Posted on 08/31/2005 9:44:39 AM PDT by Pukin Dog
Since I am not flying this week due to a lack of gasoline, I have a little time on my hands. Ya think that if I can fill my Hummer, my employer could fill my 777? Oh well. Since I’m around, I thought I would share my thoughts on what I am seeing on television and on the Internet over the course of the last couple of days, primarily my thoughts on looting.
Before I get into looting, I want to share a few thoughts on the plight of the poor in America. I make a point of going to Home Depot every Saturday, whether I need anything or not. It gives me ideas for my homes, just walking through the place. I never leave empty handed. One thing you can’t miss at any Home Depot in San Diego County is the number of men, some legal, some not, who are standing there all day, every day looking for work as Day Laborers.
When I see these men, I am always reminded that if you have either an education, a work ethic or both in America, then it is damn hard to become and remain poor, and that those who find themselves in that situation largely come from an attitude of hopelessness and victimhood, and generally lack the brain-power or motivation to change their circumstances for the better.
Most illegal aliens who come to America via the southern border are looking for work, hoping to send money back to family in Mexico. I get the general sense that these are people who love their families, and are willing to do whatever they can to support them. I have no doubt that were I born in Mexico, that I would be an illegal alien TODAY, were it the only option that would allow me to feed my family.
Do I hire Day Laborers? Your damn right I do. I have never seen people so willing to work hard for a few bucks. I am known to pay more than I originally offer, and I also feed anyone who works for me. As far as I’m concerned, what you do to feed your children is your business. I realize that many might disagree with me on that, but I don’t care. Often, instead of being dropped off back at the Home Depot, I have been asked to take workers to a Western Union location, so that they can wire money to Mexico.
I believe that these people make up about 90% of illegals coming into America. Is it wrong? Sure. Hungry children living in squalor is more wrong, when their parents are willing to risk death to come to a place where they might earn money to feed and cloth them. Should they have drivers’ licenses? No. Should they get an opportunity to become Americans? Sure, if they do it legally.
Now, suppose that instead of a worker asking me to take them to a Western Union location, they asked me to take them to Nike Town, so that they could pick up the latest Air-Jordans; would that be cool? Oh wait; suppose instead of helping me dig a new pond, or build a retaining wall, they just broke into my home and took money to purchase those Air-Jordans? Hold on; now suppose that they are not even illegals now, with no families needing help south of the border, and just feel the need for a little ‘bling’?
Looters piss me off.
Being born in America is a gift from God. Nowhere on earth are there more opportunities to succeed. You have to WORK at it to be poor in this country, and yet there are those who still feel as though they are entitled to the benefits of the American dream, without the responsibility as citizens to obey our laws. No one need ponder the fact of the racial makeup of the persons doing the vast majority of the looting within the disaster areas from the hurricane; but what strikes me, is the deafening silence of the so-called Black-Leaders, who could gain a few points of credibility in my book, were they to come forward and admonish those who have taken advantage of this crisis to score a larger television set, jewelry or the afore-mentioned Air-Jordans.
When Wal-Mart opens a store to the public and allows persons to “come and take whatever you need to survive” they were NOT referring to that stack of new computers, or that row of DVDs. I don’t care what color you are; if you steal during a crisis by taking advantage of the charity of a corporate entity, you are an animal. If you are a law-enforcement officer, and you join in the looting out of a sense that the man you are going to arrest next week gets higher definition on his plasma than YOU do, then you are a disgusting human being.
At my local Wal-Mart, there is bottled-water stacked to the rafters, but I didn’t see anyone carting away bottled-water. Not baby-food, not batteries and flashlights, not camping gear or raincoats, but you can bet there aint an X-Box to be found in a New Orleans Wal-Mart today. It makes me sick. Does anyone see Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson reminding people that this is wrong and should not occur? Has the idiot Julian Bond come out from his NAACP cultural nap and told anyone to knock it off? Or is the prevailing attitude to be: “Well, they just lost their house; the least we can do is comfort them with the third season of “Six Feet Under” on DVD”. Yeah I know, it’s ‘for the children’.
It seems to me that this would be a perfect opportunity to instill the notion in people that bad things happen to both good and bad people, and that we are blessed to live in a country that affords each of us the opportunity through hard work to prepare ourselves for events like these. I’m telling you, that if you have a big-screen TV in your home, and have to take your children to the doctor in a cab or mass-transit; you are a dammed loser. If you and your 9th grade education only gave you the skills to steal from others, regardless of your race, you have spit on the blessings God has given you.
Raise your hand if you would rather be a minority in Mexico or Africa instead of America. In America, our poor people are richer than 99% of the people in other nations. Just BEING HERE in America is a greater gift than many imagine. Yet some feel that because their gold chain is last year’s model and ‘played out’ that they have a perfect right to smash jewelry counter and update themselves at your expense. That’s right, YOUR EXPENSE. It will be you and I who ends up paying for what others have stolen. Wal-Mart will pay higher insurance premiums, and they will pass it along to YOU in the form of higher prices. So you see, when people steal from Wal-Mart, they are stealing from YOU.
I am beginning to understand why Limbaugh once suggested that the poor be taxed for being poor. You don’t become poor or stay poor in America without working at it. And then these people have children that they cannot afford, and teach them the science of being poor before these kids are old enough to learn better. These children are not taught that for every item on the shelf at a Wal-Mart or a Costco, that someone WORKED to put it there, to make sure the product was safe, to make sure that the product was visible through marketing, to make sure that the cost was held down as much as possible to make it more attractive to you, and so on and so on….. Dammit, somebody worked!
Still, there are those who think its okay to just stroll in and take it, whatever it was, and it should disgust you. The other day at the Chevron station, the thought never occurred to me as the meter on the pump was approaching light-speed, that I should not have to pay for the fact that I choose to drive a big-ass truck with the AC on full just because I like it. Maybe this weekend, when I fill that beast again, I should just bring my pistol with me and TAKE the gas, because I’m feeling a bit oppressed cause ‘my baby’ eats a hundred dollars worth of gasoline a week?
If an idiot like me can make it in America, then anyone can. I don’t have the common sense of a field mouse, (especially around women) but I know that if I don’t work hard, I will be poor. That one is easy. I live in earthquake country, but I know in a disaster I stand a better chance of getting out of town in my truck then the poor bastard in his trendy hybrid. That’s easy too.
The point of this little rant is that looting should NEVER be excused, under ANY circumstances, because we are Americans, and we either believe in God and Country or we do not. And while I would hire anyone, from anywhere, who wanted to trade an honest day’s work for a chance to put food on his table, I would not lift a finger for some rat-bastard who sees an opportunity to sit his fat-ass down in front of a new television to catch Jerry Springer in Hi-Def.
Stop making excuses for them.
That Shall Not Take What Belongs To Others???
Thou that is
Preach it, PD!!! Great rant, and spot on!!
Good points all around.
... But you still owe me a new keyboard.
Well, if this is just an exercise to demonstrate how much smarter we are than the folks in the storm, then I'd be smart enough to not live were hurricanes come. So I win.
Given that there is the pontential for ~some~ kind of disaster anywhere, with or without warning... the question of survival and ethics in immediate crisis becomes a little more useful to the rest of us. I'm trying to look at it in that broader sense. I have a grocery store next to me. It's actually figured into my disaster plan that I would both benefit from that, and help to defend it.
For my life, with my horses and dogs that mean a great deal to me, I am not sure what could happen that would make me abandon them.... and where to evacuate and take them, depending on the type of crisis, becomes a little complicated.
where they are going now, Astrodome, or any where else that could have been rigged. Red cross shelters all over. But out of the area the way people with transportation means were able to exit.
A day before the storm struck there were reports of people with no way to leave. Stuck.
How could the Superdome have been the best choice. God knows what would have happened to the roof if the direct hit had occurred. Reports anticipated the destruction of NOLA -- no electric, no way to return to anything.
Sorry, sister. Tell it to someone else.
All I know is that were it not for the existence of Top Ramen, I would have dropped out of college from sheer starvation. You wont be getting sympathy from the Dog.
Please, ping me when you do post that rant.
Awesome rant. I stumbled upon the link on another thread. Glad I took the time out to read it.
But it didn't. I don't think, for the short term, the Superdome as a place for people to go, was a bad idea. It worked. It's not a good longer term solution, but for the immediate storm, it worked.
right, what can you expect, anyway?;{
Normally, no. Only in very rare survival circumstances, and it's an individual judgement call. I think people caught or lost in the wilderness storms sometimes break into cabins, etc., and there may be some justification for that. But don't dare shoot a squirrel, goose or I don't know what in the Adirondack Forest or there will be H**L to pay with the feds and you will face a stiff fine or go to jail. It is better to starve than shoot a squirrel in a national forest. Not.
You KNOW the author? Cool. What's his name? Have you ever seen the movie "Moscow on the Hudson?" Robin Williams who plays a defector from Russia, faints when he's sent to the grocery store to pick up coffee. There are so many choices, he becomes overwhelmed and can't take it!
Pukin for President!
Right on, PD!!! Thank you.
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