Posted on 09/27/2008 8:24:25 AM PDT by joanie-f
That would qualify as the most eloquent, poetic imagery I have read in recent memory, if it didn't bring tears.
~ joanie
~ joanie
....now if they’ll all READ it!!!
I had a rather heated (to put it mildly) discussion earlier this week on an investment forum in which I take part. My 'opponent' claimed to be a die-hard conservative, but was chastising me for criticizing Bush.
The following is a part of one of his last private replies to me, after we had both settled down a bit:
In families, villages, or political parties, you don't get to pick your relatives neighbors or fellow party members. If you are to be of much value to them, and especially if you wish to have sway outside the fold, you don’t strengthen your position through gratuitous attacks on your mates.
When such attacks are used as an introductory device to a statement of position in an attempt to prove bona fides, they are only destructive to the argument. They only prompt questions of loyalty of the writer without supporting the position. They have become hackneyed, ludicrous habitual among "nominal" conservatives and the "country club Republican" crowd. Such attacks are ineffectual at best, cowardly at worst.
There are Republicans I despise. There are no (living) Democrats I admire. What do I gain for conservatism or the party by attacking Republicans? Would I thusly be considered smarter or more thoughtful or erudite by Democrats?
If you don't get it yet, just file it away, and some day it may dawn on you.
You seem young women. You might be my daughter's age. I love her, she is a passionate, “rock ribbed” conservative, highly educated and fairly accomplished, but her political skills and arguments are not yet fully developed either.
To which I replied:
I appreciate the more cordial tone of your message, as opposed to the previous ones.
I know that neither of us wants to begin a long-term ‘correspondence’, but it also appears that each of us appears to want the final ‘rebuttal’. So, for what it’s worth, here’s mine:
I very much doubt that I am the age of your daughter. As a matter of fact, I am probably older than you.
I have been involved in politics all of my adult life: as an activist, a newspaper political columnist, a campaigner, a freelance political writer, and a local office holder. I have served as an elected township official in our township for the past twenty-five years, and have learned, at least on the local level, how best to deal with the heavy-handed edicts handed down ‘from above’ (on the state and federal level).
I agree that we do not get to pick our party members. But neither do we have to support those who have gone astray.
The Republican Party has lost its way. The amount of damage that the two Bushes have done to the Reagan Miracle is mind boggling. I met Ronald Reagan on two occasions, and spoke with him briefly both times. There are no words to describe the concrete-ness of the vision that man embraced, and his eight years in the White House were testimony to his constant effort to achieve a return to representative republican government, whose basis is a reverence for individual liberty, accompanied by a prescribed minimal role for government.
The list of ‘accomplishments’ that both Bushes have achieved include countless ‘accomplishments’ that both eroded Reagan’s achievements and compromised with the left so significantly that it was often difficult to discern the ‘R’ behind their names.
I am an American first, a conservative second, and a Republican third. And if I see a fellow ‘Republican’ working against the conservative credo I will speak out. If I see a ‘conservative’ working against what is best for America, I will speak out. If I see an American working against our republic, I will question his allegiance.
We appear to be in general agreement as to the path down which our republic should be heading. But we vehemently disagree on where our ‘allegiance’ must lie in order to set her back on that path. I do not bear allegiance to a party, but rather to the vision of our Founders. Far be it from me to speak for them, but I suspect they would be terribly disappointed in George Bush’s lack of courage in not attempting to use the bully pulpit to educate the people as to the treason being committed in Washington every day. Instead, he himself is whitewashing, and compromising with, criminal behavior. His speech last night was a glaring example of that, and it is that kind of weakness that got us into this mess in the first place.
Our ends are the same. Our means appear to be vastly different.
Having your list at the ready should prove very helpful in future confrontations. Thanks.
~ joanie
Allegiance and Duty Betrayed
There is no more powerful reminder. Thank you.
~ joanie
I wish I had either begun or ended my essay with that brilliance. I have it filed away to use another time.
A sincere thank you.
~ joanie
The American people, as in the rest of the world, have stuck their noses in the “boob tube” every available waking moment. They have been acclimated to the point where they implicitly trust the MSM. The MSM beat the drum of “hate Bush” with every lie possible to get this Democrat Congress in control. Now, two years after the Pelosi bunch took control, things have been steadily going to heck in a handbasket daily - and yet, “Bush” is still blamed for it all, and the Republicans seem incapable of countering it. I can understand it somewhat, with a largely rabidly liberal media hellbent on getting the first liberal black (semi-black) man elected President. If Obama were a conservative black man, he would be treated as Clarence Thomas was treated with any scandal, lie or rumor paraded around for all to see with their help. As it is, the alarming truths about Obama have been ignored and pooh-poohed by the now worthless media. They shore up “their” liberal boys as they did with the disgraceful Clinton.
People need to get their noses out of those irresponsible, liberal, tawdry TV shows and so-called “news” shows and FIND ANOTHER SOURCE OF NEWS and “ENTERTAINMENT”. This country is circling the bottom of the old commode hole and is about to flush on down. WAKE UP, ALL!
Thanks for well-deserved the comeuppance.
~ joanie
Allegiance and Duty Betrayed
I would rather have NO bill come out of these "negotiations" than ANY bill that funds ACORN. Rather than that, I'd prefer the economy to go down in flames, and let the chips fall where they may. Enuf is enuf.
I am so glad to hear you say that. So many of my conservative friends keep repeating the mantra, 'But the government has to do something!'
The government has already done enough. It's time to 'let nature take its course'. Doing so would be painful, but it would stop the cycle of rewarding criminality and corruption, and that's the first (baby) step in reclaiming our republic from the scoundrels.
I'm glad, as always, that we're 'on the same page', dear sister. :)
~ joanie
~ joanie
Short, but profound!
~ joanie
Good points.
“Leadership”
in Washington???
Leaders have said a lot of things since 1900.
Their gloablist goals, intent, means are clearly stated in their pronouncements . . .
post #76
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2031425/posts?page=77#77
They are ‘leading’ the land to hell at an increasing speed.
Here is a cut and paste from a previous post I wrote on this thread that I think completes the 'reasons why Americans are ignorant of the facts in this election':
Our public education system is nothing more than an indoctrination facility anymore -- teaching children what to think rather than how to think.
I am a teacher, and I have discovered over the last twenty years or so that, unless they are provided a road map detailing how to get from Point A to Point B, American children are no longer able to navigate any intellectual pathway.
That state of affairs came about purposefully. The left needs to keep the masses in a condition where they need to be led around by the nose in order to move from day to day.
Critical thinking, and the ability to analyze a situation, widespread among the people, are majors roadblocks to the imposition of socialist rule. So filling children's heads with politically-correct 'facts', rather than teaching them to think on their own, is a distinct goal of the current public education system. And they're well of their way to achieving that goal.
~ joanie
Allegiance and Duty Betrayed
I have it saved to read (every word) later this weekend.
Thank you for providing a priceless resource! Have you considered posting it as a stand-alone piece?
Best to you and yours in these troubling times ...
~ joanie
Allegiance and Duty Betrayed
It's been proven, time and again, that the amount of money spent on education has little to do with the quality of that education.
Both my husband and I have substitute taught in several local school districts on and off over the past few years, and what we saw and heard there was demoralizing, to say the least.
Your Orwell reference is right on the mark.
~ joanie
Allegiance and Duty Betrayed
I'm increasingly coming to that realization norraad.
In theory, since both houses of Congress are in the hands of the Democrat majority, one would think that this bail-out package could pass without Republican votes. But the Dems are scared to death to do that. They NEED Republican cover; i.e., Pubbie votes to make this pig in a poke look "bi-partisan."
I hope that no Republican in Congress or the Senate will fall into this trap. One hears of all the yelling and screaming on Capitol Hill today. I imagine the reason for that is Pubbie Congress members are reminding the Dems that this "tar baby" is of their own exclusive manufacture, at the behest of the Congressional Black Caucus and their social-engineering enablers.
The Community Development Act (vintage Carter) is the Dem chicken that has finally come home to roost. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are merely "slush funds" for carrying out their social-engineering designs, and the thoroughly corrupt ACORN has been their enabler.
Further, the Dems are probably apoplectic about the prospect that the public (read: voters) will find out their presidential candidate is up to his armpits in this mess; for he is a "community organizer" with deep connections with ACORN.
So they've been trying to hang all this mess on the Bush Administration and the putative Republican mania to deregulate. Obama did this as late as last night, in the debate. This is a total fantasy! Then they claim that the "regulators" were asleep at the switch. But there was regulation of Fannie and Freddie, plus supposed congressional oversight of the regulators; the regulations were just ignored — which folks like Raines and Gorelick and Johnson probably thought they could safely do, because the Dems in Congress would give them political cover. Meanwhile, they looted the joint.
The inconvenient truth is that Republicans in both the Congress and the Senate have been making dire warnings (e.g., McCain, Shays, et al.) for years now about the impending implosion of those institutions. These warnings were poo-pooed by such as Chris Dodd, Barney Frank, Maxine Waters, and the CBC.
Meanwhile, you have ACORN out there threatening to sue mortgage originators for "redlining"; i.e., applying sound fiduciary standards in the qualification of credit-worthy applicants. Much earlier, the Reno Justice Department had done likewise. The whole point was to put lower-income and minority people (including illegal aliens!) into homes they could not possibly afford.
Now if you're a mortgage originator who is threatened with being sued for not pushing loans on unqualified applicants; and you know that you are only required to hold the mortgage instrument for 45 days before you can palm it off on somebody else (usually Fannie and Freddie, who can further resell packages of such stinky loans to investors as mortgage-backed securities with implicit taxpayer guarantees behind them); then you don't care anyway whether the applicant has the ability to repay his obligation, because that's somebody else's problem (the person or institution that bought the mortgage backed security). The bad loans were off the books of the mortgage originator just as soon as the stipulated holding period expired; the sale proceeds were then in his hands; and so he's then flush with cash to repeat this maneuver, over and over again....
Thus was a house of cards constructed. Now that it's finally come crashing down — taking the housing market, the banks, and Wall Street along with it — we taxpayers are being presented with the bill for cleaning up the mess, which was not of our own making in the first place.
So much for the "socialization of risk": Let the whole people pay for the losses and evil deeds of a relatively few greedy miscreants.... Yeah, that sounds like a really good idea!
We'd continue to receive "bills" like this forevermore, unless the CORRUPTION IN CONGRESS ends, and the persons responsible for it are publicly exposed, tried, and punished.
All things considered, I think the best thing Congress can do right now is: Do nothing at all. Let the system blow up. And then people are going to start asking "Why, HOW did this happen?" And then the TRUTHFUL HISTORY of what led to this shocking debacle must be made public.
Hang the blame on who deserves it. If we don't do that, then the same kind of "stuff" is going to continue to happen forever, and the demands on the taxpayer would become infinite.
It looks to me, all things considered, that to pass this bailout would represent the final, complete socialization of America, which would instantly become a reality — in a silent, bloodless coup.
The public needs to understand that the root cause of this financial meltdown was the unconstitutional social engineering desires of a relatively small group of extreme Left progressives in Congress. They should be impeached for derilection of duty (i.e., breach of their oath of office), or at least NEVER returned to office.
As for Raines and Gorelick and Johnson, they should be prosecuted for gross fraud and malfeasance. I mean, if Ken Lay of Enron is in jail for doing just the same things as they did, then I think it's only just and fair that they should join him.
My two cents worth, FWIW.
Thanks so much for writing, norraad!
BTTT
No, that isn’t my quote. I read it on FR.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.