How's this for financially encouraging words from teapartynation.com today?
"As I read the Constitution, Congress writes the laws and you get to decide what you are going to sign.”
Wow! There is a high and tight fastball aimed right at Obama. Can you guess who the pitcher is? It will shock you. It was none other than John Boehner. No freshly laundered white flag of surrender for him on Saturday. He was giving Obama some chin music. Has Boehner seen the light? Or just responding to the pressure from freshmen and from the people who are telling Boehner this time, no surrender.
Boehner is a politician so I know all too well not to get excited about him, but this is the power of the Tea Party at work. Boehner is not capitulating, at least not now."
(What follows are highlights of TPN's weekend Twitter "intervention" strategy)
- "Beltwayaddicts.com is the website for the intervention. The plan is very simple . . . social media as well as personal contacts with our Representatives to tell them to stop spending (for starters) $2.6 million of our tax dollars on a program to teach Chinese prostitutes to drink responsibly, close to a million to study methane production from cows or to digitize images from concerts by the band, The Grateful Dead, $1.8 million to a museum for neon signs in Las Vegas, $35 million to phantom medical clinics that never existed . . . classic sign of an addiction."
- ". . . the Twitter Tea Party this weekend and the Washington Spending Addiction Intervention this week (are advising that) the government does not deserve any more of America’s money when it cannot even manage what it already has. Now is the time to keep the pressure on. Now they are listening. Now, we are winning."
. . . although Twitter is beyond me, here's my reply to this TPN article:
"BRAVO!!! - and my two cents worth about Speaker Boehner. I know that guy, not personally of course, but I've hung around with guys like him all my life so I can tell you even the best of character needs cheering from the stands. Our "players" may not always hear it, but the brave hearted feel the energy! Go, Go Go!!!"
OK, your turn - am I still too naive, too optimistic - or does it make sense for me to be fueling off my own merry-go-round?
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Are We Vital or What?
- gotta do this . . . gotta keep trying . . . gotta share wherever I'm welcome what I just spouted off to my local CVTP, hoping that somewhere along the line I connect with people who can get we, the people, off the blocks and back into preserving our precious union!
Dear Fellow Patriots. if you are so inclined, take a look at what I just sent Bill O'Reilly
(like I think he's ever going to read a word I say - but last night was just plain the last straw for me! His total disregard for the thought that some of his audience may include something besides baby birds waiting in our nests for him to drop his worms of wisdom into our open beaks reminds me of Obama! - and if he doesn't respond to me, that will be the substance of the next message I send him )
Bill, with all due respect, it's your turn to listen! Stop looking out for me until you hear me out and learn who I am! This isn't about you or me - it's about U.S. staying alive, right? I offer you the following perspective from my point of view because I don't think you mean to divide and conquer and I think we need each other's company.
I just heard Dennis Miller say, "You can have everything, but if you don't feel vital you have nothing." Since you and I both feel vital to the process of staying alive in America, please consider the following:
- Call to arms from Erick at redstate.com:
"The President today (July 12) signaled his willingness to shoot the hostage. (i.e.: senior citizens' social security and military checks). The GOP should do the same — show an absolute unwillingness to raise the debt ceiling without their balanced budget amendment passing out of Congress to the states."
- Drawing the battle lines:
"Jim Pethokoukis notes a Goldman Sachs report showing there will be plenty of money flowing into the treasury in August for the government to pay its debt obligations, pay social security obligations, pay military obligations, and avoid default. But Obama won’t let facts stand in the way of starving senior citizens to score political points against the GOP."
- Surge strategy outlined by Senator DeMint (R-SC):
"Republicans need to stop worrying about their own political careers and demonstrate the courage our country needs in this critical time.
Change in Washington means changing the people we send there.
The only way forward . . . the only acceptable trade-off for raising the debt limit is to (1) immediately CUT spending, (2) CAP spending out into the future, and (3) pass a constitutional amendment to force Congress to BALANCE the budget every year. This is the only way to ensure that this is the last time the debt limit will ever be raised again."
- The Wall Street Journal teetering on the front line:
"The tea party/talk-radio expectations for what Republicans can accomplish over the debt-limit showdown have always been unrealistic. As former Senator Phil Gramm once told us, never take a hostage you’re not prepared to shoot. Republicans aren’t prepared to stop a debt-limit increase because the political costs are unbearable. Republicans might have played this game better, but the truth is that Mr. Obama has more cards to play."
- and I say, come on folks - let's be men not mice!!! I'm with Erick here:
"Again and again, Congress folds to the doomsday scenarios. The Wall Street Journal again and again claims the sky will fall and the markets will crash. The suits come down from New York and paint the disaster scenario. The GOP falls in line. TARP is passed. What else will be passed?
This time, the GOP should embrace the apocalyptic future, call B.S. on the fear mongering, and shoot their debt ceiling hostage. If they engage in politics as usual as the Wall Street Journal and Mitch McConnell would have them, we’ll be back in this mess again next year.
Politics as usual usually gets us here. If we want to move back to fiscal sanity, we need to try a different approach."
This morning, one young lion of my close acquaintance said, "We drop a bomb on DC!!! That's how we fix this." I'm only one of many he knows are willing to sacrifice our social security checks in behalf of his best business practices. So, what do you think? Aren't we the bomb - we who refuse to cave to politics as usual this time around?
Thank you for your attention and consideration of how we may work together for the preservation of our Republic.
C. Brooks Nielsen
Visalia, CA
cbn, citizen journalist, Char Speaks or http://cbnielsen.blogspot.com/
Dear Fellow Patriots. if you are so inclined, take a look at what I just sent Bill O'Reilly
(like I think he's ever going to read a word I say - but last night was just plain the last straw for me! His total disregard for the thought that some of his audience may include something besides baby birds waiting in our nests for him to drop his worms of wisdom into our open beaks reminds me of Obama! - and if he doesn't respond to me, that will be the substance of the next message I send him )
Bill, with all due respect, it's your turn to listen! Stop looking out for me until you hear me out and learn who I am! This isn't about you or me - it's about U.S. staying alive, right? I offer you the following perspective from my point of view because I don't think you mean to divide and conquer and I think we need each other's company.
I just heard Dennis Miller say, "You can have everything, but if you don't feel vital you have nothing." Since you and I both feel vital to the process of staying alive in America, please consider the following:
- Call to arms from Erick at redstate.com:
"The President today (July 12) signaled his willingness to shoot the hostage. (i.e.: senior citizens' social security and military checks). The GOP should do the same — show an absolute unwillingness to raise the debt ceiling without their balanced budget amendment passing out of Congress to the states."
- Drawing the battle lines:
"Jim Pethokoukis notes a Goldman Sachs report showing there will be plenty of money flowing into the treasury in August for the government to pay its debt obligations, pay social security obligations, pay military obligations, and avoid default. But Obama won’t let facts stand in the way of starving senior citizens to score political points against the GOP."
- Surge strategy outlined by Senator DeMint (R-SC):
"Republicans need to stop worrying about their own political careers and demonstrate the courage our country needs in this critical time.
Change in Washington means changing the people we send there.
The only way forward . . . the only acceptable trade-off for raising the debt limit is to (1) immediately CUT spending, (2) CAP spending out into the future, and (3) pass a constitutional amendment to force Congress to BALANCE the budget every year. This is the only way to ensure that this is the last time the debt limit will ever be raised again."
- The Wall Street Journal teetering on the front line:
"The tea party/talk-radio expectations for what Republicans can accomplish over the debt-limit showdown have always been unrealistic. As former Senator Phil Gramm once told us, never take a hostage you’re not prepared to shoot. Republicans aren’t prepared to stop a debt-limit increase because the political costs are unbearable. Republicans might have played this game better, but the truth is that Mr. Obama has more cards to play."
- and I say, come on folks - let's be men not mice!!! I'm with Erick here:
"Again and again, Congress folds to the doomsday scenarios. The Wall Street Journal again and again claims the sky will fall and the markets will crash. The suits come down from New York and paint the disaster scenario. The GOP falls in line. TARP is passed. What else will be passed?
This time, the GOP should embrace the apocalyptic future, call B.S. on the fear mongering, and shoot their debt ceiling hostage. If they engage in politics as usual as the Wall Street Journal and Mitch McConnell would have them, we’ll be back in this mess again next year.
Politics as usual usually gets us here. If we want to move back to fiscal sanity, we need to try a different approach."
This morning, one young lion of my close acquaintance said, "We drop a bomb on DC!!! That's how we fix this." I'm only one of many he knows are willing to sacrifice our social security checks in behalf of his best business practices. So, what do you think? Aren't we the bomb - we who refuse to cave to politics as usual this time around?
Thank you for your attention and consideration of how we may work together for the preservation of our Republic.
C. Brooks Nielsen
Visalia, CA
cbn, citizen journalist, Char Speaks or http://cbnielsen.blogspot.com/
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Best of the Best
"Joe Louis was the first black hero of white Americans, as well as black Americans. The dignity and sportsmanship with which he conducted himself had much to do with changing the image of black people in general, and eventually opening many doors for them.
In those days, you didn't have to act like a lout to try to show that you were black. Acting like a gentleman was something admired by blacks and whites alike.
Louis engaged in none of the cheap, show-off antics that have become all too common among boxers of a later era. He came to the ring to do a job, and he did it professionally, skillfully and with devastating results. He still holds the record for the most one-round knockouts in heavyweight championship fights."
- written by Dr. Thomas Sowell, another of those door openers, in his case to better economic prospects for everyone
I wish Whoopie Goldberg would get a grip on herself and stop ruining her own good professional standing by ranting over every imagined slight to whatever "demographics" she associates with herself. Maybe it's just "The View" that has tainted her good nature. If so, hopefully she will look around and see that she's dealing herself out of her own promise.
Meanwhile, I wonder if Whoopie is suffering, like so many other self-afflicted types I've known, from a lack of sufficient mothering. It appears to me that everyone I know who has fallen into his own reflection in the pond is still begging his mother (or a reasonable facsimile) to save him.
Pardon the politically incorrect pronoun reference here, but I'm tired of trying to be so . . . . inclusive about everything. I once tried to invent a non-gender-specific pronoun to make my writing life easier, but all I could come up with is "heshit" which is entirely too incivil for my tastes. Besides, I take no affront at being referred to as a member of mankind. Oh, well, each to his own - at least that's what I will keep thinking until they deliver the knockout punch to my individuality, and even then, I doubt the music will come to an entire halt.
In those days, you didn't have to act like a lout to try to show that you were black. Acting like a gentleman was something admired by blacks and whites alike.
Louis engaged in none of the cheap, show-off antics that have become all too common among boxers of a later era. He came to the ring to do a job, and he did it professionally, skillfully and with devastating results. He still holds the record for the most one-round knockouts in heavyweight championship fights."
- written by Dr. Thomas Sowell, another of those door openers, in his case to better economic prospects for everyone
I wish Whoopie Goldberg would get a grip on herself and stop ruining her own good professional standing by ranting over every imagined slight to whatever "demographics" she associates with herself. Maybe it's just "The View" that has tainted her good nature. If so, hopefully she will look around and see that she's dealing herself out of her own promise.
Meanwhile, I wonder if Whoopie is suffering, like so many other self-afflicted types I've known, from a lack of sufficient mothering. It appears to me that everyone I know who has fallen into his own reflection in the pond is still begging his mother (or a reasonable facsimile) to save him.
Pardon the politically incorrect pronoun reference here, but I'm tired of trying to be so . . . . inclusive about everything. I once tried to invent a non-gender-specific pronoun to make my writing life easier, but all I could come up with is "heshit" which is entirely too incivil for my tastes. Besides, I take no affront at being referred to as a member of mankind. Oh, well, each to his own - at least that's what I will keep thinking until they deliver the knockout punch to my individuality, and even then, I doubt the music will come to an entire halt.
Friday, July 1, 2011
"Oh, oh, oh, just listen to the music!”
I can hardly wait for July 4th! Every year I'm more grateful for my American Independence. I had to laugh, today, when I heard that one of our esteemed halls of ivy claims Fourth of July celebrations are not good for democracy. According to a Harvard University study, kids who participate in this holiday are more likely to grow up to be Republicans. That probably makes some sense if we're just talking about labels. After all, America is not a democracy, rather having been conceived as a republican form of government.
But, then labels do not a country make, at least not this country! Fortunately, we are free to march to our own drums in America, argue our heads off and call ourselves and each other any names we want. That makes me ever fonder of crooning this song along my own parade route:
There's a long, long trail a-winding
Into the land of my dreams,
Where the nightingales are singing
And a white moon beams:
There's a long, long night of waiting
Until my dreams all come true;
Till the day when I'll be going down
That long, long trail with you.
Written in 1915, its words were penned by Stoddard King and its music by Alonzo "Zo" Elliott; the song proved popular among America's newly-departed Doughboys during WWI. I figure if it was good enough for those guys to march to, it's good for me, too!
It was also good for me to start out this year touring The National Infantry Museum and Soldier Center, the first of its kind in the United States, built and operated by a non-profit organization. Since its opening in June of 2009, this world-class facility right outside the gates of the Fort Benning Maneuver Center of Excellence, honors infantrymen, past, present and future. Throughout the 190,000-square-foot museum, visitors may take an interactive journey through every war fought by the U.S. over the past two centuries.
The museum tells the heroic story of everyday Infantrymen through an enviable collection of more than 30,000 artifacts. Era galleries trace Infantry history from before the Revolutionary War to action today in Iraq and Afghanistan. There is a special gallery recognizing Medal of Honor recipients and one that pays tribute to those who love an Infantryman, and the sacrifices they make supporting him.
I was drawn to this tribute by my oldest grandson's graduation from Army basic training. The ceremony was a moving tribute to the ongoing strength of our American way, conducted at the adjacent Patriot Park that includes a parade field composed of earth collected from every American battlefield.
Once again in mid-2011, reports of war weariness on the home front remind me that sometimes people need reminding what our American military is all about. Whether through the draft of our nation's past or the current volunteer recruitment process, somehow America continues to produce many strong young people who recognize the value to themselves of serving our country. Although it is true that a steady job, benefits and future higher education possibilities may be the initial draw these days, what better motive than the determination to achieve self-reliance?
Looking forward to Independence Day 2011, I thank God that our American military still protects and preserves the soul as well as the soil of our exceptional nation. May we all add our support for those in our halls of government who likewise honor our good old U.S.A.!
HAPPY 4TH OF JULY TO EVERYONE!
But, then labels do not a country make, at least not this country! Fortunately, we are free to march to our own drums in America, argue our heads off and call ourselves and each other any names we want. That makes me ever fonder of crooning this song along my own parade route:
There's a long, long trail a-winding
Into the land of my dreams,
Where the nightingales are singing
And a white moon beams:
There's a long, long night of waiting
Until my dreams all come true;
Till the day when I'll be going down
That long, long trail with you.
Written in 1915, its words were penned by Stoddard King and its music by Alonzo "Zo" Elliott; the song proved popular among America's newly-departed Doughboys during WWI. I figure if it was good enough for those guys to march to, it's good for me, too!
It was also good for me to start out this year touring The National Infantry Museum and Soldier Center, the first of its kind in the United States, built and operated by a non-profit organization. Since its opening in June of 2009, this world-class facility right outside the gates of the Fort Benning Maneuver Center of Excellence, honors infantrymen, past, present and future. Throughout the 190,000-square-foot museum, visitors may take an interactive journey through every war fought by the U.S. over the past two centuries.
The museum tells the heroic story of everyday Infantrymen through an enviable collection of more than 30,000 artifacts. Era galleries trace Infantry history from before the Revolutionary War to action today in Iraq and Afghanistan. There is a special gallery recognizing Medal of Honor recipients and one that pays tribute to those who love an Infantryman, and the sacrifices they make supporting him.
I was drawn to this tribute by my oldest grandson's graduation from Army basic training. The ceremony was a moving tribute to the ongoing strength of our American way, conducted at the adjacent Patriot Park that includes a parade field composed of earth collected from every American battlefield.
Once again in mid-2011, reports of war weariness on the home front remind me that sometimes people need reminding what our American military is all about. Whether through the draft of our nation's past or the current volunteer recruitment process, somehow America continues to produce many strong young people who recognize the value to themselves of serving our country. Although it is true that a steady job, benefits and future higher education possibilities may be the initial draw these days, what better motive than the determination to achieve self-reliance?
Looking forward to Independence Day 2011, I thank God that our American military still protects and preserves the soul as well as the soil of our exceptional nation. May we all add our support for those in our halls of government who likewise honor our good old U.S.A.!
HAPPY 4TH OF JULY TO EVERYONE!
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