Immigration Reform and Border Security now!
Don’t for a minute believe:
- because your parents arrived here just to give birth to you and never had any intention of staying here that you are really a citizen of this country
- because you live here now after sneaking across America’s porous border, that you’ re a citizen
- because you work here now and no one asked you to provide proof of citizenship that you’re a citizen
- or because you may even pay some taxes here, that makes you a citizen of this country.
It doesn’t and its insulting to those who belong here.
You should have to stand in line like every other immigrant to the USA had to do for centuries. Follow the rules and we will kiss you on both cheeks and welcome you here and think highly of you for choosing the best country in the world to live in and be a part of. We will look forward to your contribution and your children’s.
However don’t sneak in here and squat in our living room pretending you belong, ignoring the law, and then have the audacity to act indignant because we don’t welcome you here openly and have the nerve to call us racist.
Ellis Island immigrants
Each time we allow someone like you to enter and stay in this country there is someone else who is waiting to get here legally but because you’re here now you have made the process that more difficult for them and hurt the economy of the USA in the process.
If you are here illegally go home and start the legal process to immigrate here or contribute to your country to make it better so your people will not want or feel the need to move to the USA.
Cracker Barrel under fire in Venice
One of my favorite places to eat is Cracker Barrel. Its homey southern country atmosphere and good comfort food is enjoyed by all in my family and its been a regular stop for me for breakfast especially.
Recently the chain has taken some serious criticism for the way it handled a situation at its Venice, FL location that resulted in a 72 year old employee getting fired for what appeared on the surface to be just handing out a muffin to a homeless man. The 72 year old former employee, Joe Koblenzer, a Vietnam veteran was terminated shortly after his charitable act. Once the news broke and the court of world opinion, and presumably Cracker’s Barrel’s soon to be former customers convened, Cracker Barrel was found guilty on all counts.
The critics came out of the wood work excoriating Cracker Barrel for the way it disgracefully treated a veteran, and the way it treats homeless people in general and how greedy it is, how un-Christian like (someone actually quoted scripture) etc, etc, etc
However as is often the case there’s more to the story. Apparently Mr Koblenzer had a habit of eating food without paying for it and taking food from the store and giving it to others without paying. Cracker Barrel understandably counseled, and wrote up Mr Koblenzer several times and after his latest incident, the fifth one, they fired him for cause.
Being charitable is something all of us could and should do more of and perhaps it was a noble thing Mr Koblenzer was doing except for one thing. He stole from his employer to do the good deed. Robin Hood is alive and well apparently living in Venice, FL albeit unemployed now but you get my meaning.
Since when did it become acceptable to steal from your employer to provide charity to someone else? To those Christians that are spewing hatred on the Cracker Barrel Facebook page and quoting scripture where does the Bible say Jesus stole from his employer to provide food to the hungry?
According to the story Mr Koblenzer was taking food from the store for his own use and on also giving it away against the store policy, in essence stealing. If he is indeed concerned about his fellow man going hungry he should have paid for the food himself and then gave it to those in need, not take it from the store in which he works and decide for his employer who they should be charitable to. That is the point here. IT’s not about how charitable Cracker Barrel is or isn’t, its about whether an employee has a right to take from his employer to give to someone else without permission.
Americans love their Robin Hood myth, steal from the rich and give to the poor. Wealth redistribution. Perhaps Prince John deserved it but does every business or person who is successful in America? For anyone that owns a business I would find it hard to believe they would be okay with one of their employee’s repeatedly stealing from them for whatever reason and disregarding company policy.
The trouble is most Americans don’t own businesses and indeed in school today they are taught to be good little subjects of the STATE and employees, not responsible individuals and entrepreneurs. So they have no idea how hard it is to make a business successful, obtain customers, pay the bills and make a profit. To them it should all be free. If you talk with some of these people they actually believe profit is evil. How incredible ignorant.
Koblenzer ate food without paying for it and he gave it away to others without permission to do so. That is wrong. Who is he (an employee) to decide for a corporation’s ownership how much a corporation should give to other people?
Cracker Barrel may not want to start handing out food from their restaurants as a matter of practice as their might be a line out the door every morning of homeless people at every store waiting to get their free coffee and biscuit. Maybe they would like to donate or help out in some other fashion or not at all. The point is they should have the right to decide for themselves when and how much charity they should provide. Cracker Barrel’s employees have no right to dictate the ownership’s charitable giving policy and they definitely don’t have a right to steal no matter how little or insignificant the employee thinks it is. Court of socialists opinion be damned.
This is not Sherwood Forest, unfortunately more Americans would like to think it is. Soak the rich, sock it to those greedy corporations, never mind they provide families with jobs and benefits and make the economy grow. What a bunch of dummies.
Whether its supporting a government that is only too willing to tax the snot out of rich individuals to redistribute the wealth elsewhere or force corporations by threat or intimidation into redistributing its profits elsewhere. You cannot force people to be charitable otherwise its just stealing and unlike the Robin Hood myth I believe that’s still a crime in most places and against God’s law too.
The Man Without a Country
“I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do. What I can do, I should do. And what I should do, by the grace of God, I will do.” Edward Everett Hale
Ronald Reagan once said at an address to the annual meeting of the Phoenix Chamber of Commerce March 1961 “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it on to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”
I think maybe Reagan was wrong. Extinction is…
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Treason from within
Marcus Tullius Cicero
(3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC Roman philosopher, politician, lawyer, orator, political theorist, consul and constitutionalist. He came from a wealthy municipal family of the Roman equestrian order, and is widely considered one of Rome’s greatest orators and prose stylists. Source: Wikipedia
“A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear.”
― Cicero
Taking care of those who serve?
” No vet should go without food, housing, healthcare,work, and respect….ever!
That’s what today’s Facebook meme said and on the surface the sentiment can certainly be appreciated. I respect veterans immensely for the sacrifices they make, especially since they volunteer to serve in the military nowadays. To those who were drafted and later suffered after their service I believe your country does owe you its thanks and support where and when appropriate.
The idea however that all vets are owed food, housing, health care, and a job is somewhat suspicious to my way of thinking. To many the military is a place to serve their country. It is a place to get an education and training, provide opportunity and for some a refuge from a life of crime, poverty and street living.
If vets leave the military I think there should be good military programs in place to get them job placed and trained to function in the civilian world. Any health issues or dependency issues like PTSD, drug or alcohol should be dealt with so that when they separate they are squared away or at least given a status that requires they seek treatment after being taken off of active duty. If they are badly wounded and cannot take care of themselves then I agree they should receive those things mentioned in the Facebook meme until they can take care of themselves.
If however they develop dependency problems years later after their service like many do, or health issues unrelated to their military service I believe we the American people don’t owe them food, clothing, shelter, healthcare and a job for the remainder of their life. We would be doing them a disservice and enabling dependency to their addiction and their government.
No healthy American citizen should think they are “entitled” to receive anything from their government especially for making poor lifestyle choices in life. Help is available in other places like family, civic foundations, churches, etc.
It is the individual that provides charity to his fellow man; it is not the place of government to do so or force its citizens to provide it.
When you start grouping citizens into categories simply because of vocation and giving them perks that other citizens don’t have access to or the ability to have ie, members of military, member of Congress, federal govt workers, law enforcement, firefighters, teachers, union members etc etc eventually there is no equality among the citizens any longer.
For example when they say “vets” do they mean people who are shot at or just people who put on the uniform? Do they mean the SOF guy who served behind enemy lines or the guy who served food at the chow hall on the front?
Why should a homeless drug dependent veteran receive all of the benefits mentioned above but someone who worked their whole life providing goods/or services to their community be left to fend for themselves? Everyone in a sense serves the country if they are gainfully employed or provide service. Some more than others, granted, but are we placing a higher value on people these days simply by the nature of their chosen profession?
The guy who served on active duty gets VA benefits but the part-time reservist does not? The federal civil “servant” should receive good healthcare but the electrician should not? The school teacher should be allowed to purchase computers at cheaper cost but the insurance salesman cannot? The firefighter can receive discounts on his cars and mortgage but the local Subway owner cannot? The Senator can get better healthcare than most and receive most of his salary for life but civilians cannot?
In my opinion the road to entitlement is getting more and more bumpy. Who gets to decide the value of these people and their professions ? Who decides who gets the perks and benefits and who gets left out? Who decides who pays for it all? Our all knowing government masters, the faceless nameless bureaucrats in Washington?
That sounds decidedly un-American doesn’t it?
A vote for change
Over the last several decades and more so since Reagan left office, the country has moved steadily leftward politically or at least that is the perception I get. I believe this has a lot to do with the influence of our public schools, print and news media, and the entertainment industry. For all of their efforts however the country is not better off and in fact is worse while the citizens have become even more needy, fearful of everything, and dependent on government. That perception has to change and so too does the American people.
Ronald Reagan-40th President of the United States
Anybody who actually thinks Democrat government policies work better than Republicans should actually just look at the biggest slums in America. Look at Detroit, Chicago, New Orleans, Atlanta, Miami, Cleveland, Washington DC. In every case those jurisdictions perpetually elect Democrats to run their local governments and they perpetually have higher crime rates, more poverty, more people on welfare, and more under- educated workers. If Democrats know what they are doing why are people still living in this condition? It’s not for lack of trying, or having time to enact their policies or lack of money as most of those cities have spent millions trying to help. So could it be their ideas just don’t actually work?? I think that is a fact they are not willing to face and why I would never vote for a Democrat. Their ideas however noble or lofty just do not work in American society.
The US city of Detroit, once a symbol of US industrial power, filed for bankruptcy, with debts of $18.5 billion on July 18, 2013, which makes Detroit the largest city in US history to do so.
So this brings us to the GOP who for years have been identified as the party of the rich rascist, homophobic, elitist, etc etc. Some of that reputation might be well earned if you believe the party is made up of just Bernie Madoff types. I don’t believe that however.Embed from Getty Images
I think the party leadership may identify more closely with crony capitalists and Wall Street tycoons but its large base of conservative voters does not. This explains Bush, McCain and Romney. Running on a platform of conservative values George Bush won twice however he turned out to be a Progressive spending more money and growing government as well as any Democrat in the office. The crony capitalists had their way and helped elect Bush and later pushed McCain and Romney on to the party faithful telling us they were the only guys that could win elections. They were dead wrong. When you get down to it a moderate, big government spending Republican is not much different than a Democrat and to the party faithful they would rather stay home then support such a character.
Isn’t the definition of insanity doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result?
Why would anyone think a Democrat or someone pretending to be Republican think their policies will make a difference if elected? What would make them successful? Spending more money, taxing more citizens? Growing government more? More time in office? Hasn’t that already been tried in the cities I mentioned above and in the country now? Also, there is never going to be 100% consensus or agreement of public policy so you cannot blame the voters for the reason the policies do not work especially with a party majority. Democrats held control of the Congress for four decades at one point.
I laughed when I saw an ad recently that called, Tom Tancredo a Republican running for governor in Colorado, too conservative for Colorado? Really, only a socialist would say that. Since when did limited government, fiscal responsibility and adherence to the Constitution become too conservative, radical or a bad thing?
The way I see it, both party leadership would have us believe that the only candidate that is viable is one that supports growing government and giving the people what they want without bankrupting the country.
That’s why they really hate Tea Party candidates and why a candidate that offers a distinction from the rest of the pack might just win an election but more importantly should win every election if we are to save the country from itself.
Keeping the world safe for Democracy?
What is our mission in the world? Is it to make it safe for Democracy? Is it to bring freedom to the world? I know many think this is still the USA’s purpose to be the greater force for good. I have heard conservative leaders espouse these views. I am starting to be convinced however that the world does not really want the “good” or “freedom” we promise. They want familiar. They want their basic needs met and a little comfort and that’s it. They also want their society to line up with their core beliefs.
For 1 billion souls on Earth who believe in Islam, the concept of freedom and Democracy is very different than the rest of us Westerners. It has become ever too apparent that invading Iraq was not a good idea. We picked off a painful scab in Saddam Hussein, whose regime was forcefully holding together disparate peoples with different values like Shia’s, Sunni’s, Kurds etc … and replaced it with nothing near as strong or forceful. Now the country is slowly heading into the radical Islamic camp. Recently two cities Mosul and Tikrit, cities we once controlled, are now firmly in our sworn enemies hands, led by a man we once held captive. 
Invading Iraq was kind of like raking leaves around the bottom of a tree. You may clean them up, blow them away but in the Fall they will be back again. To say invading Iraq was a waste in money, lives and resources is an understatement. For us as Westerners to come into a country impose our values on a society that for the most part has not changed its concepts of freedom and servitude in centuries is foolish. Additionally while going after Osama Bin Laden in Afghanistan may have been a good idea, invading the country and trying to impose our will on those people was a mistake. Also, its foolish to think completing civic projects for these people will somehow change their opinions of Westerners who do not have the same religious values as them. When we eventually leave Afghanistan just like Iraq, the same people who were there before the invasion, that were swept away, will come back and nothing will have changed. Vietnam should have been enough of a lesson for us to learn. Nation building may have been appropriate immediately following the second world war but its outgrown its purpose and has morphed into something else that most in the world resents.
In my opinion we should not make war unless we are prepared to annihilate a country’s infrastructure and completely subjugate its people in perpetuity or assimilate them into our culture. If countries continue to harbor terrorists giving them shelter, funds and training then we should go to war with those countries regardless of how big they are or how much they pretend to be our “friends”. End it one way or another that’s how I would do it.
This new asymmetrical war being fought in the shadows and in the open in the 21st century is still war. We are still killing people to impose our will against someone else’s will but there will never be a peace the way this war is being fought. It will never end and more and more money will be spent to “win” and more and more people will die. Is this the cost of freedom now, perpetual war fought over ideological and religious differences that are incompatible with one another? To talk to our military industrial complex they would say yes, and be okay with that. Do you agree with them?
In America, clearly 40% plus of voters continually choose leaders that promise a government that will take care of them. They do not want individual freedom and in fact view it as dangerous. They don’t want Republican Democracy they want Socialism. They want to be just like the rest of the world and no different. The possibility of being exceptional they find distasteful and somehow “unfair”. If this block of dependent citizenry is permitted to grow and with the defacto open border policy we currently have with future Democratic voters from Latin American coming here by the truck load legally and illegally to access our “free” things, America the land of prosperity and opportunity will disappear. What replaces it is not going to be pretty.
So , if we cannot even convince our own citizens that freedom and democracy is desirable and that America is exceptional, how can we possibly convince a jihadist to change his spots? The best course of action is to make our system work here not try to sell it elsewhere. We need to annihilate our enemies and put the big nations that oppose us like China and Russia on notice. We need to root out the hard core leftists in this country and start teaching our young what an exceptional America looks like. We need to bring back a flourishing economy, a growing manufacturing base; encourage technological innovators and then we won’t have to sell America to the rest of the world. They will look to us, as they have in the past and say, how can we be more like them?
Patriot Rant
Embed from Getty Images
Once upon a time the majority of Americans were pro-life, pro-gun, and pro-marriage defined as between a man and a woman. There was a time when most everyone would have recognized the politics of today’s Democrats as the antithesis of America. Have we have slipped so far left as a country that we are supposed to accept that moderate Progressivism is the new position for Republicans and Conservatism is just radical?? Hell No.
The only real change will be when we start calling Democrats for what they really are: moderate socialists or just plain communists, and start removing them from every position of authority and influence in the country. We will not survive as a nation of free people if their influence is permitted to continue in politics, media and the education system in America. There cannot be co-existence between these two very different political viewpoints. Liberty will disappear altogether once the Democrats have completed their mission and enough Americans reject their history and willingly surrender their sovereignty to the yoke of Government sovereignty.
Total Security?
Pres Dwight D. Eisenhower
“If all that Americans want is security, they can go to prison. They’ll have enough to eat, and a bed and a roof over their heads. But if an American wants to preserve his dignity and his equality as a human being, he must not bow his neck to any dictatorial government.”
(Source: DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER, president of Columbia University, speech to luncheon clubs, Galveston, Texas, December 8, 1949.The New York Times, December 9, 1949, p. 23.)
Americans whine a lot these days about safety and security as if its their right owed to them by their government. It’s not! Our government unlike most others in the world was created to protect individual rights and property. It was understood that feeding, clothing, sheltering, and providing safety was an individual’s responsibility first and foremost. It was not a duty owed to them by their government unlike when they served England’s King at his pleasure. Back then people traded their liberties for the promises of a monarch that included “safety and security” in a caretaker role not unlike a slave and master.
I see nothing in over two centuries that has taken place since we broke with England to tell me that men are more enlightened in governing each other, more respectful of individual rights ( in fact quite the opposite), more honest in their dealings with their citizens, and yet more and more Americans are willingly surrendering their individual responsibilities so a government agency can take care of them.
I feel liberty will once again have to be fought for in the future of this country, and once again it will be by a small but determined minority. Those willing to risk their lives, treasure and sacred honor shepherding the sheep once more into freer pastures.
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