My understanding is that liberal used to have a far different meaning, way back a couple centuries ago.

My understanding is that a liberal education did not mean being cut and carved and served up for progressive consumption in the feast of socialism.

Like socialism? Where has it worked for more than a small and very diverse populace?

Like communism maybe? Yeah, that’s proven what can happen when socialistic flames get stoked to the point of needing to be strictly and completely controlled. Ends in smaller fires and far more exterminations of the uninformed, undesired, unwanted, uneducated, unwelcome, uninhibited and unimportant elements within its own existence. Even the originators get consumed and destroyed.

No one wants war really. Well, maybe a few do. But war comes nonetheless. It always has and always will no matter how much your well-fed, anti-capitalistic, weed-smoking, over-sheltered, tenured, and completely naïve Che-G-wearing prof may try to convince you otherwise. Has he or she been outside the great wall of learning within, say, the last lifetime?

Get educated, sure, but stay wise and vigilant. There’s a reason it’s called utopia.

Liberal causes are amazing to me. They can champion just about anything or anyone outside of what has stood for generations as success, common sense, good practice, moral fortitude, and natural tendencies but they steer ever clear of the old and mundane. Too boring. Too un-cool. Just time-tested and proven and know to actually work. Maybe, at the heart, just too damned white.

We have become a laboratory for the well-connected and also those who wish simply to tumble the apple cart to see the apples roll and have a giggle at someone else’s expense. Funny when it ain’t’ you.

If you stay true to your moral guidelines; if you practice some sort of uplifting and tolerant religion; if you seek and pursue and acquire true education and not indoctrination; if you believe in God and country; if you work for a living and work until you can afford to do more; if you then do more and marry the opposite-gendered person of your dreams; if you buy a house, start a family; if you work hard to improve yourself so as to help your family and your community; if you actively participate in elections and vote for policy rather than causes; if you plan for the future of your children and for your own retirement and ultimate demise; if you give a damn, really, about others and giving them a hand up and not a free ride at someone else’s expense; if you care about the future of this great country and it’s standing in the world; if you want a better tomorrow in all areas possible; if you still believe in the American dream…

Well then get out and get a job and work and sweat and have some kids (not one child as a project). Go to church once in a while and believe in a power higher than yourself. Worry over some bills that you and not someone else is responsible for paying. Turn to and face and even embrace the real world and, well, you might just find it very, very hard to be a liberal.

Churchill said it best and it still rings ever true. Eh? Look it up.

What is the world like in your utopia? Did you ever think it through to the end? Did you start with an objective and lay out a strategy or did someone just convince you to blindly follow a cause…or perhaps just its leader since that requires far less research and intelligence.

Get wise and get real.

Liberalism, as defined today, simply means doing your best to destroy the old and failing miserably when constructing its replacement if you even happen to have an idea of what that may look like in your utopia.

All of the best and brightest socialists and communists knew it and maybe you should wise up, study their histories beyond their idealistic phases (these would be the phases your profs highlight with no mention of what happened later) and you might too become enlightened. I don’t think there were many happy endings.

Life’s too hard to be so naïve. Wise up.

Life’s too short to be so stupid. Wise up.

Been awhile…

So many things in my head and so much I wanna say but just don’t seem to get here often enough anymore.

How ya been?

Me?  Well, not the greatest but getting’ by, getting’ by.  Made it this far so far right?

Are you happy?  I mean with yourself and your life; with your family and your place in society; with the education systems and the local government; with the state of the culture; with your personal rights and freedoms; with your ability to freely practice your religion with no government interference; with your state and our federal government; with your economic position and condition; with all that is now, or is to be, and compared to what once was in this land of ours?

Oh, that’s right, the land my really not be “ours” but that’s just a detail on a bureaucrat’s desk somewhere and of no particular concern to you.

And you only reading this to kill some time waiting on the check from Daddy G.

Life ticks away and freedoms slide on by and somehow just disappear while we ain’t looking.

Are you better off now then you were before?  Do you live by the toil of your own self or do you let Daddy G do all that for you?

Easier to be bought off I suppose; getting fucked for money is probably better than getting fucked just for fun…if you wanna eat in the morning that is.

And you just take it don’t you?  Ain’t no concern of yours and ain’t no business of no one else.

But there is that deep-down fear that you manage to always ignore and avoid ain’t there?

Look, even now you can’t find it, face it, or figure out a way to shake it off. It’s there and that’s all there is to it.

How much you done for yourself this week?  Slave or whore- you gets to pick.

Daddy G just keep givin’ until, well, he either decides to stop or the stuff he givin’ just run out.  There ain’t no more of what ain’t no longer there.  Even Daddy G can’t do the loaves & fishes thing even though he sure does a good job in tryin to make you think it so.

No, it don’t stop, it just keep getting worse. But if you inside the bubble there ain’t no reason to make it pop is there?

And I know you don’t read or know much history (unless you managed to read the stuff they done re-wrote during your formative scholastic years) but there are lessons there.

No?  Oh, okay, what’s different now?

Oh yeah- there be smarter people in charge that just know how to do it right…for you.

Yeah, right.  Why they so nice?

Maybe it’s that there be slicker folk in charge now and they just know how to do it right…to you.

Maybe they the same gender so, yeah, they got it right. Maybe they the same party so they gotta know.  Maybe they the same sexual preference so they really understand.  Maybe they the same color so they know you and get you.  Maybe they worship the same god- or none- and you just like that.  Maybe they from the same place so they feel the pain and know the streets. In some way man they just like you!

Right? The fact that they rich and powerful and livin’ by a whole different set of rules is just, well, maybe it’s just the way nature made it to be.  But it ain’t no particular worry for you anyhow as long as you get the last little trickle from the hose.

Yeah, it gonna end and you ain’t got no choice since you took the money and got on your back with legs spread (or bent over with cheeks spread if that’s your liberal preference).  They own you and you won’t even admit it. Or worse yet you don’t even know it.

Used to be that slaves didn’t wanna be slaves.  Used to be that slaves knew they were slaves and the ones that knew it and didn’t like it tried to change it.

Yeah, it’ll end and since you ain’t choosing when to say when they gonna end it on their terms, when Daddy G don’t need you no more. How long that?

And then don’t come runnin’ to me cuz I hope to be long gone and outta here when that shithouse meets the flame…

And it seem to me that we closer to the end now than the beginning.

Seems like there was a lot of snow around here not long ago. Anyone know where the snow went?

Seems like there was a sight more purpose in my being not very long ago. Anyone spot an unleashed purpose running around?

Seems like there was once a good deal more respect and decency and intelligence in the world, heck, in our communities, not so very long ago. Anybody happen to know when all this narcissism crept into everyone?

Seems like people used to love this country and all that it once stood for, or might one day more readily and openly stand for, than any other country in this world. Who knows when it became cool to bash just about everything Ameican?

Maybe the big, successful guy is just an easy target. Maybe it’s just easy to sit back and blame everything and everyone else for what you and others should be accepting as your own responsibility. Nah…

It just ain’t your fault.

And I sure as hell know that it ain’t mine.

It’s gonna rain today on a day when my kids are supposed to be enjoying their outdoor school field trip to an amusement park. Wonder how much fun that will be.

But that ain’t their fault and it ain’t the school’s fault and it ain’t my fault or your fault.

Nope. It just plain sucks. For them at least.

Why them, why now, why today? Who knows- who ever does? Haven’t I asked that same question in the past? Many times??

Not raining yet but it will. Just a question of when and how much. I feel bad for my kids and their friends but kids have a way of finding fun even when it seems to be running the other way. Good for them.

Am I a racist, a sexist, a homophobe, and Islamophobe, a climate denier, an income inequalitist, a white privilegist, an imperialist, a selfish nationalist, a one-percenter, a pro-lifer, a Christian, an old white Republican, a stay-with-the-family dad, an unequal opportunity employer, an anti-minimum-wage dirty old capitalist, or just a horrible person all around?

Maybe I’m just one of those anti-Obama and anti-Hillary guys who hates them because of their color and/or gender. (Why all the hate bro?)

Or maybe I just happen to think that they are both dangerous and destructive political heads (note that I did not call either a leader) who also seem to be self-absorbed elitists their very selves.

It ain’t the color of the skin but maybe it could be the content of their character and their policy.

Is there anything more despicable than all that surrounds and has emanated over the years from Hillary Clinton?

Oh, yeah, there is: the media that surrounds and embraces and seeks to coronate her. No matter what.

Back home I worry about the rain ruining the day for my kids and their classmates but there is so much more serious to worry about it seems to me.

If I can just erase all the biases that the liberals have placed upon me then I might just be able to have a care other than total capitulation but, well, not quite yet.

Not while I continue to take a breath on this sweet old earth and within the crubling borders of this still great country.

I can be, I might be, the last man standing but somehow I doubt that I will be. There are just too many of us who still get it and still give a damn about things other than the climate changes that, today, bring the rain to us here in Pleasant Valley.

So damn ridiculous out here in the netherlands- much rather be in Baltimore. Wouldn’t you?

There can be no real debate remaining towards the arrival of our imminent demise can there be?

You can feel it in the cafes at night, there’s revolution in the air. And it ain’t the good kind.

In fact, can you name for me more than three “good” revolutions? Yeah, I didn’t think so.

It’s everywhere and it is brought upon us in so many insidious ways along so many invidious fronts. The folks on the other end of the gun don’t know, maybe don’t care. But the folks on the other side of the plan know full well and have been planning for a long, long time.

C’mon man, you have to see it- it’s everywhere. Not long ago it was there but nowhere and now it is everywhere.

When did we all get so sloppy and lazy and not give a crap about anything much other than “what’s in it for me?” followed shortly by “what’s on TV tonight?” Dress sloppy, look shitty…act accordingly.

Where is the pride in a job well-done by me but maybe for someone else?

When did we start to stop caring about spending money that isn’t ours and that we don’t really have anyhow?

When did Christianity become so evil and Islam so good? Whose heads are rolling? When the hell did God leave the building?

When did color of skin supersede content of character? You all like to quote the words and then not live up to the intent.

When did it become so cool to throw open our borders and despise our police?

At what point did we all agree that we have to celebrate two lovers of the same gender and accept their union as traditional marriage?

Where are our birth rates at these days?

What happened to the family?

How are our schools doing? When did the liberal-progressive faction consume our institutes of higher learning and why do we allow them to continue to digest and defecate our young? Younger still every year…

When did free speech become free only when pre-approved?

At what exact point did personal freedoms give way to government decrees?

How much did you get for your soul and how much did you pay for mine?

When do those who once spat on our soldiers throw open their arms in embrace? And, even more importantly, why? They always have motives.

Once you are so easily put at ease you just as well might be put at rest. Guard taken down is opportunity. Capitulation is so softly and easily sold and consumed.

How to fight any of this?

It has to start with our youth and we have to have the patience to allow it to grow back from there.

I had an eastern redbud once that the local horticulturist insisted was dead- likely educated at one of our fine universities. I otherwise learned to cut it back all the way to the main stems, the still-living wood, and perhaps pray. Sun and water help as well.

It quickly and amazingly became one of the largest and most beautiful shrubs in our yard. It’s still there and still beautiful.

Sometimes it can be that easy- you just have to be aggressive with the shears.

Maybe all revolutions ultimately fail but maybe they just need to be revived from time to time.

Okay, so we have more and more folks being brutally murdered by non-Islamic Muslim terrorists.  And the Christians that they kill, um, behead, are citizens and not Christians.  The children that they kill are simply victims.  And the women that they capture, beat, rape, kill or sell are just, well, unfortunate, shall we say.

Meanwhile, the beat goes on.  Beck and Kanye at the Grammies; SNL 40th anniversary bash; Bruce Jenner’s “age crisis”; the NBA all-star game.  All such American events.  All so wonderful.  All soon to be a thing of the past if those non-Islamic Muslim terrorists have anything to say about it.

Hear they’re heading for Rome and those cross-people.  Couldn’t happen then, there, to them…no never, and sure as where the bad people go never here to us.  Just keep on watching Hollywood and Facebooking all about where you live, what you are eating, where you are on vacation.  No need to worry, it’s alright ma.

What’s the word from D.C.?  Oh, I got it- ain’t none.  It’s just fine ma.

What’s the word from the streets?  Oh, yeah, “hands up, don’t shoot.”  You can cut my fuckin’ head off but don’t shoot bro.  It’s cool ma.

How does the general electorate fell?  Forgot- we’d need to explain who ISIS is.  We’d also need to have them get over the fact that the extent of their knowledge is that anyone who would ask them what they know about Islamic terrorism just had to be a racist.  Oops, I meant non-Islamic Muslim terrorism.  Of course.  It’s okay ma, I was only kidding.  Just get back at it, nothing here to see, know, understand or in any way worry your simple self about.

Yeah, even though they’d kill you too.  If you believe in nothing or anything other than what they do- because they are, after all, Muslims, even if that part of them doesn’t figure in the terrorism they carry out.  Kinda cool to be able to separate oneself like that- like a superhero- “Non-Islamic Muslim Man” to the rescue.

Don’t speak, don’t draw, don’t worship any other god.  Don’t not worship.  Don’t be gay.  Don’t be female unless complete subservience and full body armor is what makes you you.  Don’t be a Jew or Hindu or Buddhist or Coptic.  Don’t use alcohol (not in public at least).  Go get you a prayer rug and get ready to pray a buncha times a day.  Don’t be speakin’ your mind now ma.  Don’t be making or starring in those raunchy Hollywood movies that have sex and stuff.  Don’t try to create your own style of music or write your own free words.  Don’t think or act unless it is well within the constraints and complete restrictions that have been placed upon you.

Don’t cry for tears won’t save you.  Don’t hope for there is none to be had.  Don’t deny what you have been given to believe and all that you have been instructed to behold.

Don’t run no mo ma- there ain’t no place for you to hide.  Not no mo ma.

Elections have consequences, that’s what they say. Maybe.

But sometimes it just doesn’t seem to matter. So maybe not.

The Republicans won the recent midterms in something of a landslide. Yahoo. They don’t take office until next month but already the effects can be deeply felt.   Yeah, right.

There are Democrats and there are Republicans and there are other parties. There are folks on the left and those on the right and there are those who exist in between. There are many different people with personal and also institutional agendas who think that what they want can be gotten through normal political means and there are those who shed those means and take things into their own radical hands in order to achieve their goals.

And then there are the Washingtonians and the smaller kingdoms that aspire to be so. These folks also claim to be Democrats or Republicans or members of yet another party; left or right, liberal or conservative; calm folks or radicals; movers or shakers; people of the people. But they are really none of these no matter how hard they might try to convince us. They are the Washingtonians.

No matter how they arrived and no matter who they were when they arrived they wind up all the same. In the end there is no difference as they are all Washingtonians.

They simply work with the goal of keeping their jobs. Whatever it takes. But if they happen to lose their jobs through the undesired outcome of some election then they simply wind up turning that into something else- become a lobbyist, become a television commentator, become a political advisor, become a lecturer and tell people all about the stuff that you did that you really didn’t do. Recycle into the system. All that they care about is themselves. Seems to be the case with a lot of people in this country these days.

Nobody really gives a shit about this country anymore do they?

When we had Reagan we had hope; with Clinton, economic prosperity; Bush, international respect. What is it that we have now?

We have major issues with race relations. We have open borders. We have little apparent concern with the never-ending growth of the national debt. We have lost the global economic lead to China. China. We have an executive branch of our government that has decided the Constitution really doesn’t matter anymore. We are a joke on the international stage, no longer feared, no longer respected, no longer thought of as a country to be imitated. Islam is on the rise and we just continue to condemn Christianity and work tirelessly to finally remove God from our country. We have a popular culture that seems to have very little in the way of a moral compass- just do what you want to do (thanks 1960s). People in general just seem to not really care much anymore and if they do they mostly just don’t seem to know enough to have an informed and considered opinion. The liberal pundits were right, they ARE right- the American people ARE stupid I guess.

I gotta go now and happily greet the coming day but I will continue this soon. I am proud, still, to say that I am an American and I am cocky enough to add not a stupid one. I care deeply about this country and I am so sick of those who only seem to be focused on knocking it down perhaps with the ultimate goal of knocking it out.

But it ain’t over yet. We’re still standing, if just barely, and the final bell ain’t rung just yet.

Soon, maybe, but not just yet.