Archive for November, 2008
Sorry that I have been quiet as of late. On November 12, my mother had an orange sized tumor removed from her brain. The doctors got it all and it was benign. She is doing really good and is continuing to recover at home. I was in Texas from November 13 to November 18. We even sent a Red Cross message to my wife’s ship and she was able to meet us in Texas. We had as good of a time as possible in the situation. We saw a lot of family that we hadn’t seen in a long time and I even had time enough to get a new Texas Driver’s Lisence (my first horizontal lisence). Needless to say, I missed three and a half working days, so I have had some catching up to do to get up to date with all of my projects. I am now fully caught up and will be back to using some of my free time to post.
My main concern with this holiday weekend is not the 8 trillion communism proposal, but the Lone Star Showdown. Preparations have begun and I am at my office Marooned Out. Thank you all for supporting my family during this stressful time and Gig ‘Em Aggies!
WHOOP!
What the hell happened? Sometimes it is hard to wrap my mind around the ridiculous notions that people get in their heads. If you visit my brother’s site, www.travisthornton.net, you will find a much more enlightening discussion over the Federal Bailout. I, was not schooled in the nicetiesof political science, so I am going to shoot straight with you. Say you were to start a restaurant, and it did not do so well. You cannot really recoup initial capital invested, and you have to close the restaurant. Seems like a simple concept to most people. Now, say you are in charge of a large automotive manufacturing company that has steadily lost market share since Baby Boomers would actually buy imports. You are hemhoraging money. You have a long string of layoffs, but eventually you are going to have to fold up. What’s the difference between these two business models? Certainly one exists on a larger scope, holds more value when affecting the national GDP, and employs a unionized work force that is a political goldmine in the “swing states”. However, it is still a private business. If someone puts their money into a GM, Ford, or Chrysler and invests capital (in the way of money) into their production, and the venture fails… Well, the venture should fail.
There are no, and should be no guarantees that every time you make an investment that you will make back a profitable return. That is the nature of free enterprise. Risk. If you take a risk, sometimes you are going to lose. If you agree to a adjustable rate mortgage, you have to realize that eventually your payments will increase. If you are a lender, sometimes the person in debt is going to default. If you are an insuring agent and you insure one of these loans, sometimes you are going to have to pay off that policy because of the default. Taken all in, if you see that this problem is pervasive throughout the housing industry, which provides the basis for the financial industry, then you are bound to fail one day. We did that, through oversight on the part of both Democrats and Republicans, we did that. The revolutionary idea that I will suggest is this, it is not the private citizen’s responsibility to reward someone else’s risk gone wrong.
If you base your business on risk or a product that does not attract market share, perhaps you should find another venture. Detroit automakers should be the first to make a change to an entire fleet of Hybrid and Fuel Efficient Vehicles. However, they would have to start small, and I’m not talking about just 5% of their production line. Seriously downsize the workforce and only focus on the kind of cars that concious buyers are looking for. GM is even producing Hybrid Silerados and Tahoes now. As a man raised in the rural setting, and a cheap/Earth-concious consumor, this is great. I will be able to get a truck that is still good for the Earth. If I were GM, I would be hammering this product. I wouldn’t have made the switch to Hybrid so gradual. I would have swiftly cut production and the workforce and retooled to produce strictly Hybrid vehicles, but here again, they have union quotas to appease. Communism at its best, crippling the American Auto Industry. Now, the Socialist suggestion of Bailout (which let’s not forget is just government ownership of a private entity) for the Big Three. How fantastic! Not only will our Financial Industry be government owned, but so will the Auto Industry. Therefore, we will have to go to our Government Car Dealership and get our Government Car Loan pending government approval. Slippery slope?
I guess my real reason for embarking on this rant is because Circuit City has filed for bankruptcy and humorously or seriously, there have been mentions of using Bailout money to help them out. I think this enrages me because Circuit City does not actually produce its own goods. It is a retail chain. It sells the same things that Best Buy does. However, Best Buy has garnered the lion-share of the electronics market, because they simply can sell things better. The product that they produce is the buying experience. I would just rather be in a Best Buy store. Circuit City stores are usually in disrepair if they are the older variety, and have a cheap presentation in their new stores. The buying experience in Circuit City is awful. If people don’t buy their electronics from there, they fold. It happens.
If a private business fails, let it fail. It is private. In the immortal words of Hyman Roth, “There was this kid I grew up with; he was younger than me. Sorta looked up to me, you know. We did our first work together, worked our way out of the street. Things were good, we made the most of it. During Prohibition, we ran molasses into Canada… made a fortune, your father, too. As much as anyone, I loved him and trusted him. Later on he had an idea to build a city out of a desert stop-over for GI’s on the way to the West Coast. That kid’s name was Moe Greene, and the city he invented was Las Vegas. This was a great man, a man of vision and guts. And there isn’t even a plaque, or a signpost or a statue of him in that town! Someone put a bullet through his eye. No one knows who gave the order. When I heard it, I wasn’t angry; I knew Moe, I knew he was head-strong, talking loud, saying stupid things. So when he turned up dead, I let it go. And I said to myself, this is the business we’ve chosen; I didn’t ask who gave the order, because it had nothing to do with business!”
Let’s let bad businesses of the past go and (though painful at first) refocus on ensuring our Free Economy is more free than a Nationalized Economy.
The campaign obviously did not turn out as I had personally wished. I was hoping that Americans would see the benefits of not participating in a Federal Socialist society. Apparently, feelings had been so strong about the present administration that they wished for any break from what they saw as a continuance of the current course. Therefore, a great orator that embodies a change simply by being the person he is was handily won this latest contest.
Is there reason for Constitutionally minded Americans to fear? I don’t think so. While the upcoming administration may indeed embrace ideals that will promote the most Socialist society in American history, the means of the Change will be reversible. For in reality, the only true way to preserve the change in time perpetual is to totally amend the US Constitution to adequately ensure that these goals would remain the Modus Operandi for the Federal Government. This simply will not happen in a Center-Right country. All Change will come in the form of expanding bureaucracies which can be eliminated if the implements of that Change prove to be fallible. I personally believe that America will embrace the ideals of Freedom and Personal Responsibility. That the ideal of Rugged Individualism will again rise from the ashes to inspire Americans to live the life that the Founders had envisioned. My hopes are that the current economic crisis will lead the American people to honestly reflect on our current consumer frenzy and focus us on ideals that motivate us to a society where we work for our rewards. No matter the position, no matter the level, Americans need to remember that sustaining our way of life is dependent on the individual and the fruits of their personal toils. These are my personal hopes for the future of our society.
As I was perusing Facebook statuses yesterday, I observed a sight that truly saddened me. Ardent supporters of the Republican ticket were lamenting that the President-Elect is “not their President” or that they would move from the country. The supporters of the winning ticket were also reveling in the victory and being quite callous in their personal statements. It broke my heart to witness people voice such vehement feelings toward someone just because they do not agree. If Republicans are truly angry, do not forget that it was under a Republican administration that our current situation arose. Now certainly, Congressional Democrats did prevent the reform of the Government Sponsored Entities whose failure exacerbated the problem of deficit spending. Democrats also have their certain share of blame for the war of Facebook statuses. For if one is a true Liberal, they would accept that people have the right to disagree. Our nation was built upon discourse. To brand someone as a horrible person just because they don’t agree is not proper, indeed it isn’t even what would be considered mature.
The election of Barack Obama to the post of President of the United States was truly historic. It is the culmination of the idea that every American has an equal right to participate in the process. This election truly validates the grand experiment in Democracy known as the United States of America. The fact that I may not agree with the agenda of the President-elect does not make him any less in my eyes. He was, in fact, elected to be the President of my country. I won’t be the one lauding his policies, but I will give him the support and prayers that the leader of this nation has always garnered in my being. Barack Obama will be the next President of the United States, and as a citizen, I cannot in good conscience tolerate our society to divide over what is an actual mark of progress in that society. Did I vote for him? No. Are there valid questions about his past and his policies that I still hold? Yes, but I will not allow them to further the divide between the two sides of our Political Spectrum in my personal life. I will take a path not trod as of late by those in the Left (with respect to their disdain towards President Bush), I will support him as the leader of the Free World, not fester an underground hatred, and do all in my power to voice the virtues of our Federal government operating as defined in the US Constitution. In the immortal words of John Wayne when asked about the election of John F. Kennedy, “I didn’t vote for him but he’s my President, and I hope he does a good job.”
Unite as Americans, do not divide as partisans. May God Bless America and may God guide the President-elect in his leadership of the Unites States.
Good evening, London. Allow me first to apologize for this interruption. I do, like many of you, appreciate the comforts of every day routine- the security of the familiar, the tranquility of repetition. I enjoy them as much as any bloke. But in the spirit of commemoration, thereby those important events of the past usually associated with someone’s death or the end of some awful bloody struggle, a celebration of a nice holiday, I thought we could mark this November the 5th, a day that is sadly no longer remembered, by taking some time out of our daily lives to sit down and have a little chat. There are of course those who do not want us to speak. I suspect even now, orders are being shouted into telephones, and men with guns will soon be on their way. Why? Because while the truncheon may be used in lieu of conversation, words will always retain their power. Words offer the means to meaning, and for those who will listen, the enunciation of truth. And the truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn’t there? Cruelty and injustice, intolerance and oppression. And where once you had the freedom to object, to think and speak as you saw fit, you now have censors and systems of surveillance coercing your conformity and soliciting your submission. How did this happen? Who’s to blame? Well certainly there are those more responsible than others, and they will be held accountable, but again truth be told, if you’re looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror. I know why you did it. I know you were afraid. Who wouldn’t be? War, terror, disease. There were a myriad of problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your common sense. Fear got the best of you, and in your panic you turned to the now high chancellor, Adam Sutler. He promised you order, he promised you peace, and all he demanded in return was your silent, obedient consent. Last night I sought to end that silence. Last night I destroyed the Old Bailey, to remind this country of what it has forgotten. More than four hundred years ago a great citizen wished to embed the fifth of November forever in our memory. His hope was to remind the world that fairness, justice, and freedom are more than words, they are perspectives. So if you’ve seen nothing, if the crimes of this government remain unknown to you then I would suggest you allow the fifth of November to pass unmarked. But if you see what I see, if you feel as I feel, and if you would seek as I seek, then I ask you to stand beside me one year from tonight, outside the gates of Parliament, and together we shall give them a fifth of November that shall never, ever be forgot.
People should not be afraid of their governments, Governments should be afraid of their people.
We stand upon a precipice. As you cast your votes today, remember that this election will have historic outcomes.
If Barack Obama is the victor, we will have elected the first Black man to the Presidency, which is a great step of progress in the long road to true and equal Civil Rights for all. He may also be the first non-citizen to be elected to the Presidency, but that is for the courts to properly ascertain. He may be a naturally born citizen but his citizenship would have been forfeit after becoming an Indonesian citizen and even traveling on an Indonesian passport. Even after going through proper steps to legal citizenship, Mr. Obama-Soetoro-Dunham would only be a naturalized citizen. Now that the Governor of Hawai’i has closed the records, we may be in for a Citizen-gate type situation. If Obama is found to be ineligible for the Presidency does that mean that Joltin’ Joe Biden would ascend in his place?
Nevermind the nationality of the Junior Senator from Illinois right now, if elected Sen. Obama would also be the first openly Marxist President of the United States. Progress? I think not. We would also have the first outright lie of his Presidency on his first day in office. Actually, it would come during his first act as President. When taking the Oath of Office, Barack Obama would be required that he will support and defend the Constitution of the United States, which he has already stated in an NPR interview in Chicago that he does not. That is history in the making.
Let’s examine another historic step that Sen. Obama has been proposing. He would institute a civilian national security force. I, personally, was under the impression that the National Guard already filled this role quite adequately. Perhaps the “us” that will be defended will be fellow Marxists ascending through the ranks of our governing system to tear it down. In history, this has actually been done before. The forces were called the Gestapo and the Checka. They brought national security by squelching the voices of discension.
Let’s move away from Senator Obama to Senator McCain. The election of John McCain to the office of President of the United States would also be historic. We have had war heroes in office before, but I do not think that we have ever had one as counted out as Senator McCain has been so often in this election.
In the matter of nationality, a lot of criticism has been flung right back to the Republican cause because John McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone. It appears that no one in the media will bother to report that if you are born on a military installation in a foreign country (John McCain was born in Coco Solo Naval Air Station) then you are a legal citizen of the US. That sews up that argument right there. The longest time that he spent in a foreign country was as a Prisoner of War.
Senator McCain’s idea of a spending freeze is a step in the Right direction. What happens when a mechanic is trying to fix an engine? Do they keep working on it while the engine is working? No. You will hear the following phrase, “alright, shut her down.” This is precisely what we need to do in our government. Freeze spending and start taking out parts that do nothing of value. Eliminate bureaucracies, modernize. The time of preserving government jobs for the sake of government employees needs to come to an end.
If McCain is elected, it would also be a major step forward for the Feminist movement. Although, Marxist Feminists on the Left were hoping that their side would be the first to break the Glass Ceiling. I think that Governor Palin would be a fitting Vice President.
In closing, I would like to tell you about a true American Patriot. My brother would probably never tell this story himself, but I will be his mouthpiece. Lt. Travis Thornton and his lovely wife Hannah have recently moved to Alexandria, Virginia from Norfolk, Virginia. During which time, they have attempted to register to vote absentee in our home county of Liberty County, Texas. At some point, their registration was found to be lacking. Was there an attempt at disenfranchisement of a current member of the military? I wasn’t holding the light, so I cannot tell you for certain. However, after my brother and my father had contacted state and federal legislators as well as the Secretary of State for the State of Texas, the call was made from Austin to Liberty on November 3, 2008 to fully register Travis and Hannah. They had the option of being able to get their ballots in late, but my brother and his wife have chosen to fly down to Liberty, Texas today from Alexandria, Virginia to vote in this election. My father explained that my brother had given the following statement as his reasoning, “In four years my little brother (Jack) could graduate (from the Naval Academy) and be deployed to Iran. I wanted to do everything that I could to prevent that.”
The Aggies defeated the University of Colorado. I’m sorry that I called that one B.
The Mids also beat Temple to make them 6-3. Way to go Navy! The following was a picture I found while looking at Navy’s space on ESPN.com. Some may recognize a Mid in the upper left hand portion.
Thanks and Gig ‘Em!
