Black Lives Apparently Don't Matter to Democrats Who Use Them As Cannon Fodder in Pursuit of Power

America is being destroyed from within.  The Republic is being demolished by the Swamp, the borg of pernicious politicians, entrenched, politicized bureaucrats, media elites and academics who wield environmentalism and equity as truncheons to obliterate individual freedom, economic opportunity and the rule of law.  The recent episode of hypocrisy onMartha’s Vineyard demonstrates with crystal clarity the universe the elites of the Swamp create as they make laws that apply to peasants but no to the aristocracy.

Columns documenting the machinations of the Swamp are legion, but this is not one of them.  No, this piece is specifically about the destruction of the rule of law that the those elites have unleashed on said peasants, specifically as it relates to violent crime.

This past week New Orleans reclaimed the title of America’s deadliest city after seeing murders jump 141% over the last couple of years.  In New Orleans the murder rate is a staggering 52 per 100,000 people.  That compares to the national average of 6.9, the highest it’s been in a quarter century and the 50 per 100,000 of Venezuela, the most dangerous country in the world.

If New Orleans were an outlier it would be a shame, the fact that it’s not is a tragedy:  New York, Chicago, Portland, LA, San Francisco, Philadelphia and more. Big cities and small, crime is up across the country over the last two years, in most cases, dramatically.

We’ve always had crime in America.  Such is the price of freedom.  But what we are experiencing today is something altogether different.  It’s not just crime.  America can sometimes be a dangerous place.  Everyone knows working the midnight shift at a convenience store carries more risk than working the 9 AM shift at your local library, just as common sense tells you the odds of getting into a fight in a bar on a Saturday night are far higher than they are at church on Sunday morning.   

And just to be clear, this is not Antifa thugs and BLM cultists burning down cities.  Protest, even violent protest has been part of American history since its founding and largely is event driven like Shay’s Rebellion, the Vietnam War protests, or the riots after the killing of MLK or the acquittal of the police in the Rodney King video.

No, this is something different.  It’s one thing to rage against the machine, it’s another to commit violence against citizens, particularly when they are unsuspecting innocents or compliant victims.  And this is the issue today and we see it taking place across the county, from urban jungles like New York City to Midwestern communities like Salt Lake City.

What America’s experiencing today is exponentially worse than the typical crime that America is used to, and the truth is, most of it – but far from all of it – is being perpetuated by young black men, although increasingly, by young black women as well. 

Violence is being taken not only to a new level in terms of its frequency, but in the application as well. It’s not taking place in dark corners or deserted parking lots, but rather right in the middle of regular hustle and bustle of American’s daily lives.  It’s taking place in broad daylight, in full view of video cameras – often with others videoing the carnage to share on social media.  Violent, brutal crime is taking place on main street USA, in schools, drugstores, fast food restaurants, subway platforms, high end retail stores, and of course homes. 

We see large groups of young people blitzing stores and grabbing merchandise off shelves and running out with smiles on their faces.  We see “shoplifters” methodically clear store shelves of merchandise and simply stroll out the door, unconcerned about getting stopped or arrested and often assaulting employees along the way. 

What’s more, there’s an element of violence that seems unprecedented in its scale.  Almost daily we see random innocent people on subways or on stairs or in restaurants getting shoved or kicked or punched. We see fast food workers attacked as customers come over or around counters and spark mayhem.  We see bus drivers attacked and shop owners beaten and cops spit on. Indeed we see countless instances where robbers beat or shoot victims even after they have taken whatever they were after.  We also read daily of innocents of all ages killed in the crossfire while sleeping in their beds, standing in a bar or sitting in their cars. 

There also seems to be a racial element to this new crime wave with black perpetrators targeting a disproportionate number of white or Asian victims… but make no mistake, the single largest group of victims of this crime wave are black citizens. 

The question is, why is all of this this happening?  What is it that has caused an increasing number of black Americans to believe that they can rob and beat and even kill their fellow citizens with impunity? There are no doubt countless contributing factors, from missing fathers to failing schools to social media, but those problems (at least the first two) have existed for quite some time. No, the reason for the sharp jump in violent crime and unhinged behavior on the part of large numbers of primarily young black Americans is the Democrat proposition that everything bad that happens to blacks is a consequence of racism and as such, they’re not responsible for their choices and therefore they should not be held accountable for their actions.

Ronald Reagan once said, “If you want more of something, subsidize it…” and that is exactly what the Democrats have been doing with violent crime.  While they are not yet directly paying criminals to attack their fellow citizens and rob local businesses, they are subsidizing crime nonetheless.   

On the one hand George Soros backed Democrat prosecutors from coast to coast are demonstrating their pro criminal empowerment bonafides by refusing to seek bail for most arrestees, refusing to prosecute countless misdemeanors and simultaneously undercharging countless violent crimes as said misdemeanors. While on the other hand you have Democrats effectively decriminalizing an entire swath of crimes or eliminating bail for almost every offense.  Indeed, the lunatics running Illinois have just passed a law that eliminates bail for virtually every offense below 1^st degree murder and prohibits police from arresting or removing trespassers caught in the act of burglarizing a home or business.  That means that if someone breaks into your house in the middle of the night and you call the police, if you’re lucky enough given the Democrat “Defund the police movement” that they respond while the trespasser is still there, they are literally not allowed to remove them from your home…

All of this is happening exactly when America’s cultural and political elites are telling young black Americans that the system is rigged against them, that they’re incapable of succeeding when playing by the rules, that most white people hate them and if they break the law there are no consequences to be had.  That is literally a recipe for the collapse of society. 

Today in Democrat run America, it’s only the rights of criminals that matter, never the victims… and the fact is that most of the victims of this American renaissance of violence are, in fact, black Americans, the very people Democrats pretend to care about.  Democrats have leveraged the fictions of “systemic racism” and millions of “white supremacists” running around to accumulate power, and Americans of all races are paying the price.  But this is exactly what happens when politicians pursue policies of balkanization and victimization, setting groups of Americans against one another for the purposes of gaining power.  The Democrats thrive, their grifter partners thrive and America’s citizens suffer. 

America was founded on the principle that all men were created equal in the eyes of God and in the laws of man. While the execution of those truths have been imperfect from the beginning, it has consistently improved for over 200 years, bringing Americans freedom and prosperity unmatched in human history, and that includes black Americans, who make up fully 8% of American millionaires.  Democrats, in half a generation have undone 200 years of progress and created a violent cage match between demographics in the public square, and the result has been a body blow to civil society, mayhem in cities, and blood on the streets, and most of it black.  But somehow black America continues to vote Democrat in Stalin like numbers. Perhaps they should reconsider…

Commodus, Nero and the Punk Next Door, or at the Gas Station or in Walgreens...

From Madison reading Cato and Cicero when framing the Constitution to the outsized impact both Rome and America had on the world around them, the United States has long been associated with historical Rome.  There are great similarities, and there can be much to learn. 

When most of us think of the worst emperors Roman in history we think of names like Commodus, Nero, Caligula and Elagabalus.  To a man they were vain, self centered, bloodthirsty hedonists who took what they wanted and tortured and killed many thousands of Romans and provincials. 

All emperors, including the great ones like Augustus, Trajan and Aurelian had blood on their hands to one degree or another, but most tried to maintain or grow the empire.  Commodus et. al. didn’t.  Their goal was to satiate their lusts, whether literal lust, or gluttony or sadly, bloodlust.  While there were other bad emperors, these four are among the worst.    

What makes this relevant today is the fact that all four of these “men” were spoiled, pampered, entitled sadists who were given free reign when they were still essentially children.  Commodus was the oldest at 19, while Nero was 17 and Elagabalus and Caligula were both 16. 

They were overindulged brats who never faced consequences for their behavior.  They were given virtually anything they wanted, or just as often, allowed to take what they wanted with impunity. And it was at those ripe young ages they were literally given the keys to the kingdom and unleashed on the Empire and virtually everyone in it suffered as a result.

Every day in America we see modern day Commoduses or Caligulas wreaking havoc on our streets and in our stores, restaurants, schools and more.  Instead of a single entitled Emperor, America in 2022 is being ravaged by a generation of young men – many of whom have grown up fatherless – who have been told that they can do and say anything they want and that regardless of what they do, there will be no consequences for them. 

Just as Elagabalus et al brought nothing but blood, despair and dysfunction to the Empire, these 21^st century youth are bringing blood, despair and destruction to America. A generation of Americans has grown up being given “time outs”, “participation trophies” and grades that have nothing to do with actual academic success, while at the same time they’ve been told that all inequality is due to racism or sexism or homophobia or anything other than individual choices or actions.  The consequence of this indoctrination is that far too many young Americans think they can do anything with impunity.  If they want something they take it. If they’re mad about something they protest, disrupt the lives of everyone within shouting distance and frequently riot.   They assault, rape and sometimes even murder, increasingly with impunity. 

Pat Moynihan predicted much of this 60 years ago in his “The Negro Family: The Case for National Action."  In it he “…described through pages of disquieting charts and graphs, the emergence of a “tangle of pathology,” including delinquency, joblessness, school failure, crime, and fatherlessness that characterized ghetto—or what would come to be called underclass—behavior.” 

While most of the scenes of flash mobs, carjackings, Knock Out Game punches, subway shovings and daily shootings involve black male youth, this is not a race issue.  Yes, the problem is disproportionately black, but white and Hispanic America is increasingly experiencing the same challenges of unwed mothers, school failures and the lack of responsibility that underpins much of the dysfunction.  Whether a California college student getting 6 months for rape, a Texas boy getting no jail time for killing four people in a car crash or charges being dropped against a South Carolina boy for killing someone in a boat crash, unaccountable America spans across races, wealth, and indeed the country itself.  This is nowhere better demonstrated than by the legions of rioters who participated in the “peaceful protests” of 2020 who found their charges dropped or their bails funded by the glitterati.   

These unrestrained youth highlight the existential threats to America today:  The lack of accountability and individual responsibility.  To the degree that America’s leaders have spent more than a generation telling youth they’re nothing more than products of others’ malevolent thoughts and actions and are not responsible for their own actions, they shouldn’t be surprised at the carnage we see across the country.  To the degree that single mothers and schools and increasingly DAs across the country are not holding youth accountable for their transgressions, they should not be surprised by the blood on their streets, the boarded up shops in their neighborhoods and the flight of families seeking safety and security. 

Since its beginning America has been a nation governed by the Rule of Law as opposed to the Rule of Man. Imperfect and sometimes unequal in its application, America’s Constitution has successfully guided the behavior of government (mostly) for more than two centuries and in doing so guaranteed citizens freedom and the prosperity freedom cultivates.  But that framework only works when citizens feel confident that justice and the laws are applied equally, or mostly so. When citizens begin to recognize Orwell’s “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others" in their daily lives and on their streets and on their television screens, the civilization’s days are numbered.  Which is exactly what Americans are seeing today…

Nero, Elagabalus and the rest of that youthful cohort showcase exactly what happens when young men learn that accountability doesn’t apply to them.  When people aren’t held responsible for their actions, many will act accordingly, without restraints, unleashing a torrent of violence, excess and depravity that tears at the fabric of a civilized society. 

Which is exactly where America is in 2022.  If the country remains on its current path, one of coddling youth and ever increasing cries of victimhood combined with the acceptance of rampant crime, ubiquitous homelessness and public drug abuse as the price of addressing “inequality”, it will lead to an acceleration of the breakdown of civilization.  As more citizens feel like they cannot rely on government to provide security and enforce societal norms, they will increasingly take matters into their own hands. They will look for vigilantes like a Charles Bronson character to step into the gap, or more likely, many will choose to arm themselves as they increasingly feel they need to become the next Bernhard Goetz. But 2022 America is not 1994 New York… indeed it’s worse.  Thugs are bolder, crimes are more widespread, and most of all, today everyone feels vulnerable because they see videos of horrific crimes every single day, often in the parking lots of stores they frequent, at the gas stations where they fill up or in the subways they ride every day.  That’s a powder keg filled with 100 million armed Americans who are tired and frustrated and feel let down by a government that no longer cares about them.   

Unlike the citizens of the Roman Empire, who were often stuck with whichever murderous psychopath emerged from the carnage to don the purple, Americans have an opportunity to guide their own society in ways that don’t involve assassination or subterfuge or armies marching against one another. We have the ballot box. We have recall petitions.  We have school board meetings and the right to peacefully protest – or at least we used to.  But… will the political and “elite” establishment listen, or will they continue to turn a blind eye to the calls for a return to a civilized society? Blood is already spilling.  The question is, will we get less of it or more?  The ideal is less.  But if the answer is more, the question becomes, whose will it be?  And who will do the spilling? 

The Mouse that Roared: Covid 19 and the Collapse of Freedom

Suggestions that Americans get the vaccine are endless.  That’s understandable.  The vaccines appear to work in helping to reduce the likelihood of contracting Covid.  People see that there is a possibility to stop the spread of a deadly virus and they want to encourage others to participate. 

What’s not understandable are the relentless demands and the push for vaccine mandates.  Do it for your fellow Americans!  Real patriotism is getting the vaccine!  Don’t you care about your family?  These are all intended to shame the unvaccinated into getting the shot.  And if those don’t work, there are the mandates.

We’ve been told that mandates are necessary because the unvaccinated are putting others at risk.  That of course makes no sense because anyone who is concerned with contracting Covid and wants to get the vaccine can, and for free.  Those in the high risk category can also take other measures to try and ameliorate the threat such as staying home or wearing masks. 

More recently we’re told that mandates are necessary to protect hospitals from being overwhelmed by Covid patients, most of whom apparently are unvaccinated.  That may indeed be true, but overall numbers are down substantially across the country.  To put this in perspective, on January 8^th of this year new daily cases were 304,000 and deaths 3,995.  On August 10^th the number of new cases was 144,635 yet deaths were 715.  The former is a decline of approximately 53% while the latter is a decline of 83%. So there may indeed be a surge, but it’s a far from what the nation and hospitals were facing just six months ago. It appears to be the case that the Delta variant may be more contagious than the original, but it’s also far less deadly as well.

One last element mandate advocates use is coercion.  “Any unvaccinated person who gets Covid will be turned away from hospitals to free up space for the vaccinated who might get it.”  Given that we’re told hospitals are overwhelmed, one can see how that might sound logical… Only those who have taken the vaccine should be treated with the limited valuable resources available. 

As we’re constantly told, such valuable resources are frequently limited, so that logic should be extended. Hospitals should also begin turning away gay men who contracted AIDS from unprotected sex, IV users who contracted AIDS from sharing needles, drunk drivers who got into accidents, lung cancer patients who smoked, liver disease patients who drank alcohol, heart disease patients who ate too many burgers and wings and surfers bitten by sharks, among others.

But the mandate advocates would never go for any of those things.  It’s a “privacy” thing, of course.  Even though AIDS, heart disease and lung cancer are far more deadly than Covid, mandates to ameliorate them are verboten. 

And how deadly is Covid? According to the CDC, an estimated 120 million Americans have contracted Covid in the last year and a half with 6.2 million hospitalizations and 767,000 deaths.  That means that out of 120 million people infected with Covid, 99.36% of them survived.  And lest someone think Covid is striking down healthy Americans in their prime, 31.8% of Covid deaths occurred in Americans over 85 years of age, 60% over the age of 75 and fully 81% above 65 years.  Not only is it age, but health that correlate with Covid deaths… The CDC states that 94% of Covid deaths occurred in patients who had underlying medical conditions such as diabetes, respiratory failure, heart failure and obesity. 

So what we have is a virus that kills 0.63% of the people who contract it, 94% of whom had underlying conditions and the average age was 75 while the average American life expectancy is 79. And that assumes that 100% of the 767,000 people died OF Covid rather than just WITH Covid, which is very unlikely.

And this is where we find ourselves today… in a nation of almost 350 million people, where 2.8 million people die every year, where 7,600 people die every day of all causes, Americans are being forced to take an experimental vaccine for a virus for which they have a 99.36% chance of surviving if they catch it at all, and virtually 100% chance if they don’t have some potentially fatal underlying condition or are below 65. 

But we’re told the new danger is the Delta variant, which is more contagious.  Of course what we’re not told is that the Delta variant also seems to be less deadly although the vaccines are apparently less effective against it.  So now, because a virus that is less deadly than one that kills 0.63% of the people who contract it, Americans are now being forced to sacrifice their liberties and compelled to take an experimental vaccine or lose their jobs, lose their ability to go to school or their ability to essentially operate in normal society.

The mask mandates are nothing more than a power play by Democrats to control the nation and solidify their position for decades to come.  We saw what they were able to do in 2020 after a year of keeping Americans focused on a virus that fewer than 1 out of 450 might succumb to.  That hyperbole allowed them to crush small businesses, hook millions on the cancerous drug of government handouts and eviscerate the social fabric of communities via closed churches, shuttered schools and bankrupt businesses.  Of course the culmination of the control was the fraudulent election and the installation of Joe Biden as emperor. 

Now that the reality of the abject failure of the Biden administration is becoming clear and the negative consequences that disaster would logically have on Democrat candidates in 2022, the Delta variant – soon to be followed by the Lambda variant – will be the tool with which Democrats maintain their power.  The “danger” will be hyped to keep kids in masks, demand vaccinations, cripple businesses and potentially implement martial law like restrictions on those who refuse to comply.  Once the population is cowed into acquiescence, next will come a series of Rube Goldberg voting rules ostensibly intended to make voting safer, but in reality acting as Democrat vote replicators. 

Covid 19 may yet prove to be the single deadliest virus in history.  Not because it kills more people directly, but because it destroyed the greatest Republic in human history and with it went the freedom and opportunity that fueled everything from splitting the atom to men on the moon to a worldwide level of prosperity never before seen.  The absence of that Republic portends ill for much of the world that relied on it for security, trade and pursuit of freedom. In the 20^th Century Communism and Fascism killed at least 125 million people, and that was with the United States acting as a contravening force.  One can’t help but wonder what the 21^st century bodycount will be once the United States is no longer able to play that role. 

Divide and Conquer: Democrats Turn Americans Against One Another in Naked Pursuit of Power

Evidence of civil war has been playing out in the streets of America for the last year; the reality is it’s been percolating for decades. From the 1999 WTO protests to the hordes calling George Bush a Nazi to Occupy Wall Street, the hyperbole and violence have been ratcheting up for years.

The catalyst that put us on the path to today was the nomination of Barack Obama. Not because of Obama himself, but rather because of the cudgel Democrats crafted from his race. Anyone who opposed Obama’s policies was racist. Suddenly, conservatives who reiterated policies they’d supported for decades were racists as was anyone who opposed Democrat policies.

But race was only the beginning. If you opposed gay marriage: Homophobic. Opposed women in combat:  Sexist. Supported the police:  Fascist.

Such was the beginning of the journey that brings us to America circa 2021.  Today you’re either on the side of angels or the side of Hitler. There’s no middle ground. George Washington was a slave-owning racist and nothing else matters. Michael Brown and George Floyd were innocent victims of racist cops. Period. All women should be believed… unless they accuse Democrats. There are an infinite number of genders. Clearly.  America is systemically racist and any evidence to the contrary is fiction. "Border wall" is a dog whistle for white nationalists.

The reality is, there are racists among us.  So too sexists, homophobes and fascists. There are also bad cops, sexual predators, and evil people. But here’s the thing: Most Americans are none of those. It wouldn’t be possible to build the free, thriving, diverse and prosperous nation America so recently was if they were. If America were systemically racist, we’d never have had a black president: many of the most popular and highest earning entertainers wouldn’t be black; Asian Americans wouldn’t make up 40% or more of the student body at some of America’s best colleges; and minorities wouldn’t own 30% of businesses.

But of course, none of that matters to Democrats. The only thing that matters is setting Americans against one another via victimization and leveraging that conflict for power.

But here’s the other thing about all of this: There’s not an American alive today who can’t claim victim status for one thing or another. If you’re black, you’ll undoubtedly encounter racists. If you’re short you’ve likely been the butt of short jokes, while if you’re 7’ tall “How’s the weather up there?” is a ritual greeting.  Beautiful women are taken for dumb while rich men are in the IRS crosshairs. Fat people or ugly people often find themselves ostracized or worse. An Asian might be expected to be good in math while gays no doubt have heard countless whispers that communicate disapproval or disdain.

The point is, if someone wants to see themselves as a victim, they can… every time. But that’s not traditionally what Americans do. In early 20th century America, when Jim Crow reigned in the south and redlines crisscrossed the country, black Americans moved to places like Harlem and Chicago’s south side and built thriving communities. In the latter half of the 19th century, two million Irish came to America and, despite facing extraordinary hatred, built successful communities. Millions of Jews came at the turn of the century and despite virulent anti-Semitism built a pantheon of successful businesses. Chinese, Vietnamese and Mexican immigrants had similar experiences. And up until the 1970s there were places where women weren’t allowed to get credit cards or open bank accounts without their husbands’ signatures!

Virtually every American alive today can point to some injustice in their lives or those of their ancestors that they could use to paint themselves as victims. But again, historically Americans have not done that. In fact, American history is a story of a people, a diverse mix of people really, overcoming extraordinary adversity and pulling themselves up by their bootstraps to build a nation out of a sparsely populated continent and, in the process, changing the world for the better in virtually every area of culture, charity, science, commerce and, of course, freedom.

That is the story of America. Americans, largely (but not exclusively) white males, built a nation unlike anything the world has ever seen. Americans, again, largely white men, but not exclusively so, united to save the world from self-destruction in two hot wars and one cold. Americans, largely white men, but not exclusively, put men on the moon. Along the way, they invented television, air conditioning, movies, mobile phones, safety elevators, the Internet, the iPhone, the Pet Rock and, sadly, Facebook.

A nation made up of imperfect men and women, in the short expanse of two centuries, has created prosperity unlike anything the world has ever seen. It’s not perfect -- at times it’s even been ugly -- but for the most part, it’s been spectacular. Not for everyone, and not all the time, but for most people of every race, creed, and color, America has been a Godsend.

Not sure about that?  Would black Americans be better off moving back to Africa? Would Italian Americans be better off moving back to Italy? Chinese to China? Mexicans to Mexico? Iranian Americans back to Iran? The answer is likely no in almost every instance.

But again, none of that matters to Democrats. America’s greatness doesn’t matter.  America’s freedom and prosperity don’t matter to Democrats. What matters to Democrats is raw power. The proof is easy to see and can be found in the fealty black Americans pay to the Democrat party. Democrats don’t care about black Americans, but use their votes to get and maintain power. For 50 years Democrats have had a stranglehold on the black vote, and what they’ve done with that power shows exactly how much they value the lives of black Americans. Not much…

And that’s the template for the Democrats’ endgame: Divide and conquer. By seeking to turn every American into a victim, by seeking to demonize the group that played the single biggest role in building the nation that we inhabit today (white males – because of numbers, not because of DNA or some special gift from God), Democrats are seeking to build a coalition of us vs. them, where the “us” is characterized by victimhood and the “them” are evil incarnate in the form of white males.

The beauty of that plan is that, when literally every single person can point to something today or two decades ago or two centuries ago that constitutes a slight or injustice to be rectified, the pool of potential soldiers is bottomless and all that’s necessary is a promise of salvation. Army not big enough? Craft a few more victim narrative promises of salvation and presto, more soldiers.

But the consequence of those votes will be anything but salvation. Once they set the entire population at war against itself, Democrats will step in to pick up the pieces and their literal death grip on power will bring the end of individual liberty, limited government and in time, the Republic itself. And with it will go the prosperity that gave so many Democrats the luxury of focusing on our differences and fabricating victimhood in the first place. Caveat emptor.

HR 1 and Why Election Integrity Matters…

 If you’ve ever read Lord of the Flies, The Rise and the Fall of the Third Reich or 1984, you understand the threat to life and limb that unrestrained power can be.  Lord Acton distilled the danger down to a simple phrase:  “Absolute power corrupts absolutely”.

Our Founding Fathers knew that, which is why they crafted for us the greatest document ever written by men.  The Constitution they gave us had built into it a variety of checks and balances on government or any branch of government accumulating too much power.  They gave us the Connecticut Compromise, which balanced representation between large and small states, with two Senators elected from each state and Congressmen being elected based on population.  They gave us the Legislature which passes laws and the Executive which implements them.  And most of all, they gave us the Massachusetts Compromise, which created the ultimate check on government power, the Bill of Rights, an explicit articulation of individual rights that could not be infringed upon by government.  Finally, in what was likely the most groundbreaking element of any constitution ever written, the Founding Fathers explicitly limited the powers of the government with the 9^th and 10^th Amendments, the former stating that the enumeration of certain rights did not preclude the existence of others not addressed, while the latter stated that the federal government had only those powers given and any not given to it were reserved for states or the people.

Extraordinary students of history and men, Madison, Adams, Franklin, et. al. understood the nature of man and built a Constitution specifically crafted to counter that nature. It wasn’t a perfect document – and had a tool for addressing imperfections built into it – but it largely worked well for 233 years and allowed the United States to develop into the strongest and most powerful nation in the history of mankind.

Specifically their Constitution worked because it was – by design – insulated from the passions of men.  The staggered six year terms of the Senate was to balance out the biennial elections in the House – and Senators were appointed by states while Congressmen were elected by the people.  Presidents were elected every four years and Justices were appointed for life.  And the government was explicitly limited to what they could do.

Incredibly, while they knew nothing about cars or televisions or mobile phones or the Internet, the mechanisms they put in place largely survived as the march of time progressed. But for all of their familiarity with the dark sides of man’s nature, even the Founding Fathers, possibly the greatest assembly of men to ever come together in history, couldn’t foresee the darkness that lay ahead with the Democrat party of the 21^st century. 

Today America sits and watches as Democrats essentially send the Constitution through the shredder.  Emboldened by a pusillanimous Supreme Court, Democrats today – with HR 1 – seek to undermine the very foundation upon which that Constitution is based:  voting integrity by the governed.  They seek to codify arrangements that are by their very nature intended to eviscerate the notion of vote integrity.  Voter ID:  Eliminated.  Mail in voting:  Mandated.  Maintenance of accurate voter rolls:  Outlawed.  Same day registration:  Required.  Ballot harvesting:  Allowed.  These and much more are to be codified by HR 1, with the goal of giving Democrats end to end control over voting in the United States.  Once in control of voting they will control every branch and every element of the federal government in perpetuity.  And given that they back a regulatory state that never met a freedom it didn’t want to regulate, they will control every aspect of the lives of formerly free Americans. 

And that will be the end of America as we know it.  Entrepreneurial innovation?  Gone unless the mission furthers the green or “justice” themes of Democrats.  Educational freedom? Access to and success within will be predicated on a willingness to muzzle any thoughts or words that fall outside of whatever is currently deemed as acceptable.  Virtually everything, from sports to medicine to science to literature to media to the Internet to your very job, will become nothing more than vehicles for establishing one’s acquiescence to the left’s diktats, whether as regulated by Democrats or enforced by their fellow travelers seemingly everywhere from academia, the media and increasingly, big business.  

For more than two centuries Americans suffered through periods of government overreach, incompetence, malice and outright failure because they understood that they had the ultimate hand in dictating how government is run and that they would have the opportunity to make a change for the better via the voting booth.  Voting and elections were chaotic, exasperating and sometimes frustrating, but we largely accepted them because they were seen as a legitimate reflection of the public’s voice.

With HR 1 the Democrats are disemboweling election integrity, sullying the sanctity of the voting booth and most importantly, undermining Americans’ confidence that they control their own government and by extension, their own destinies.  The Constitution works only because people have confidence in its workings and their role in it.  Sadly, Democrats may find out too late that a citizenry who no longer have confidence that their government answers to them may decide to defy that government and seek to establish their own order.  It would be apropos – albeit sad for the world – if the very schemes Democrats put in place to try and guarantee their grip on power over a citizenry they disdain were the very schemes that caused that same citizenry to overthrow the system Democrats perverted to control them in the first place and replaced it with something one might see on an unnamed island in the South Pacific… My guess is the party worried about mean tweets, racist pancake syrup and offensive children’s books won’t thrive under the new system. 

Why America is on the Brink of Civil War...

If you’d have asked me even six months ago what the chances of the United States being on the verge of a civil war I would have said probably under 1%. Today I think that number is much closer to 25% and maybe even higher.

Why is that? Simple. Democrats, media and academia…

I grew up on the Navy base on Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. It was a small base but there were a million things to do. Horseback riding, year round sports, a bowling alley, four pools that I can remember, game rooms, gyms, motocross, hiking, scuba diving, surfing, half a dozen outdoor movie theaters – it almost never rained! - karate tournaments and spectacular parades and midways for 4th of July. Cable TV hadn’t reached us and of course the Internet hadn’t been invented so we spent our time actually doing things… I loved virtually every minute of it, but despite being in something close to nirvana, there were people who hated it and were miserable.  We find what we're looking for.   

We often get out of life what we are expecting... are you a glass half full or a glass half empty person?  This question explains why America is at the brink of civil war.

We look around and see people burning down our cities, destroying public and private property, disrupting life for millions of Americans who are simply trying to go to work, eat their lunch or shop at a mall. We see people chanting “F the Police”, “No justice, No Peace” holding up “Black Lives Mater” signs and calling everyone and anyone who doesn’t agree with them racists. We see in New York, LA and countless other cities thugs shooting cops, beating civilians and feeling entitled to do so the whole time.

How did we get here? Very simple. We’ve had decades of the Democrat / Media / Academia Industrial Complex telling Americans that the country is racist. That Republicans don’t care about the poor. That Christians are homophobic. That whites have privilege. That America is rife with systematic racism. That cops hunt down and kill unarmed innocent black males with impunity. And of course that if you are a person of color you have no control over your life and the system will not allow you to succeed, regardless of the hard work you put in, the education you achieve or the virtuous life you lead.  In essence they have been proffering the notion that not only is the glass half empty... but that the other guy took your glass and poured half your water into his glass and then poisoned what's left in yours.  

It is upon this decade’s long backdrop of despicable lies that the same group, along with the Obama holdovers in DOJ, has spent the last four years telling us that Donald Trump is a racist bigot. That Donald Trump was bought and paid for by Russia. That Donald Trump is guilty of abuse of power with respect to Ukraine. That Donald Trump is a power hungry fascist who seeks to make himself king by stealing the election and disenfranchising minority voters.

Of course, none of those things are true. None of them. But that has not stopped the media, academia and the Democrats from shilling each of them, repeatedly. And the result is, you have young people – mostly young, but not all by any stretch – who today see exactly what they have been told to see, exactly what they expect to see. If you are told that you can’t succeed regardless of the life you lead, regardless of the hard work you do, then it’s not unexpected that you would want to tear down the system that has boxed you in.

The fact that all of the bile that the Democrats have been spewing for decades is not true is of no consequence. The fact that the media blatantly paints a picture that is demonstrably false 24 hours a day, seven days a week is of no consequence. The fact that leftist hack academics have rewritten American history through the perspective of their 21st century woke lenses, is of no consequence. The only thing that is of consequence is power… Democrat power. Nothing else matters. As such, if burning down cities is the cost of power, so be it. If putting targets on the backs of police is the cost of power, so be it. If undermining the basic elements of common courtesy, politeness and civic order are the cost of power, so be it. If destroying the life's work of shopkeepers and the jobs of workers trying to provide for their families are the cost of power, so be it.

What you are seeing in the streets is not protest, peaceful or otherwise. What America is experiencing is the beginning of a civil war, only one side has not yet awoken to the fact that it is involved in one. Civil wars don’t have to last long nor be bloody, but they can be, and this one might be. But it doesn’t have to be. Stopping it will take no only a firm response by police and the government, but more importantly in the long run, it means expunging from academia the anti-American fascists who have been rewriting American history as a march through hate and oppression and racism. It means discrediting and marginalizing the manipulative media cabal that proffers the “blame America first” or “America is racist” fictions as they seek to drive up temperatures. Finally it will take a party, whether it’s the GOP or some new entity, that finally stands up for the United States and embraces its history, both good and bad. They must be willing to recognize that America is indeed an imperfect place, as it has been since its founding, but that it gets better decade after decade and has done more to advance the condition of mankind than any nation in human history. They must know and be willing to say that the United States is the greatest nation in the history of human civilization and that there is more freedom here, more opportunities here and more prosperity here than anywhere on the planet. That with hard work one can make a better life for himself, for his family and his community.

Imagine what a country could do if those were the ideas that young people were being exposed to every day. Imagine if they expected to succeed… if they expected to be treated fairly… if they had gratitude for our freedoms and what others sacrificed to give it to them. Imagine they understood they are living in a time and place most people in history would have traded their souls for and millions of people risk their lives for every year.

Tell young people their lives aren't theirs, they can't succeed and racism is everywhere and they will believe it find it around every corner.  Tell them racism and other evils exist, but they live in the land of opportunity and their success is in their hands and they will succeed despite the roadblocks.   Couple that glass half full on steroids mindset with America’s bounty and the opportunities are infinite.

The Profound Rush Limbaugh: ”Have you ever noticed how under capitalism the rich become powerful, and under socialism the powerful become rich?

Love him or hate him, there is no debate about the fact that Rush Limbaugh is a genius. Last week he said the following:

”Have you ever noticed how under capitalism the rich become powerful, and under socialism the powerful become rich? It's amazing when you look at it that way. Under capitalism, the rich become powerful. Under socialism, the powerful get rich. They exploit others. They get rich by taking from others, by using their power. In capitalism, the rich become powerful. It's a minor little distinction. It's one of those little pithy bullet points that is just shy of a profundity.”

I have to disagree with Rush slightly… that statement is indeed profound. Although he characterizes it as a minor little distinction for rhetorical purposes, his context demonstrates exactly how significant it really is.

When you think about it, on the most basic level, it makes perfect sense. In socialist, communist and fascist countries, despite the egalitarian rhetoric, invariably it is the people who control the infrastructure of the state who end up with the biggest bank accounts and grandest (relative) lifesyles. They decide who can do what jobs, who can get what permits, who can open up what businesses. Given that the state controls the avenues through which so much of life runs, is it any wonder that corruption is often rampant? Is it any wonder that while Muscovites were looking for food on barren supermarket shelves Brezhnev gorged himself at his Jurmala dacha? Or is it much of a surprise that while Mugabe has turned Zimbabwe into one of the poorest countries in the world he has accumulated billions of dollars in personal wealth? It comes as no shock that to get anything done in Mexico takes the greasing of palms of government officials all along the way. The reality is, when government controls most aspects of life, from the major to minutiae, they get to decide who is successful and who is not, and often they choose themselves their friends and their families.

Of course everyone wants success, but the difference between state control and free markets is who gets to decide what constitutes success and who gets to enjoy its fruits. With state control it’s the bureaucrats who get to decide while in free markets it is the citizens. One can quickly guess which produced "green" cars no one wants, a healthcare system that doesn’t work or a tax code so complex even its authors can't understand it. 

You may hate Wal-Mart, but no one ever forced you to shop there. Wal-Mart became a half a trillion dollar behemoth not by forcing customers to come into their stores, but rather by advertising what they were willing to sell and for how much. People willingly walk into their stores and voluntarily exchange their hard earned dollars for Wal-Mart’s goods. You may have heard that JD Rockefeller was a “son of a bitch” businessman, and you’d be right. But he earned his money by standardizing the industry and lowering prices on kerosene, gasoline, and a wide variety of other petroleum products as well. Although competitors were sometimes mad, consumers and the economy benefited dramatically. The success of Standard Oil was based on selling products to willing consumers, not on government redistribution. The same holds true today for Intel, Apple and Frito Lay, just as it did for others like Sears and Roebuck, Gillette and Howard Johnson a century ago.

In the United States numerous rich businessmen have converted their success into power. The Koch brothers come to mind. So too does George Soros and Michael Bloomberg. But the difference is, what those guys are selling, we don’t have to buy.

While the US may still ostensibly be a capitalist system, how long that will last is open for debate. Today we are rapidly becoming a command and control socialist country with Washington as the vortex. Government tells you what kinds of bulbs you can buy, who you have to rent your house to and how you can use your property among other things. It takes the money you worked for and uses it to give phones, EBT cards and birth control pills to those who didn’t. Basically Washington has the power, and now it has the money too. The Washington DC area now has 6 of the 10 richest counties in the country. Out of 3,100 counties in the US, 6 of the 10 richest in the Washington DC Metro area! To put that in perspective, Occupy Wall Street was worried about the country being run by the richest 1%. Those 1% guys are pikers, in reality the country is run by .0019% richest, and they live in Washington.

And why does money flow to Washington?  Simple.  That’s where the power is. Because that's where the laws and regulations that restrict your freedom come from. Washington’s bureaucrats don’t solicit explicit bribes like they do in third world countries… but then they don’t have to. They earn twice what private sector workers do, have virtual lifetime employment, and have the "respect" that comes from having the power to destroy a business or an industry with a stoke of a pen. As a result, while some companies spend money in Washington seeking to suckle at the public teat, (defense, agribusiness and green energy industries come to mind) most firms today spend their money on lobbyists not to get dollars from government, but rather to influence legislation and regulations so that they can simply survive.

Capitalism is not yet completely dead in America. Thankfully guys like Mark Zuckerberg, Simon Cowell, Sean Combs and lots of other people whose names we’ll never know are able to create businesses that earn them millions or billions of dollars without stealing a single dollar from any one of us or eviscerating one iota of our freedom. But one has to wonder how long that will last. Today there are 92 million adults in the United States who are not working. From unemployment benefits that last for years to welfare programs that create lifelong wards of the state to regulations and taxes that disincentivize work, one has to wonder what the real agenda of Washington is. Is it to see a resurgent private sector where more Americans can support themselves and their families without government help, thereby inducing a reduction in the size of the army of bureaucrats and lobbyists? Or is it to slowly strangle capitalism so that more and more jobs and lives look to Washington for their preservation, which in turn means bigger government, more lobbyists and of course more money for Washington.

With Mark Zuckerberg getting rich off of us and our data, it’s an even exchange in that we have a free choice in deciding how much of that data we’re willing to exchange. If we don’t like it we can simply delete our Facebook accounts. However, when the Washington establishment uses the police power of government to get rich off of us, we have no options, we can’t simply choose to not pay taxes or simply start another business without Washington’s interference. It’s not possible. What we can do however is work fewer hours, shut down our businesses or take the path that more and more Americans are taking every day; to simply give up working altogether and look to Washington for our every need. My guess is that Rush would probably say that is exactly what the left's agenda is. And as usual he would be right.