As I have mentioned elsewhere, we unfortunately no longer have the time, energy, or resources to devote to blogging that we once had in the past. Political blogging takes a heavy, and often a truly staggering, personal and professional toll on anybody who does it. Moreover, I have had some severe health issues and have had to cut back on certain activities, so it is a matter of priorities. Thus, in recent months, we have been blogging on a very infrequent basis.
When the 2008 US presidential election came down to Hillary, McCain, and Obama, followed by the worldwide economic collapse, it became clear to us that there was not much more that we could contribute by blogging at the same rate as we had previously been doing. Fortunately, we had reached the point where all of the points that we have been trying to make are also being made by many other bloggers, and even by a few conservative journalists and other public figures. We do not aspire to be acknowledged as the leaders of any particular movement.
Therefore, at this point, we have decided to post an article only when we have something to say that nobody else is already saying.
As you already know, I had little to say about the 2008 US presidential election because, then as now, I regarded both of the candidates, and all their pomps and all their works, as beneath comment.
Even before the election, it was obvious to me that the winning candidate would someday deeply regret having run for that office. Let me go on record that I stand by that prediction.
It has often been claimed that no one can win a thermonuclear war. Be that as it may, there is no question that it is easy enough to lose one! In similar fashion, becoming president of the US at this time is just as clearly a no-win scenario for the perpetrator and all his retinue.
Despite all the empty promises from both sides, there is simply nothing that any US president could do at this point to effect a recovery. A recovery would have to happen on its own, and every day that goes by, it seems that we have less and less to build on, in terms of civil and industrial infrastructure, a functioning civil society, and an informed citizenry.
The mass media and what we call our educational system seem to be doing everything they can to keep the citizenry from figuring out what their supposed betters are about. Oh, and by the way, everything I have just said about the plight of the US goes double for the EU.
The scope of the problem
See for yourself what already happened to a part of the US that lost its productive capacity:
With trees growing up through abandoned buildings, large parts of Detroit have already come to resemble scenes from the grim speculative documentary Life After People.
By now, the US economic decline has spread far beyond Detroit and the Rust Belt.
Think about it: When was the last time you saw the label “Made in USA” on any product, good or bad?
I recently heard yet another self-styled pundit of the US employment scene recommending three areas where there still seem to be some jobs for Americans. The only available jobs are in health care, education, and government work - because they cannot be outsourced.
Wow.
Will someone please explain to me who is going to pay for this health care, education, and government work? Does anyone care to predict what will happen after we go into debt to educate the next generation, knowing that there will be no jobs for them after they finish school?
Where do we go from here?
Good question.
And yes, I do have an answer! My point in posting this is that we need to understand exactly what our problems are, and the true extent of our difficulties, before we can even begin to address them.
What’s the next step? We need to stop wasting tax dollars on bailing out Wall Street. Instead, we need to bring our industrial base back to the US. We need to repeal the tax laws and ever-proliferating regulations that have been strangling US businesses or driving them overseas. We need to make it much simpler and more cost-effective for businesses, especially smaller businesses, to provide jobs for US citizens. That’s the only government “stimulus package” that will work.
No, it is not all under our control. But we can keep the faith and do our best to help each other. As Bishop Antoun of the Antiochian Orthodox Church recently told us, “The Lord will provide.”
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WARNING: This video contains some strong language and graphic elements. It is intended for a mature audience.
Each day, I see events unfolding around the globe that cause me concern. Yet most of the people I encounter seem to be oblivious, or at best, only peripherally aware of the grave threats facing our nation - and civilization as a whole.
Our enemies are counting on our short attention spans, our over-confidence and our stubborn complacency to keep the blinders on our eyes until it’s too late.
Each day, the future of freedom and democracy in Europe seems bleaker… and the United States is already taking steps down the same path.
1389 Blog has posted this video because it makes many vital points - especially about the failure of the US and other western nations to acknowledge, investigate, and respond to suspicious incidents.
That said, we vehemently disagree with George W’s handling of foreign policy - though not for the same reasons as the liberals disagree with it. We claim - and we have repeatedly provided the facts to back up this claim - that GWB has, all too often, appeased jihadists when he should have stood against them.
Meanwhile, Sen. Obama himself is reiterating his offer to meet with Hugo Chavez, the next-generation heir to the Che tradition of violent socialist thuggery:
Obama, in a question-and-answer with supporters, said the U.S. had neglected Latin America under George W. Bush and he said he would meet Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.
He said Chavez was consolidating power, had “despotic tendencies” and was using oil money to fan anti-Americanism, “but it is not enough to say `I oppose (Cuba’s Fidel) Castro and I oppose Chavez and that’s the end of it.”
He said Latin America will no longer be a junior partner in its relationship with Washington, and he will travel the region to talk to leaders about human rights, political prisoners in Cuba and hemispheric trade ties.
19 years after the end of the Cold War, Obama is still playing reruns from the 1970s. But then, everything about his campaign is a rerun from the 1970s.
Click here or on the image below to watch the video:
A plea from Tom Burnett Sr. to the wonderful people of Somerset
(The ad copy below is running in tomorrow’s Somerset Daily American.)
My son Tom confronted a terrible moment of truth. Faced with a plot against our nation, he and the other heroes of Flight 93 fought back, and at the cost of their lives, foiled that plot to destroy the White House or the Capitol. Now it is time for the rest of us to face our moment of truth. Flight 93 has been re-hijacked, and I am requesting that if you can, you go down to the public meeting of the Memorial Project at Somerset Courthouse Saturday, sign up to comment at the end, and demand that a proper investigation be conducted.
THIS was no accident:
The Memorial Project held an open design competition in time of war, in-viting the entire world to enter. Guess who joined in? That group of trees that sits roughly in the position of the star on an Islamic flag is the crash site. Who do YOU think is being memorialized here?
A second Islamic feature that I also protested when I served on the Stage II jury is the minaret-like Tower of Voices , formed in the shape of a crescent, with its top cut at an angle so that its crescent arms reach up into the sky.
Every iota of this original Crescent of Embrace design remains completely intact in the so-called “redesign.” That is why Congressman Tancredo asked the Park Service this autumn to scrap the existing design entirely. Instead of getting rid of the giant crescent as Tancredo demanded back in 2005, architect Paul Murdoch only disguised it with a few surrounding trees.
Also remaining are those d—-d 44 glass blocks on the flight path. (There were forty passengers and crew and four Islamic terrorists on Flight 93.) The Memorial Project acknowledges the 40 blocks inscribed with the names of my son and the other heroes, and they acknowledge the three inscribed with the 9/11 date, but they pretend not to know about this one: the huge glass block that dedicates the entire site.
When this 44th glass block is pointed out, Project Partners say that it can’t be counted with the other blocks because it is not the same size. What? Because the capstone to the terrorist memorializing block count is magnificent, that is supposed to make it okay?
For every Islamic or terrorist memorializing feature of the crescent design, the Park Service has another equally phony excuse. Please read the exposé below of the Park Service’s fraudulent investigation, and please come to the meeting on Saturday to demand state and Congressional investigations into the Flight 93 memorial.
Yesterday, I filed a complaint with the Michigan Attorney General against Daily Kos’ blogger Markos Moulitsas, requesting an investigation into whether Moulitsas is encouraging voter fraud in next week’s Michigan GOP primary.
The idea of the freedom to vote is part of the bedrock foundation of this nation. Vote fraud is not a new concept; likely it reaches back even to the time of the founders. However, once vote fraud is discovered, it should be prosecuted aggressively like all flagrant violations of the law. Daily Kos’ call, under the direction of Markos Moulitsas himself, for a conspiracy to commit massive vote fraud during the Michigan primaries may be one of those serious attempts to circumvent election law.
In Daily Kos’ January 10 posting entitled “Let’s have fun in Michigan,” Moulitsas called on Democrats to cross party lines and vote in the Republican primary for the express purpose of helping Mitt Romney win. Romney, he says, will be a “weak” opponent for the Democrats in November. Daily Kos makes no attempt to hide the fact they are influencing Republican primaries as Democrats to benefit Democrats.
Moulitsas’ call could be felonious. Michigan state law clearly indicates that unqualified electors voting in elections is a felony. It also specifies that counseling or aiding someone to vote in an election they are unqualified for is also a felony. Election law clearly specifies that to vote in a party’s primary, one must actually belong to that party….(more)
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