the locals deem it that way. So that means every year you get to go vote. In our system, we vote for people who do the daily voting for us. Sometimes, the person who gets chosen is the person you wanted. Sometimes it isn’t. But the entire idea, our entire society, is built on the idea that everyone accepts that person until their term is over (or they turn out to be so corrupt they get arrested *ahem New Jersey ahem*).
Left cultists don’t seem to get this concept. Maybe it’s because we stopped teaching civics in school. Maybe it’s because, as parents, we were too lenient on Not My Johnny. Maybe it’s because they’re mentally more susceptible to believing fantasies. I was talking with a friend the other day, a pretty astute guy for a Marine, who mentioned he thinks this is all from technology. When I quizzed him as to why, he said the very tools that make interacting easier, are also the tools that make expansive government less necessary than not that long ago, and the left cultists have bought into the idea of the nanny state. I’m not sure, but there’s a kernel of an idea in there.
I’ll have to explore it later. For now, it’s time to put the coffee on and start getting ready for my day. Moving furniture is probably one of my least favorite tasks.
It’s Good To Be Back
I haven’t meant to be away for so long. For those of you who don’t follow me on social media (and while we’re on that topic, why aren’t you?), I experienced yet another flare of my Crohn’s Disease a couple of weeks ago. Or, as the doctors call it, an exacerbation. Whatever you call it, I call it a humdinger of an attack. My ileum (that’s the part of your intestines that connects the large and small intestine together) blew up like a hot air balloon. I wound up totally obstructed, which is a pleasant way to describe a very unpleasant form of constipation. A week at the VA hospital in Philly, and another week of more-or-less R&R at home, has me feeling much more like myself these days. I’m not totally out of the woods just yet and ileostomy remains a very real possibility if this recurs in the next 60 days, so even if you aren’t the praying type – prayers are appreciated!
Now, one of the things that happens when you’re lying in a hospital bed is you get a LOT of time to think. Boy, have I been doing quite a bit of thinking. I have notes and ideas scattered all over my desk. The topics foremost on my mind: the looming midterm elections, the immigrant “caravan,” and the impending baseball offseason. And no, the World Series is not high on my list of worries this year. The only team I hate more than the Dodgers are the Red Sox. This is the first year I find myself hoping nobody wins that thing.
So, beginning tomorrow, prepare to get deluged with posts. Lots and lots of posts.
Happy reading!
In Remembrance
September 11, 2001.
There are only a few dates in a person’s life that can be recalled in perfect clarity. Dates where your memories are supercharged by the emotions felt that day, dates that haunt your dreams and whose events can be replayed like an old video.
My wedding day is one such day for me. The other is not nearly so happy: September 11, 2001.
It was my first day off from work in nearly two months, and I rewarded myself by sleeping in that morning. I was sitting at my kitchen table, a cup of coffee and the morning newspaper (yes, back then, a newspaper was not unusual) in front of me when my wife hollered from the living room. “A plane just hit the World Trade Center!” she yelled. “It’s on the TV. Come and see!”
I’m ashamed to admit that my first reaction was that it was a bad accident, but one I had been expecting for years. After all, those two skyscrapers jutted out, almost into the air lanes at the very southern tip of Manhattan. That no pilot had accidentally run into them before I considered a miracle.
I went into the living room, coffee in hand. My wife had the Today show on. They were showing the smoke pouring from the building via a helicopter shot and Matt Lauer was babbling about the WWII bomber that ran into the Empire State Building. I remember thinking that as much as I had dreaded a pilot losing his way and flying into one of those towers, I couldn’t wrap my head around how one had done so on that morning. The weather seemed so perfect, the skies so clear, that it seemed impossible that a pilot couldn’t have seen where the hell he was flying.
Fast forward a bit, and the first reports came in that air traffic controllers had lost contact with the plane before the crash. “Maybe the pilot had a stroke,” I remarked to my wife. It was 9:01 am. I remember the time because I had glanced at the wall clock as I turned to go back into the kitchen. I was hungry and about to root around for some food.
2 minutes later, my wife was screaming, “Another plane just crashed into the South Tower!” It was the moment our world changed. Because at that moment, I knew this wasn’t an accident. It was a planned, coordinated attack on the very heart of our economic might, on symbols of our national strength. Someone had just declared war on the United States.
Do you remember how you felt at the moment you first realized that? I do. I was pissed off. And confused, because like most Americans I had no idea who it might be. I had never heard of Al Queada, and never in a million years would I have guessed a bunch of cave dwelling goat herders could be sophisticated enough to use our own aircraft to attack us.
After that, of course, came the mad scramble. I called my store, told my employees to lock up and head home for the day. Called my DM to tell him what I did and why (like a lot of people, he was already at work and had no idea what was going on yet). And then the phone lines were jammed – nobody could a call through, which just added to my wife’s anxiety. I wasn’t certain if it was another attack or just everyone in the country trying to call one another, but I wasn’t taking chances. We raced to the school to grab our kids, just in case this was a precursor to a larger attack.
Of course, there were two more attacks that morning: flight 77 rammed into the Pentagon, and the heroes of flight 93 averted a major disaster by taking back their plane and crashing it before it reached Washington.
At 9:59, the South Tower collapsed – and like everyone else, I was shocked. One plane brought down a 1000 foot skyscraper? A few minutes later, the North Tower followed it’s sister to its death.
I was numb. I was angry. I was afraid.
And I wanted whoever had done this to be beaten to a bloody pulp, heads ripped from their necks, a pike driven so far up their asses that when it rained they could get a colonic.
When a date is so traumatic, so vivid, that it can be shared by a generation, it is a milestone event, a moment in history that can galvanize and define nations. Such is September 11.
God bless those who lost their lives that day and the men and women who toiled for weeks after to search for survivors and perished as a result.
May God bless the United States.
#NeverForget
The Attack on Parenting
Some time back, the left uncorked a nutty idea: parents weren’t essential cogs in society. Over the last couple of weeks, this ugly theme has reappeared as a talking point in several leftist articles with wide circulation, all arguing that child rearing is better left to government overlords. Indeed, we are again being told that thousands of generations of humans have been poorly served by parents, because the reality is that “it takes a village” to properly care for a child – if that child is even deemed viable in the womb by those overlords. This seems like yet another attempt at destruction of the most essential building block of society, the nuclear family.
Now, for a quick detour. Why, you may ask, would anyone want to destroy families? The answer is simple, if you understand history. The first thing to understand is the roots of modern liberalism are found in the ideals of socialism, and modern socialists (whether they understand it or not) are promoting a soft communism. They may be willing to swap out the dictator for some sort of proletarian government, but make no mistake: they believe all of society’s ills can be cured by government. Their contention is that no government, regardless how well intentioned, can survive so long as private, unregulated ownership of property and capital is allowed to exist.
The nuclear family has been seen as an existential threat to this ideal since the very first promulgation of their warped philosophy. It was Engels who wrote an entire book on the subject, in order to reinforce his and Marx’s idea that the family was a construct of capitalist societies that existed primarily to ensure the preservation of individual wealth. They then further fantasized that governments and western religions encouraged the nuclear family, as a way of ensuring that children were indoctrinated with the approved morals and views of government.
Taken in that light, it isn’t terribly surprising to the rest of us that the family is one of the left’s foremost targets. So long as the family unit exists, the possibility of a socialist utopia cannot. The two are mutually exclusive.
Over the past 50 years, the left has launched a legislative assault on the traditional family. Liberalized divorce and abortion laws have removed most legal impediments to dissolving a family. The expansion of child welfare agencies and redefinition of what constitutes abuse have left parents who want to discipline their children at the state’s mercy. Increased participation in school curricula and operations by federal and state legislatures have ended parental control over their children’s education. They have even redefined the family with the legalization of gay marriage and making gay adoptions permissible.
While this assault on the family has recorded casualties (we’ve gone from 87% of children being in a traditional family to 68% in the last 50 years), the fact is that the normative family remains the standard in American society. But if your goal is to further the socialist ideal, to focus on the dubitable positives of equality of outcome, the family remains as your greatest threat. Modern socialists realize they cannot emulate their Marxist heroes and end the family by decree, so they instead have instigated a propaganda campaign to persuade us that parenting is not the most important job a person can have.
This line of attack, while perhaps not coordinated, has seen a dramatic uptick in the last few weeks. The first of these “thought pieces” that came to my attention was by Daniel Enberg in Slate. In Parenting Doesn’t Matter, he writes:
…what does affect a child’s future? Twin studies say a large proportion of the differences between children’s cognitive abilities, personalities, and chances of ending up with mental illness (among other long-term outcomes) can be explained solely by their DNA. And most of the rest appears to come from random chance, quirks in their biology, and specific non-parent-related life experiences: the teachers they had, or the friends they made along the way.
The entire article is a screed about how, even though he’s the father of an infant, he doesn’t see how anything he does – including things such as helping his daughter choose her friends, selecting her classes, her extra curricular activities, even simply reading her a bedtime story – will make any difference in her life. As he puts it, nothing he does “means she’ll still be shitting her pants at her high school graduation.”
The second piece was Ruth Marcus’ well publicized op-ed in the Washington Post. It is one of the most reprehensible articles I have ever read. It is nothing less than a full throated endorsement of eugenics, solely for a prospective mother’s “convenience.” She wrote:
I’m going to be blunt here: That was not the child I wanted. That was not the choice I would have made. You can call me selfish, or worse, but I am in good company. The evidence is clear that most women confronted with the same unhappy alternative would make the same decision.
Indeed, further on in the piece, she acknowledges that she foresees abortion as being the key to allowing eugenics to become a new societal norm (not unlike Nazi Germany’s “Final Solution”):
Technological advances in prenatal testing pose difficult moral choices about what, if any, genetic anomaly or defect justifies an abortion. Nearsightedness? Being short? There are creepy, eugenic aspects of the new technology…
But hey, if the mother chooses to kill her family before it even begins, that’s not society’s concern, right? I would fully expect an avowed leftist like Marcus to pen such drivel and assume some sort of perverted moral high ground with it.
Then there’s “How to Raise a Boy” by Will Leitch. Now, I enjoy Will’s writing when he sticks to his bailiwick, which is sports. But for some reason, he felt it necessary to provide the rest of us his take on parenting. Many others have taken his piece to be a commentary on other leftist tropes: white male privilege, the need to end “gun culture,” the virtue of being a beta male and so forth. But in reality, he supports Enberg’s view that parenting really amounts to little more than providing food and shelter for his offspring, not moral guidance or education.
There are things that I think I’m supposed to show them…that I don’t necessarily agree with but don’t want to stand in the way of. What do I know, you know? Every parent is only pretending that he or she has any real answers…this lesson of self-reliance is only an illusion. I can tell myself that any “success” I’ve had has been because of “hard work” and “perseverance,” but I’m kidding myself.
So, even though Leitch acknowledges that his parent’s example and instruction, their constant admonishment to “work hard and study hard” may be the reason he is able to earn a comfortable living as writer, he is conflicted as to the reason. Why? Because the combination of a liberal education and liberal thought has told him that his success is solely dependant on his DNA.
And in the end, that is what liberalism wants us all to believe. Not what our history and experience tells us. They won’t be happy until something similar to Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World is society’s new normal – and they know that can’t exist so long as even one traditional family exists.
Happy Anniversary!
I just found out today marks the 8th anniversary of this blog’s launch.
8 amazing, incredible years that have seen a lot of change. Personally and professionally for myself, and profound for our country.
Over these 8 years, over 5,000 of you have decided to hop aboard. I’ve typed out over 425,000 words, spread out over more than 500 posts – and for some reason, ya’ll keep coming back for more. Thank you, each and every one of you, for following my wonderings and observations.
Here’s to another 8 years, God willing!
Why We Hunt Deer in the Wild
(Reprinted from someone who wants to remain anonymous, who farms, writes well and actually tried this)
I had this idea that I could rope a deer, put it in a stall, feed it up on corn for a couple of weeks, then kill it and eat it. The first step in this adventure was getting a deer. I figured that, since they congregate at my cattle feeder and do not seem to have much fear of me when we are there (a bold one will sometimes come right up and sniff at the bags of feed while I am in the back of the truck not 4 feet away), it should not be difficult to rope one, get up to it and toss a bag over its head (to calm it down) then hog tie it and transport it home.
I filled the cattle feeder then hid down at the end with my rope. The cattle, having seen the roping thing before, stayed well back. They were not having any of it. After about 20 minutes, my deer showed up– 3 of them. I picked out a likely looking one, stepped out from the end of the feeder, and threw my rope. The deer just stood there and stared at me. I wrapped the rope around my waist and twisted the end so I would have a good hold.
The deer still just stood and stared at me, but you could tell it was mildly concerned about the whole rope situation. I took a step towards it, it took a step away. I put a little tension on the rope, and then received an education. The first thing that I learned is that, while a deer may just stand there looking at you funny while you rope it, they are spurred to action when you start pulling on that rope.
That deer EXPLODED. The second thing I learned is that pound for pound, a deer is a LOT stronger than a cow or a colt. A cow or a colt in that weight range I could fight down with a rope and with some dignity. A deer– no Chance. That thing ran and bucked and twisted and pulled. There was no controlling it and certainly no getting close to it. As it jerked me off my feet and started dragging me across the ground, it occurred to me that having a deer on a rope was not nearly as good an idea as I had originally imagined. The only upside is that they do not have as much stamina as many other animals.
A brief 10 minutes later, it was tired and not nearly as quick to jerk me off my feet and drag me when I managed to get up. It took me a few minutes to realize this, since I was mostly blinded by the blood flowing out of the big gash in my head. At that point, I had lost my taste for corn-fed venison. I just wanted to get that devil creature off the end of that rope.
I figured if I just let it go with the rope hanging around its neck, it would likely die slow and painfully somewhere. At the time, there was no love at all between me and that deer. At that moment, I hated the thing, and I would venture a guess that the feeling was mutual. Despite the gash in my head and the several large knots where I had cleverly arrested the deer’s momentum by bracing my head against various large rocks as it dragged me across the ground, I could still think clearly enough to recognize that there was a small chance that I shared some tiny amount of responsibility for the situation we were in. I didn’t want the deer to have to suffer a slow death, so I managed to get it lined back up in between my truck and the feeder – a little trap I had set before hand…kind of like a squeeze chute. I got it to back in there and I started moving up so I could get my rope back.
Did you know that deer bite? They do! I never in a million years would have thought that a deer would bite somebody, so I was very surprised when ….. I reached up there to grab that rope and the deer grabbed hold of my wrist. Now, when a deer bites you, it is not like being bit by a horse where they just bite you and slide off to then let go. A deer bites you and shakes its head–almost like a pit bull. They bite HARD and it hurts.
The proper thing to do when a deer bites you is probably to freeze and draw back slowly. I tried screaming and shaking instead. My method was ineffective.
It seems like the deer was biting and shaking for several minutes, but it was likely only several seconds. I, being smarter than a deer (though you may be questioning that claim by now), tricked it. While I kept it busy tearing the tendons out of my right arm, I reached up with my left hand and pulled that rope loose.
That was when I got my final lesson in deer behavior for the day.
Deer will strike at you with their front feet. They rear right up on their back feet and strike right about head and shoulder level, and their hooves are surprisingly sharp… I learned a long time ago that, when an animal -like a horse –strikes at you with their hooves and you can’t get away easily, the best thing to do is try to make a loud noise and make an aggressive move towards the animal. This will usually cause them to back down a bit so you can escape.
This was not a horse. This was a deer, so obviously, such trickery would not work. In the course of a millisecond, I devised a different strategy. I screamed like a woman and tried to turn and run. The reason I had always been told NOT to try to turn and run from a horse that paws at you is that there is a good chance that it will hit you in the back of the head. Deer may not be so different from horses after all, besides being twice as strong and 3 times as evil, because the second I turned to run, it hit me right in the back of the head and knocked me down.
Now, when a deer paws at you and knocks you down, it does not immediately leave. I suspect it does not recognize that the danger has passed. What they do instead is paw your back and jump up and down on you while you are laying there crying like a little girl and covering your head.
I finally managed to crawl under the truck and the deer went away.
Now for the local legend. I was pretty beat up. My scalp was split open, I had several large goose eggs, my wrist was bleeding pretty good and felt broken (it turned out to be just badly bruised) and my back was bleeding in a few places, though my insulated canvas jacket had protected me from most of the worst of it. I drove to the nearest place, which was the Co-Op. I got out of the truck, covered in blood and dust and looking like hell. The guy who ran the place saw me through the window and came running out yelling, “What happened?”
I have never seen any law in the state of Kansas that would prohibit an individual from roping a deer. I suspect that this is an area that they have overlooked entirely. Knowing, as I do, the lengths to which law enforcement personnel will go to exercise their power, I was concerned that they may find a way to twist the existing laws to paint my actions as criminal. I swear… not wanting to admit that I had done something monumentally stupid played no part in my response. I told him “I was attacked by a deer”. I did not mention that at the time I had a rope on it. The evidence was all over my body. Deer prints on the back of my jacket where it had stomped all over me and a large deer print on my face where it had struck me there. I asked him to call somebody to come get me. I didn’t think I could make it home on my own. He did. Later that afternoon, a game warden showed up at my house and wanted to know about the deer attack. Surprisingly, deer attacks are a rare thing and wildlife and parks was interested in the event. I tried to describe the attack as completely and accurately as I could. I was filling the grain hopper and this deer came out of nowhere and just started kicking the hell out of me and BIT me. It was obviously rabid or insane or something.
EVERYBODY for miles around knows about the deer attack (the guy at the Co-Op has a big mouth). For several weeks people dragged their kids in the house when they saw deer around and the local ranchers carried rifles when they filled their feeders. I have told several people the story, but NEVER anybody around here. I have to see these people every day and as an outsider — a “city folk”. I have enough trouble fitting in without them snickering behind my back and whispering, “There is the dumbass that tried to rope the deer!”
All these events are true so help me God…An Educated Farmer
Kneeling for Stupidity
After a year of what may go down as the dumbest protest in American history, it seems the National Football League is ready to listen to their fans and end the shenanigans, once and for all. The NFLPA should thank them, before any more of their members are made to look like communist sympathizers.
Former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick began this hairbrained scheme on September 11, 2016. At the time, I thought it was nothing more than a very idiotic marketing ploy by a former starter whose poor play had landed him on the bench of a bad, and dysfunctional, team. He may have claimed it was to protest police brutality, but his actions since (appearing at press conference in Miami wearing a Fidel Castro t-shirt & drawing little pigs on his socks among them) only bolstered my opinion: either he was a wannabe Che Guevara (but without the cajones), or he was desperately trying to force the league to keep him employed. When the season began with him not having a job and the outcry went up from certain segments of the sports commentariat that Kaepernick “deserved” a job, I felt vindicated. After all, his terrible play the previous three seasons certainly didn’t justify his being on an NFL roster. But that didn’t stop that rather vocal group of commentators from assuring us the only reason Kaepernick was watching the games from his couch was racism.
(As a side note: 22 of 87 NFL quarterback are black, as are 9 of the 32 starters. The NFL, as are all pro sports leagues these days, is the most egalitarian of employers. The only thing that matters is performance on the field, not race or religion.)
The NFL is a league that employs rapists, murderers, drug fiends and wife beaters, among other sundry malcontents. And until a week ago, approximately a quarter of those players were engaging in on-the-field behavior 90% of the country finds reprehensible. The outcry and backlash was the result of a few players who may have thought they were doing something principled, and a bunch of guys who get paid to have their brains routinely bounced around their skulls falling for what President Trump does best: troll.
And that was the insanity of this protest from the get-go: perceived police brutality in American cities is a topic worthy of discussion. But the moment you start using the National Anthem and the US flag as the center of your protest, the cause gets drowned out. It isn’t very positive imagery. Look, I get it: the First Amendment allows political speech involving the national symbols as props. But it doesn’t excuse you from widespread ridicule and scorn when you’re even perceived to be disrespecting them. The result in that case tends to be that your cause gets lost in the noise. Nobody cares, nobody wants to hear it – worse, your cause becomes anti-American. If you need a better example, the Supreme Court rulings that upheld disrespecting the flag as political speech were over the flag burning incidents in the late 1960’s and early 70’s. Does anyone remember what those protests were about? No. All we remember is seeing the images of people burning a flag, and the outrage and anger it sparked.
Prior to the President’s calling out the players, only a handful were engaging in carrying on Kaepernick’s egregious demonstration. But, Trump Derangement Syndrome combined with the idea of team unity, and that Sunday nearly every team was protesting the flag and anthem. The blowback has been fierce, to say the least: attendance and viewership have cratered in the intervening two weeks. The league and networks have been scrambling, and the proposed rule change is a result of all that. Of course, the better option for the NFL might be to forgo the nearly $6 million they get annually from DoD for their contrived displays of patriotism prior to kickoff. But somehow, unless Congress expressly forbids it in the next budget, I don’t see that happening.
As for the players who feel strongly about police brutality and targeting, they have plenty of outlets to do something. After all, these are all multimillionaires with public megaphones in their adopted communities. They can arrange rallies and protest marches, and actually do more than simply stage ridiculous publicity stunts. They can endow scholarships. They can engage in outreach between their communities and the local police departments. Money and fame both talk, and neither is in short supply for a Cam Newton or Marshawn Lynch.
As for Mr. Kaepernick, he gave an interview on Saturday that amounted to him begging for a job. Of course, his girlfriend came out Sunday and tried to claim he was misquoted, but I suppose the cat is out of the proverbial bag now. As I thought from the beginning, he was trying to use the BLM activists to ensure his employment. Rather than celebrating him, they should be seething at this point. He used them, and in the process, turned their protest movement into a mockery of responsible public demonstration, making it a subject of abject ridicule.
As for me, I don’t watch football for political stunts and could care less about them. I tune in on Sundays to watch young men get their brains routinely bounced around their skulls, not unlike the Roman gladiators of old. Much the same as I don’t care a whit about the idiocy of the people who entertain me from Hollywood, the same goes for the ones on the gridiron. So I’ll keep watching, at least until they decide to switch from tackle to flag football.
Update: looks like the NFL isn’t going to force players to stand, only “encourage” them. Whatever, it’s their funeral. -10/11/17
Grinding Gears
Things that grind my gears:
- Sub-par football players who think they are entitled to an NFL job, simply because they stage lame-brained protests. Also, people who think sub-par football players are entitled to an NFL job, simply because they stage lame-brained protests.
- People who think other people shouldn’t do their job because their name sounds like a guy who’s been dead for 147 years.
- People who think being somewhat conservative automatically makes you a Nazi. Also, people who think being somewhat liberal automatically makes you a communist.
- Customer service reps who seem to care about everything except the customer.
- People who cannot discuss their differences without hurling bricks at each other.
- People who think shooting police officers is good sport.
- Police officers who think everyone is ready to shoot them.
- Gas station attendants who don’t know how to pump gas.
- People who are absolutely certain the only character quality that matters is the pigmentation God gave them.
- Americans who insist they’re something other than an American. For instance, Asian-American, Hispanic-American, Irish-American, Italian-American, African-American, Polish-American, Arab-American, Hindu-American, German-American… Knock it off. You were born here, you’re an American. End Story.
- People who don’t think, but immediately launch into “tribe’ mentality. Nobody is perfect, not even the anointed leader of “your side.” Be real enough to fess up when they mess up.
- Store clerks who can’t do basic math. I mean, nobody ever taught you how to take 10% off a ticketed price? Seriously?
- Fast food employees who somehow think an entry-level job is worth $15 to anyone. Here’s a clue: if the only thing you’re qualified to do is ask “Do you want fries with that?”, you need to get yourself some edumaction. You. Not the government. YOU.
- Public Sector Unions. Heads up: working for the government is a privilege, not a Constitutional right. We – your fellow citizens – hired you because you’re supposed to be the best and the brightest. Prove it.
- The Veteran’s Administration.
- People who think nobody needs a gun, so nobody should own a gun. Hopefully, I’ll never need mine. But if you try to take mine away, you’ll be proving why I need them.
- Idiots who own guns, but leave them around for kids to blow their heads off. Hint: the mattress isn’t a lockbox.
- Cockroaches. Cockroaches annoy the HELL out of me.
- So do skunks.
- Finally, people who treat everything as if it’s a life and death matter. It isn’t, trust me. Learn to laugh a little, even at yourself.
Trust me, you’re funnier than you know.
Kentucky Fried Horsesh!t
I sent this to Kentucky Fried Chicken’s corporate headquarters yesterday. Apparently, they thought I was kidding.
On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the best score possible, I would rate your Fallsington, PA store a -10.
The condition of the restaurant appeared unsanitary and unappealing. The waste receptacles were filled to overflowing, it looked as though nobody has swept the floor in days and the counter was sticky. Perhaps someone spilled a soda last month and nobody thought to wipe it up?
Regardless, my family wanted your chicken for dinner, so I soldiered on. Despite it being the typical dinner hour, only one employee was taking orders – and she was also handling the drive-thru window. After waiting 20 minutes to place my order, this poor creature had to inform me that a Kentucky Fried Chicken had run out of… fried chicken. Could I wait ten minutes until the next batch was ready? As I said, my family had their hearts set on your chicken, so of course I said yes.
Ten minutes turned into thirty. I asked to see the manager, but was informed he was not available. I suppose not having a manager might explain the unsatisfactory condition of the restaurant. It could also go a long way toward explaining how a fried chicken restaurant didn’t have any, you know, FRIED CHICKEN. It certainly would explain why I had been standing in your store (no way I was sitting in those filthy excuses for seats) for nearly an hour. Anyway, the employee at the counter did offer me a free soda for my trouble and when I declined (I am a diabetic, as I explained to her), she included a free chocolate cake with my order. How a chocolate cake is any better for a diabetic than a soda is a little difficult for me to comprehend, but I suppose you cover that in employee training somewhere.
Another ten minutes went by, and my order was finally ready. I honestly can not recall the last time I was so thankful to leave a restaurant, even if my wallet was $40 lighter than when I arrived. At least my order was correct. I arrived home tired, hungry, and with a family ready to gnaw off my left arm. Great relief was evident as my wife unpacked the bags and began to plate our long anticipated, desperately desired food. I sat down to my meal, ready to devour every last morsel. I was halfway though my first piece of chicken when, to my horror, I discovered it was bleeding! Yes! Despite taking an hour to cook your world-famous chicken, your store had served my family a salmonella infested bucket of undercooked poultry. Happily, my wife cranked up the oven (because who isn’t happy with a 425 degree oven roasting the house on a 90 degree summer day?), finished cooking our chicken and saved our lives.
Now, I do need to give credit where credit is due. Despite her poor training, lack of support and a curious fascination with her cell phone, the employee at the counter/drive-thru retained enough of her humanity to be genuinely concerned about the situation. Not that she was able to do anything to correct the problems, mind you, but at least she was upset by the entire episode.
I hope to hear back from you within the next 24 hours, with your ideas for ensuring something like this never happens again. It would certainly behoove you to do so, as at 2pm tomorrow this letter will be posted to a number of social media outlets. Thanks in advance for reading this and correcting the situation.
Well, it’s now 5pm tomorrow and still not a peep from Colonel Sanders.
Suffice it to say, I will never eat at KFC again.
Political Baseballs 