Another Blast From The Past.

For my good buddy, Mark.



I know for a fact that I had the time of my life, with that cat. He was one of the most genuine people I could have ever met in my life. If he hadn't been, I would not have known him for as long as I did.

Shock And Grief: Week Two

Last week I posted a short tribute to a gentleman we knew, someone who passed away last week. His passing was not totally unexpected, but still, the grief was deeply felt by those who knew and loved him.

Early yesterday morning, I got more bad news. I learned that my best friend from high school, someone I have known for almost 40 years, was killed in an accident. This was completely unexpected and has caused many others great sadness, myself included.

The two families did not know each other, so many will be spared additional sorrow. But in the case of the Sunsett household, it has brought sorrow upon sorrow and calamity upon calamity.

Needless to say, I probably will not be blogging for a couple of days. I may look at your blogs and stay in tune with the world. But I will not write much during this period of time.

As is always the case in the loss of a close friend or a family member, life must go on. But the process to heal must begin with mourning and reflection. That is what I will be doing, with much of my free time (as little as it may be).

I will be fine. I always am. I became well acquainted with grief when I was 21 years old and lost my younger brother, so I have more experience than many. But of you are so inclined, please say a prayer for his family. Some of them are not as familiar with loss. Some of them are still deeply in shock and will need to make important decisions soon.

Thank you all for bearing with me, for what you have done in the past, and for what you will do in the future.

And thank you all for being a part of this thing called PYY.

Brad Is Bad For Indiana

A little short rundown on the Indiana senate race.

First, two-term Senator Evan Bayh shocks the world by announcing he is not running for re-election. It's too late for the Indiana Democratic Party to field a primary, so a special caucus must be held. So by doing the only thing they can do, the kingmakers in the party anoint IN 8th District Congressman Brad Ellsworth, to face Republican Dan Coats in November.

If this isn't enough, they try to seal the deal the best way they know how. Bayh donates $1 million to the Democratic Party for the relatively unknown Ellsworth to get his message out.

But, there is one little problem with this little scenario: He has no message.

He does have a record. He has toed the Democratic line, the Obama agenda, spending us into oblivion. Check his votes out, if you do not believe me.

But.....beyond these mild little inconveniences, there is a bigger problem on the horizon for Team Brad. This is one that could shut down any little chance he might have had.

Despite not having to spend money in a primary battle facing other candidates statewide, despite being a rubber stamp for the Pelosi/Reid/Obama Syndicate, and despite having the audacity of calling Dan Coats a lobbyist's dream, it also turns out that he is behaving in a hypocritical manner where lobbyists are concerned.

Roll Tape:



Ellsworth and the Indiana Democratic Party want Hoosiers to believe that Ellsworth's time as a Sheriff makes him a law and order man. They also want them to buy into the fact that he is a moderate/conservative Democrat who will not stray from the issues that concern Hoosiers. But he's having a tough time persuading. By the way he was installed on the ticket, the way he was propped up by the same machine, and the way he has been nothing more than a "yes man" to almost everything the progressives have put up, he is openly showing that he is nothing more than a tool of the thugocracy.

Coats may not have been many people's first choice in the GOP Primary last May. But he was nominated by the voters and it's highly doubtful he will get his marching orders from the Triumvirate of Evil I mentioned earlier and others in powerful positions.

And there is more to this mess, as you would expect.

Here is this little tidbit:

Ellsworth received $12,000 in contributions from Charlie Rangel. Only after it was announced that Charlie was going to face charges, did Bad Brad decide to divest his campaign from them. How' that for ethics? How's that for a "law and order" man?

Brad Ellsworth was bad for the 8th District. He will be even worse, if we give him six years to ruin the entire state.



BTW----If you are a resident of Indiana and interested in this race, you might want to follow....

B(r)ad For Indiana......for more info on Congressman Ellsworth.

I am sure more will be forthcoming.

Sunday Reflection

Nothing is as strong as gentleness; Nothing is so gentle as true strength. - Saint Francis de Sales

Beating one's chest is not a sign of true strength.

Quietly maintaining the highest standards (while withstanding every adversity that is brought upon us) is.

Another Blast From The Past

Sarah McLachlan -- Angel



For all, who have lost someone special.

In Remembrance

Roy Mitchell
1931-2010

I am not posting a funny this week.

Some of you may remember awhile back, I created a funny little post about a mythical Uncle Carmine of mine. In doing so, I used the photo of the gentleman you see above because he looked like an Uncle Carmine and I knew he wouldn't care.

Needless to say this wasn't my uncle. In reality, he was the grandfather of my step-son on his father's side of the family. He passed away earlier this week and we are saddened by it.

Not many parents of a current spouse's ex would be so gracious towards the new spouse of their ex-daughter-in-law. But Roy and his sweet wife were very much so. They treated my son and myself just like anyone else in their family, anytime we were in town. We couldn't have asked to know or be associated with people any nicer than them.

Please pray for all of Roy's loved ones, they are many and they are are mourning his loss.

NAACP's Shelton Caught In A Lie

I know, I know. It's hard to believe, isn't it?

There are lies and there are damned lies. The damned lies are the ones that will get a person into trouble, especially when the person telling them cannot keep them straight. Here is Hiliary Shelton of the NAACP lying his ass off in one of these clips. Which one it is, is anyone's guess.



If a person tells enough damned lies, I would say that makes them a damned liar. But hey, they all lie, right? So the next time Hiliary Shelton says that TPers used the "N" word and spit on Black Caucus members awhile back, how can we believe him?

Just a suggestion to the NAACP, they may want to take this guy off of the circuit or he will really get them in hot water, the next time.

MEANWHILE:

Jobs are being lost at warp speed, we have spent $3.7 million for nothing, and the nation is divided more than it ever was. It's not good to be a Progressive and/or a Democrat these days and the NAACP is proving to be irrelevant again, after their 15 minutes in the spotlight.

Update--Racism Within The NAACP

As always the crack team of journalists at PYY (who work tirelessly into the wee hours of the mornings to bring you the freshest perspective on the net), want to get it right. They want to be fair and honest about what they write. So as the news takes its twists and turns, there are instances when we must assume we may have jumped the gun in our conclusions.

Yesterday's post assumed that what we heard was real and straight forward. And why not? It was there, we heard it and it was clear. The WH heard it because we are now learning that the official was made to resign. But in the same line of thought, we find that we may have cause to think, this wasn't what it seemed.

Asked about the NAACP’s actions during an interview with CNN on Tuesday, Sherrod said the only reason the video surfaced was in response to an NAACP resolution accusing the tea party of using “racist” tactics. “They got into a fight with the tea party, and all of this came out as a result of that,” Sherrod said

I agree with Jeff Dunetz at Breitbart. He writes:

It is also hard to understand why the NAACP would instantly condemn Ms Sherrod, if the speech was indeed as she said, why wouldn’t they respond by releasing the entire speech? One explanation may be that she is lying, but if you listen closely to the end of the clip she does seem to be pivoting toward saying it was about income not race (and then seems to change her mind again).

It's true. She could be lying her ass off. But as someone who can read people pretty well, I am not so sure she is. Besides that, the white farmer's wife thinks she did a great job for them.

But let's read on:

Another explanation for the White House and the NAACP not releasing the entire tape is the possibility that Shirley Sherrod is their sacrificial lamb. Possibly they do not care about the truth. Perhaps they realized their resolution attacking the Tea Party as racist was such a political loser, especially coming right after disclosure of DOJ Black Panther scandal, they see the condemnation of Sherrod as a way out of theses crises and seem racially balanced.

The "union/mob/thug model" of conducting government business uses this kind of system when bargaining behind closed doors. They turn on people and sacrifice them for PR, for return of favors, and whenever political heat is turned up on them for something.

Clearly there was an angle here. The heat was on the NAACP (and more importantly the WH) to act as if they were not looking the other way on black racism within the ranks.

But it gets better.... it gets more confusing as we read this story.

But the NAACP, after earlier condemning Sherrod, reversed its position Tuesday and called on Vilsack to "reconsider."

NAACP CEO Benjamin Todd Jealous originally released a statement overnight calling Sherrod's comments "shameful" and saying the group was "appalled by her actions." But after Sherrod started telling her side of the story, the NAACP said it would conduct an "investigation" and review the full tape, which was shot for the NAACP by DCTV.

Late Tuesday, Jealous effectively retracted his earlier statement and blamed the media for the confusion.

"With regard to the initial media coverage of the resignation of USDA official Shirley Sherrod, we have come to the conclusion we were snookered by Fox News and Tea Party activist Andrew Breitbart into believing she had harmed white farmers because of racial bias," he said. "Having reviewed the full tape, spoken to Ms. Sherrod, and most importantly heard the testimony of the white farmers mentioned in this story, we now believe the organization that edited the documents did so with the intention of deceiving millions of Americans."

I have one way to settle this.

Show us the whole tape, in it's entirety.

If what Ms. Sherrod says is true, the entire speech will bear it out. If she was truly doing a good job and the WH had this video leaked to make her the sacrificial lamb, the NAACP needs to take on the WH on this matter. If this is true, then Ms. Sherrod needs to realize that Obama is not her friend and start to realize that she was merely a pawn of injustice, to make Obama's thugs look just. If it true that this is the case, it shows how low these people in power are.

If she can come to this realization, I think those who can empathize with her might be able to see that Obama is not a friend to blacks at all. He wants them to think so, but they are only there to serve his purposes when he thinks it is fruitful.

Like I said, let's see the whole tape. I know they have it. If the NAACP is truly sincere, they will see this through and prove this woman was improperly set up.


UPDATE:

The complete video has surfaced
. It is lengthy, but you can find the area in question beginning at the 16:30 mark.

The NAACP has stepped up their defense of Ms Sherrod and apparently the USDA is reconsidering her dismissal. But I from first glance, she may not be interested.

Frankly, I don't blame her. If I were her, i would re-evaluate how this "hope and change" stuff has helped HER.

There are three possible motives for this story's existence:

1) It was leaked to provide a sacrificial lamb to combat charges of racism within the Administration.

2) The NAACP's racist rants and the resolution over the TP has backfired, so there needed to be a shift in the narrative.

3) Someone wanted to set up Breitbart, Fox News, the conservative bloggers, and anyone else who would run with this story.

Maybe it was all of the above. The result is the same though:

The heat is off of Eric Holder for dismissing the Black Panther voter intimidation case. The heat is off the $3.7 trillion it has cost taxpayers for bailouts, stimulus, and job creation....with NO jobs being created. The heat is off the Administration for it's reckless foreign policy that rewards nations traditionally hostile to our own.

That's the Chicago/Alinsky/Thugocrat way.

Time for us to get back on message and turn the heat back up. Time to ignore the bastards when they want to control the narrative and time for us to stay on task until November (and after).


UPDATE II

The tale just keeps getting more sordid as time goes on. Take a look at this Washington Examiner piece that asks some tough questions about Ms. Sherrod's employment with the USDA. Read the entire thing.

Racism Within The NAACP

No evidence of Tea Party Racism has surfaced yet, despite the $100,000 reward offered for anyone who can provide any. But it's a good thing that there isn't a similar offer to find evidence of the NAACP's racist membership.

Many within the NAACP are also in positions of authority and can use those racist attitudes they harbor, as a reason to discriminate against whites.

Here is one such example found by Breitbart.

Enter into the record, Exhibit A:



I expect more video like this to surface as time goes on. This is more widespread than many would have us think.

This is even more evidence that people who live in glass houses should never throw stones.

Confronting The Unreasonable

Irrational responses have always been part of the political landscape. We have people who try to shout down the opposition, other times we have people who create red herrings in order to take the attention off of losing a debate.

The NAACP has chosen to attack the Tea Parties, as ignoring and even allowing racism to prevail among their memberships. They do this without any proof of this being the case. They do it because there is no foundation for their existence anymore and they must subcontract their services out to the Democratic Party as the Mid Terms near.

There is no slide show, no presentation, nothing of any real substantive value. They have nothing that includes hard visual or audio evidence supporting any of their baseless accusations.

But as we counter these ridiculous claims, it's important to note their responses in evaluating the effectiveness of our criticism.

Here is a debate between Deneen Borelli of Project 21 takes NAACP vice president Hilary Shelton to task for his organization's classic use of the red herring:



Notice how Mr. Shelton cannot answer direct questions. He has no answer for Ms. Borelli, so he just keeps repeating old arguments. When he is confronted the lack of proof for his organization's baseless accusations, he recycles old material to stay on his empty message.

Without these weak and faulty claims, these people have nothing. They are empty suits living in an era that does not exist any longer.

There is racism on all fronts, in all groups. But to make everything that does not agree with a black president and/or his political party to be racist, diminishes the real instances of racism that do happen on occasion. It marginalizes those true instances so much, that it is equal to the boy who once cried wolf.

But there is another aspect to all of this that makes it even worse. The NAACP does not confront the rampant racism in their own ranks. Until they do, they have no right to expect others to act in this kind of manner. Before the organization expects to get the speck out of the Tea Party's eye, they should remove the mote from their own.

Another Blast From The Past

This week we visit the music of one of the best bands of the 80s. While they are often credited as being an Australian delicacy, the front man is actually a Scottish immigrant.

They had a small string of hits that helped define a musical era and the culture. Their sound was unique but rooted in reggae. Their lyrics were poignant and struck chords with normal everyday people who sometimes struggled.... while trying to make sense of it all.

The first tune is a live version of a song that tells of a perfectionist. It describes the neurosis that comes with worrying too much about the things you cannot control. At the same time, it makes a great dance tune:



Once external stressors can be identified, there comes a moment when a decision must be made. Fight or flight is the dilemma of which I speak, the decision described in the lyrics of this next tune deals with the extreme version of one such option and the ensuing paranoia that comes with withdrawal.

This #1 (in the USA) song covers that unhealthy choice well:



Enjoy.

Friday Funnies

The Forgotten Impressionist - Joe Alaskey



A bit dated but not bad, eh?

How Tough Are You?

Think you are tough?

Here is a guy that chews up and spits out bullets:

A brave British soldier who was shot in the face by the Taliban spat out the bullet - then walked nearly two miles for treatment before being rushed home for an emergency operation.

Well, it didn't happen exactly the way I said. But he DID walk quite a distance, while bleeding. Most people would have needed a MedEvac to get to an aid station.

HT: I Hate The Media

Rage With The Machine

It is becoming clearer and clearer that Barack Hussein Obama, the first black President of the United States, has been a disaster in the area of race-relations. His Administration, as demonstrated by his Justice Department, is a major impediment to healing rifts and closing gaps (both, real and perceived).

Despite his promise to unite all Americans (regardless of race, color, or creed), he has widened what was already a deepening and widening chasm. Instead of creating a more harmonious atmosphere where people can learn to live in peace, he and his Administration have sought to antagonize and provoke responses for the sole purpose of promoting strife and hatred.

From the very moment he weighed in on the Cambridge Police Department's incident with Professor Gates without direct knowledge of the incident, he set the entire tone for his presidency. It was at that point, where he chartered the path. By sowing discord among the brethren and putting Americans at odds with each other, he has shown that he and his cronies are not the kind of leaders we need.

How has he done this? By coddling hate groups, for one thing.

Allowing the New Black Panther Party to dodge responsibility for a blatant and obvious crime in Philadelphia has further divided the nation along racial lines. Most people who have any sense at all can see that there was a man threatening people at a polling place on Election Day 2008, and Attorney General Holder failed to uphold the law.

All the while, he is picking and choosing the cases to investigate and prosecute, mostly those that stands the best chance of advancing the causes of the black rage machine. Yes, I said it: The black rage machine. It is manufacturing rage in inner city black communities and it is spilling into average middle class communities, as well..

To these people, it is not about equality anymore. The words of Martin Luther King do not apply to them. They are all about revenge and empowerment, under the guise of social justice.

And they are not the only ones.

Take Jesse Jackson, for instance. He recently called into question an NBA owner's animated (but at the same time childish) written diatribe about losing Lebron James to another team. He said the owner demonstrated a slave owner's attitude toward James, even though the player was paid $62 million over 7 years. I bet if you could resurrect the real slaves who were badly mistreated, they would have gladly signed up for that duty ....in massive numbers.

Jesse has never been a slave, and I bet he would jump at the chance to get paid that kind of money, for producing nothing. He probably gets closer than we think.

Take Al Sharpton, for another fine example. He was in Indianapolis this past weekend trying to stir up problems further. He was visiting predominantly black churches, sowing more discord, as you may guess. He has taken up the cause of a 15 year old bi-racial kid who tried to physically interfere with police, while they were attempting to arrest his younger brother. The kid threw punches at the officers and the officers beat the hell out of him.

Let's be clear here. I do not condone the beating. I think it is a police officer's duty to perform with higher standards than the bottom feeders they must deal with, and demonstrate good professionalism in all cases. But that is a standard that is subject to the human condition and bound by its inherent flaws.

Policemen are flawed human beings and sometimes they are not nice people. There are some who are over-inflated by power and think they are the law, not the enforcers of it. Yet, I do not walk in their shoes, so it is not easy for me to comprehend how they get this way over time.

What they should have done in this case is arrest both kids with just enough force to subdue them, one for the original crime and the other for interfering. But what the media and the self-proclaimed "concerned clergy" should do is make an effort to understand that the young man made a foolish decision, as well as the officers involved.

So far, all we have is rallying cries like "no justice, no peace" and calls for all of the officers present during this incident to be fired and prosecuted. No one has said they have counseled the kid on his behavior and how to prevent it in the future.

Naturally, white kids get stupid and get beaten by cops from time to time too. I have yet to see Sharpton create a scene in those instances. I have never seen the "concerned clergy" outraged when a Caucasian is mistreated and oppressed by rogue cops. This is how we can conclude that he loves using the race card to stay visible in his actions and motives.

But what really is interesting is one of the faces you see in the picture found in the last link.

The man on the right is Mmoja Ajabu, former leader of the Indianapolis Black Panther Militia--the group that terrorized the city with threats and intimidation in the 90s. One time he shook down a Korean-owned hair care business that had a customer base comprised moslty of blacks. He told them they were profiting from blacks as customers... that he needed to give back to the community that had made him so successful. Of course that meant giving the money to his terrorist organization.

But his coup de grace came later after he was fired from his day job for carring a handgun to work. He was charged and convicted of intimidation, after his son was convicted for his role in a grisly triple murder. Three young people had their throats slashed, during a robbery. His son was not the man who did the killing, but he was present and in the middle of committing another felony. In Indiana, that's enough to be charged with and convicted of murder.

Mr. Ajabu was a Muslim and a Black Panther at the time of his threats toward the family members who lost their loved ones that fateful evening. He said that if his son was to be given the death penalty by the judge in his son's case, "other death sentences would be carried out". Naturally, it wasn't well received by the authorities. But since this time, he has converted to Christianity and is now an assistant minister of a church involved with the "concerned clergy".

That's all well and good. Everyone loves a story of true redemption. However, one must ask if he has retained much of the "Black Theology Doctrine" he was so well known for before his Road to Damascus moment.

There was a time over 25 years ago, I thought that the racial divisions of the past were much closer to being healed. If not, progress was certainly being made. At that time, I had many black friends that I would see from time to time and argue sports with them, over a cold beer. We laughed joked and genuinely had a great time.

I have been in black bars at the invitation of some these people. I spent one evening watching a basketball game with the owner of one such establishment. The friend who took me in there was playing pool, while the old guy and I were discussing how we would coach the game being played. I was buying beer, he was selling it. No one gave me any trouble, not a mean word was said.

But I couldn't do that today.

Those old places are gone. That generation has died off. Many who knew them have become more enraged because of the day-to-day activities of radical hate-mongers. They have put their faith and confidence in race baiting ministers, who share responsibility with a complicit media. They are churning out black rage as a product, rather than a byproduct. They are a part of the machine.

At this point in time, I do not believe that I could be a guest in a place like that anymore, without being a target. Fpr one thing, I could not because there is a good chance that no one would invite me. But mostly it is because I would not be welcome in most of those places, solely because of my skin color. And when I sit and think about it, it's sad for so many reasons.

They say that as we age, we get more like ourselves everyday. If we are a sanguine personality, we will become more happy-go-lucky as we mature. If we are melancholy, we will get more pensive and possibly depressed.

If this is true, then I would think other personality traits follow that same course. If we are not a racist when we are young, isn't it likely we will get to be less of one as we age?

I wasn't a racist back then. And I am not one now. But it is time for the black community to reject the messages of victimhood, time to stop letting the "so-called" voices from proclaiming that it is their destiny to suffer at the hands of evil white people. It is time to stop propagating hate and allowing the advancement of such to continue, unabated.

If not, we face a certain future.

March Of The Parrot Brains

No.... it's not a new horror movie. It's more about the sycophant nature of Jimmy Buffet's followers and fans. They are nuts about him, to the degree that many think Margaritaville is really a town. It's why many of them will go to his restaurant chain called Cheeseburger In Paradise, and allow themselves to be overcharged for an average to below average cheeseburger.

But that's another post, under another category, for another day. There is a more important flaw that I'd like to highlight here.

No doubt you have heard that the chief parrot brain is going to do a benefit for victims of the Gulf oil disaster, which is a good thing. But in the midst of his planned act of altruism, when discussing the "how we got to this point" aspect of this tragedy, he cannot resist making ignorant statements like this one:

"To me it was more about eight years of bad policy before (Obama) got there that let this happen. It was Dracula running the blood bank in terms of oil and leases. I think that has more to do with it than how the president reacted to it."

I do not mind saying that Jimmy Buffet (like many other entertainers) is a good entertainer. I have liked some of his music and I hear he is a great performer. But it is overly apparent that he is an idiot when it comes to some of the things that matter most in life.

Evidently, he doesn't have a lot of critical thinking skills.

If he did, they could get him out of this mess despite the fact that he doesn't know history very well -- despite the fact that he has a degree in history. Maybe the reefer he smoked back then rewired the circuits in his brain. I cannot say for sure on that one, but he has missed the mark.

You see, George W. Bush was only one year old when drilling and exploration began in the Gulf of Mexico. He was only a teenager when the first semi-submersible oil rig was used there.

He did not start it, he did not invent it. He was not in office when BP was given a pass on rigorous inspections that might have prevented this mess. He wasn't around when BP gave massive amounts of money to the Obama campaign in the 2008 election, so as to gain government favor(s) in the race for green technology.

Besides all of these little sticky things we call facts, old Jimmy still finds a way to do the only thing an entire administration and congress can do. And that is to deflect responsibility - for their many dismal failures. That is why they blindly and ignorantly blame George W. Bush for everything that has ever befallen mankind, since the fall of Adam and Eve.

If use logic to sort this out, I would think it would be simple to follow. For a promoter of the Gulf lifestyle and culture to not recognize that the events leading up to this mess (and the willful obstruction of recovery efforts) were the results of the Obama Administration's incompetence, is anything but remarkable.

Another Blast From The Past

Musical artistry is like any other aesthetic science. It is subjective and sometimes subject to whatever the current pop cultural mores may be at a given moment in time.

Here are a couple of tunes that take me back to a time when things were far less complicated:





Enjoy.

Friday Funnies

Maybe you have read the tale of Obamacles, now comes the tale of Obamafeld:



Go ahead, squeeze a cheap laugh out of it. No one cares. Then you can cry, because these words were spoken by the real people.

In a way, it'd be nice if this was a show...because we could shut it off.

No harm, no foul, shut it off.

Click. Boom. Gone.

Recommended Reading

I am recommending that my readers take a moment and go over to Social Sense to read Mustang's latest piece.

It is about the power of choice.

Various And Sundry Controversial Opinions

I know my readers are on top of things. So it is surely known by now that the DHS is banning federal employees' access to sites that the government thinks is controversial. Someone (with an office, a desk, and a pen) will sign off on what can be cut off and what cannot. There will be a censor.

On one hand, I cannot think of any reason a federal employee should be reading PYY on the taxpayer's nickel. They should be doing their job. Unless, their job is to read PYY.



In other controversial opinions, there's this guy called Charley Bolden, he's the big cheese at NASA, and he's a doozy. He thinks his most important objective is to reach out to Muslims and get them involved with the space programs.

Folks, that's just what we need.... an opportunity for extremists to study delivery systems up close. This is getting scarier by the day.



We now have testimony that what we all suspected was true. J. Christian Adams now says publicly that the DOJ used racial bias when they dismissed the case against the club-wielding Black Panthers at the Philadelphia polling station, in 2008.

A black AG, who works for a black President that sat in Jeremiah Wright's church for 20 years, guilty of racial bias? Who can honestly say they are surprised?

The First Modern Tea Partier?

Take a moment and listen to this speech by Calvin Coolidge. See if this doesn't sound familiar to things we are hearing today:



I have said before and will say it again. We did not get into this plight overnight. This is an accumulation of policies and acts of many previous leaders throughout the history of this country.

If we didn't get into this mess overnight, we cannot get out of it overnight. But we can stop the idiocy.

Another Blast From The Past

This weekend is a time to reflect on the day when the Declaration of Independence was signed by men of vision, hope, and optimism. It was the day when men freely declared their separation from a monarchy that was growing more and more oppressive, as days wore on. It came about because that oppressive agent was content to punish its subject for wanting to taste liberty, and embrace it.

Those guys had to pay dearly over the next few years, because of it. They were terrorized and abused by forces loyal to that undeserving entity. They had to endure.

Through all of the ups and downs, we have been through a lot of rough spots and you know, we have weathered them all. Right now, we are going through another and the nation is looking for a leader who can lead, solve problems not create them, and a person who can make the right decisions that are based in reality and good sense.

In 1980, we felt the same way. We felt the malaise, the low self-esteem, and the shame of being a nation led by cowards. We saw firsthand what it was like to witness the near collapse of our system under an out of control government that didn't care to listen. We had double-digit inflation, double-digit interest rates, and low morale in the military, how could we feel the slightest bit hopeful? But when Ronald Reagan came along, we felt there was a chance that we really could do better. We learned that we could reach higher and expect better results. We believed we could conquer our fears and our demons.

This song was but one by-product of that time, right after we watched the people rise up and be counted:



Have a happy and safe Independence Day.

And as a an encore here's the man who sang it like he really meant it:







Enjoy.

Friday Funnies

Here's a candidate with no secret motives:



Refreshing to hear such honesty, isn't it?

Measuring Tea Party Effectiveness

Politico has an excellent analysis on how the Tea Party has affected the positions of some moderate Republicans, who have been less judgmental on the big spending policies of the Democrats. It's a good read, but here is the gist of the entire piece:

Stung by a series of setbacks on must-pass legislation, Democrats think they’ve found a culprit: local tea party influence in the home states of usually reliable moderates.

In a span of just a few days, Maine Republican Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe have forced Democrats to dramatically scale back an unemployment benefits and tax bill, and they were part of a small coalition that effectively killed a bank tax tucked into a major Wall Street overhaul bill.

Both senators are RINOS, both have supported huge deficits by allowing themselves to be sucked into a rush of "out of control" spending.

I think this is largely because they have misinterpreted the wishes and desires of the voters. They thought the people wanted to spend themselves into oblivion, all because they elected Barack Obama. As it turns out, Obama was only elected because he duped enough people to overcome the amount of conservatives, who stayed home--because they didn't like McCain. (They really showed us, didn't they?)

But if this article is to be believed, many are now finding out just how much the people are displeased with the way the country is being handled. More and more are becoming convinced that we are bordering on one of the worst depressions we may ever see in history. They are starting to see that you cannot spend money you don't have, to prevent it.

As a result of this displeasure, some of the politicians are beginning to see the power and force of a determined people.

My concern is that people like Olympia Snowe will perform a chameleon act once again if they are re-elected. It's not enough that she and her counterpart Susan Collins signed onto the leftist agenda in their votes on TARP, Stimulus, and Healthcare. I am wondering if they will now see the wind shifting and once again try to turn their sails in that direction long enough to ride it out. What I mean is, I fear they will go along with the Tea Party positions to get re-elected, the Tea Partiers will become complacent by thinking they have won the battle of ideas, and then the pols will begin their old habits once again.

The truth is, this is not just a commitment we must make for the 2010 and 2012 elections. We must make this a lifetime commitment.

We must restore common sense that we must all exercise in our own lives, in order to preserve the nation from complete collapse. We cannot keep spending money that we do not have, we must not allow politicians to persuade us that this is the route to solvency.

The Dems are going to mount a challenge in any way they can. Lies, innuendos, dirty tricks (like fake Tea party candidates) will all increase as November nears. But it is extremely important that we all stay focused and on message. Do not allow them to hijack the debates with distractions.

This is working for now, but there is much more work to do. Nothing ever comes easy, we must not allow ourselves to become complacent. The closer we get, the harder it will become.

Continue to march and do not forget:

Remember in November.