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Month: November 2018

A Letter to Rome

To: Bill Rabon

Cc: Phil Berger, Chad Barefoot

Senator Rabon:

I am writing you to request an explanation as to why you will not allow HB 746 (referred to your committee on 6/12/2017) to advance in the Senate. This bill enjoys strong support statewide, and there is an equally strong national movement in this direction. I cannot imagine why you would willfully ignore the wishes of the people, or why you would use the bully pulpit of your chairmanship as a weapon of resistance to your constituency.

(I have heard through GRNC that you have even browbeaten an activist who promised to relay your true position on the bill to others. I have no evidence that this is true, and am not empowered to judge you even if it is. Such a matter is between you and your God regarding how you will act as a man. Nonetheless, it is undoubtedly an incident that is easily verified or disproved by evidence, and I would certainly question the suitability to occupy a position of trust and power of any man who would demonstrate such disdain for the people.)

My concern, however, is focused on the apparent misuse of power that leads someone to use his influence in a dictatorial manner. Last I checked, our elected officials are public servants, not puppet masters. I would greatly appreciate it if you would educate me as to your rational justification for denying this bill a proper hearing. I will be more than happy to report your response (or the lack thereof) to any and all concerned.

I have copied the President Pro Tempore and my state senator on this matter and I will welcome and relay any response they may (or may not) have. [Please note that I treat “boilerplate” responses as a form of disinterested dismissal.]

Thank you,

At This Point, What Difference Does It Make Anyway?

The AZ senatorial race is important for reasons having nothing — and yet everything — to do with Kyrsten Sinema or Martha McSally.

First, let’s consider the two candidates, in an imagined vacuum: all other factors not considered, which candidate — on her own merits alone — should have won? On the one hand, we have McSally, a retired USAF combat veteran, only the second Republican ever to represent a southern Arizona-based district in the U.S. House of Representatives, who has an excellent reputation in the House, especially after her second term. On the other, we have Sinema, a Chuck Schumer protege, the first openly bisexual member of Congress, who is a former Green Party activist, opposes capitalism, and who was once labeled by the Arizona Democratic Party as “too extreme”?

Second, consider the state of Arizona as a whole: would you have expected the result to favor a progressive or a conservative? Like most states that are somewhat wistfully called “purple”, the overall political history has been conservative. Even Sinema, ever the political pragmatist perhaps, has been chastised by the Democrat powers-that-be as leaning too far to the right, even of supporting — gasp! — Trump the majority of the time.

Now consider the outcome: the election was very close, and McSally’s concession was almost certainly a calculated move to protect her short-term political future, with her eye on the Senate seat being vacated (sooner rather than later, perhaps?) by John Kyl. Unlike races in Mississippi (run-off) and Florida (WTF knows?), the outcome manages to both mean something in one sense and nothing in another.

One final note regarding outcomes: undecided outcomes favor the Democrats, regardless of specifics. Each gives the unprincipled leaders of that party an opportunity to blame Trump for every negative aspect of the election while managing to keep the MSM (their useful idiot mouthpieces) braying ‘coverage’ of the infighting as other more important issues compete for distant second-level attention.

So, gentle reader, when all is said and done, do you still think that elections (both this and future) and voting really matter? Or is the outcome controlled and manipulated by the money men and the power brokers? The logical conclusion seems inescapable: like never before, the people truly have no voice in the matter, and government of, by, and for the people has in fact long since perished from the earth.

The sheriff’s a …

This is what happens when you don’t vote red. Shame on Wake County (and Mecklenburg before her)!

I’m taking votes on just how long we will have to wait before we begin to pay the price?

And if you are inclined to consider any contrary evidence to your plans, Sheriff Baker, check with the family of Kathryn Steinle.

A Daring Move

Admin Note: I have (perhaps inadvisedly) imported my posts from 2010-2017 from my old blog, “The Infinite Smallness”, itself born from “Sign of the Times”. The older posts (all exclusively in the category “Vintage post”) are from a slightly different viewpoint, so the 2017-2018 break is more than just physical. Some of the posts are mundane, but some are probably worth a look. I would caution you only that posts prior to 2018 require that you brave a significant time warp. Again.

Gab and the Boomers

[Author’s note: Gab has been much in the news around these parts for days. As of this writing, the site is still MIA. We continue to pray for its return, uncensored and healthy.]

#Gab is far from perfect for a variety of reasons, but it is still better than any rival, for a variety of more important reasons. There is one relevant thing that strikes close to home that I would like to discuss here.

Among the many cohorts on Gab is an unorganized militia of Boomer-haters. Being a Boomer, I am bewildered, incapable of understanding the anathema. The gist of the focus seems to be that Boomers, unlike any generation before or since really fouled things up.

I am in the vanguard of those who despair for our culture, though my reasons are far more diverse. One of them, I admit, is my impression that certain of my peers stopped growing intellectually in roughly the early ’70s. So I suppose that is why I do not dismiss the “Boomer Busters” (hereafter “BBs”) outright.

I do, however, think that there is a truth kernel that the BBs must acknowledge. Anyone who has no adult memories of the year 1968 has no standing to judge the Boomer generation. There is much to be learned from an examination of that seminal year. As a handy summary reference, I direct you to Pat Buchanan’s excellent column, “Is This Worse Than ’68?”

Boomers were shaped by 1968, especially the politically active ones. Many of them have been involved actively or passively in Democrat party politics since then. Many others who had not already done so in the previous half-decade became hypersensitive to the underlying ‘religion’ of that party.

The Democrat Party seniors of today fondly recall 1968 and long for the excitement and the (foolishly mistaken) belief that they were going to change the world for the better, against all odds.

Those people, the BBs should despise. But they must despise even more the useful idiots of succeeding generations who have bought into the Democrat cult creed and who are the ones acting on it on the front lines of the current culture clash.

Unlike Mr. Buchanan, I think it remains to be seen whether this 50th anniversary year will be worse. Right now, it clearly is not. But there’s plenty of time after November 6th for it to make a strong run on the record.

And to my #GabFam, I say “Speak freely, but do please know of what you speak.”