Showing posts with label GEORGIA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label GEORGIA. Show all posts
Fwd: a sobering read - Bill
Curator Note: First Left-wing forward I've seen in a long time. Had to share.
On Apr 28, 2020, at 9:34 AM, wrote:
Another sobering look at our situation. We must do all we can to assure Trump is not re-elected.
From one of my Emory classmates.
-On Apr 27, 2020, at 6:45 PM, wrote:
Subject: a really good editorial from the Irish Times......
Fintan O’Toole: Donald Trump has destroyed the country he promised to make great again
The world has loved, hated and envied the US. Now, for the first time, we pity it
April 25, 2020
By Fintan O'Toole
Over more than two centuries, the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the US until now: pity.
However bad things are for most other rich democracies, it is hard not to feel sorry for Americans. Most of them did not vote for Donald Trump in 2016. Yet they are locked down with a malignant narcissist who, instead of protecting his people from Covid-19, has amplified its lethality. The country Trump promised to make great again has never in its history seemed so pitiful.
Will American prestige ever recover from this shameful episode? The US went into the coronavirus crisis with immense advantages: precious
weeks of warning about what was coming, the world's best concentration of medical and scientific expertise, effectively limitless financial
resources, a military complex with stunning logistical capacity and most of the world's leading technology corporations. Yet it managed to
make itself the global epicentre of the pandemic.
As the American writer George Packer puts it in the current edition of the Atlantic, "The United States reacted ... like Pakistan or Belarus - e and a dysfunctional government whose leaders were too corrupt or stupid to head off mass suffering."
It is one thing to be powerless in the face of a natural disaster, quite another to watch vast power being squandered in real time - willfully, malevolently, vindictively. It is one thing for governments to fail (as, in one degree or another, most governments did), quite another to watch a ruler and his supporters actively spread a deadly
virus. Trump, his party and Rupert Murdoch's Fox News became vectors of the pestilence.
The grotesque spectacle of the president openly inciting people (some of them armed) to take to the streets to oppose the restrictions that save lives is the manifestation of a political death wish. What are
supposed to be daily briefings on the crisis, demonstrative of national unity in the face of a shared challenge, have been used by Trump merely
to sow confusion and division. They provide a recurring horror show in which all the neuroses that haunt the American subconscious dance naked
on live TV.
If the plague is a test, its ruling political nexus ensured that the US would fail it at a terrible cost in human lives. In the process, the idea of the US as the world's leading nation - an idea that has shaped
the past century - has all but evaporated.
Other than the Trump impersonator Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, who is now looking to the US as the exemplar of anything other than what not to
do? How many people in Duesseldorf or Dublin are wishing they lived in Detroit or Dallas?
It is hard to remember now but, even in 2017, when Trump took office, the conventional wisdom in the US was that the Republican Party and the
broader framework of US political institutions would prevent him from doing too much damage. This was always a delusion, but the pandemic has
exposed it in the most savage ways.
Abject surrender. What used to be called mainstream conservatism has not absorbed Trump - he has absorbed it. Almost the entire right-wing half of American politics has surrendered abjectly to him. It has sacrificed on the altar of wanton stupidity the most basic ideas of responsibility, care and even safety.
Thus, even at the very end of March, 15 Republican governors had failed to order people to stay at home or to close non-essential businesses. In Alabama, for example, it was not until April 3rd that governor Kay Ivey finally issued a stay-at-home order.
In Florida, the state with the highest concentration of elderly people with underlying conditions, governor Ron DeSantis, a Trump mini-me, kept the beach resorts open to students traveling from all over the US for spring break parties. Even on April 1st, when he issued restrictions, DeSantis exempted religious services and "recreational activities".
Georgia governor Brian Kemp, when he finally issued a stay-at-home order on April 1st, explained: "We didn't know that [the virus can be spread by people without symptoms] until the last 24 hours."
This is not mere ignorance - it is deliberate and homicidal stupidity. There is, as the demonstrations this week in US cities have shown, plenty of political mileage in denying the reality of the pandemic. It is fueled by Fox News and far-right internet sites, and it reaps for these politicians millions of dollars in donations, mostly (in an ugly
irony) from older people who are most vulnerable to the coronavirus.
It draws on a concoction of conspiracy theories, hatred of science, paranoia about the "deep state" and religious providentialism (God will protect the good folks) that is now very deeply infused in the mindset of the American right.
Trump embodies and enacts this mindset, but he did not invent it. The US response to the coronavirus crisis has been paralyzed by a contradiction that the Republicans have inserted into the heart of US
democracy. On the one hand, they want to control all the levers of governmental power. On the other they have created a popular base by intent is innately evil and must not be trusted.
The contradiction was made manifest in two of Trump's statements on the pandemic: on the one hand that he has "total authority", and on the
other that "I don't take responsibility at all". Caught between authoritarian and anarchic impulses, he is incapable of coherence.
Fertile ground. But this is not just Donald Trump. The crisis has shown definitively that Trump's presidency is not an aberration. It has grown on soil long prepared to receive it. The monstrous blossoming of misrule has structure and purpose and strategy behind it.
There are very powerful interests who demand "freedom" in order to do as they like with the environment, society and the economy. They have
infused a very large part of American culture with the belief that "freedom" is literally more important than life. My freedom to own assault weapons trumps your right not to get shot at school. Now, my
freedom to go to the barber ("I Need a Haircut" read one banner this week in St Paul, Minnesota) trumps your need to avoid infection.
Usually when this kind of outlandish idiocy is displaying itself, there is the comforting thought that, if things were really serious, it would
all stop. People would sober up. Instead, a large part of the US has hit the bottle even harder.
And the president, his party and their media allies keep supplying the drinks. There has been no moment of truth, no shock of realization that
the antics have to end. No one of any substance on the US right has stepped in to say: get a grip, people are dying here.
That is the mark of how deep the trouble is for the US - it is not just that Trump has treated the crisis merely as a way to feed tribal hatreds but that this behavior has become normalized. When the freak
show is live on TV every evening, and the star is boasting about his ratings, it is not really a freak show any more. For a very large and solid bloc of Americans, it is reality.
And this will get worse before it gets better. Trump has at least eight more months in power. In his inaugural address in 2017, he evoked "American carnage" and promised to make it stop. But now that the real carnage has arrived, he is reveling in it. He is in his element.
As things get worse, he will pump more hatred and falsehood, more death-wish defiance of reason and decency, into the groundwater. If a new administration succeeds him in 2021, it will have to clean up the toxic dump he leaves behind. If he is re-elected, toxicity will have become the lifeblood of American politics.
Either way, it will be a long time before the rest of the world can imagine America being great again.
Fw: Fwd: Cute little guy and some statistics; thought provoking
This RW FWD: is an updated version of this submission already in the archives.
To:
Subject: Fwd: Cute little guy and some statistics; thought provoking
From:
Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2014 00:38:07 -0500
-----Original Message-----
From:
To:
Sent: Thu, Dec 11, 2014 8:55 am
Subject: Fw: Fwd: Cute little guy and some statistics; thought provoking
See, my family made the mistake of being white in a 73% non-white neighborhood, but my murder wasn’t ruled a ‘hate crime.’
From:
To:
Sent: Thu, Dec 11, 2014 8:55 am
Subject: Fw: Fwd: Cute little guy and some statistics; thought provoking
: Fw: Cute little guy and some statistics; thought provoking
THIS IS ENLIGHTENINGSubject: FW: Cute little guy and some statistics; thought provokingPart I.
Hello. Don’t recognize me? That’s OK; I understand.
My name is Antonio West. I was the 13-month-old child who was shot in the face at point blank range by two black teens, who were attempting to rob my mother, who was also shot.
I think my murder and my mommy’s wounding made the news for maybe a day, and then disappeared.
A Grand Jury of my mommy's peers from Brunswick , Georgia ruled the black teens who murdered me will not face the death penalty... too bad it was me who got the death sentence from my killers instead, because Mommy didn’t have the money they demanded.
See, my family made the mistake of being white in a 73% non-white neighborhood, but my murder wasn’t ruled a ‘hate crime.’
Oh, and President Obama didn’t take a single moment to acknowledge my murder. He couldn’t have any children who could possibly look like me - so why should he care?
I’m one of the youngest murder victims in our great Nation's history, but the media didn’t care to cover the story of my being killed in cold blood.
There isn’t a white equivalent of Al Sharpton, because if there was he would be branded a ‘racist.’ So no one’s rushing to Brunswick , Georgia to demonstrate and demand ‘justice’ for me. There’s no ‘White Panther’ party, either, to put a bounty on the lives of the two black teens who murdered me.
I’m one of the youngest murder victims in our great Nation's history, but the media didn’t care to cover the story of my being killed in cold blood.
There isn’t a white equivalent of Al Sharpton, because if there was he would be branded a ‘racist.’ So no one’s rushing to Brunswick , Georgia to demonstrate and demand ‘justice’ for me. There’s no ‘White Panther’ party, either, to put a bounty on the lives of the two black teens who murdered me.
I have no voice, I have no representation, and unlike those who shot me in the face while I sat innocently in my stroller - I no longer have my life.
Isn’t this a great country?
So while you’re out seeking ‘justice for Trayvon’ and Michael Brown, please remember to seek ‘justice’ for me. Tell your friends about me, tell you families, get T-shirts with my face on them, and make the world pay attention, just like you did for Trayvon.
I won’t hold my breath.
So while you’re out seeking ‘justice for Trayvon’ and Michael Brown, please remember to seek ‘justice’ for me. Tell your friends about me, tell you families, get T-shirts with my face on them, and make the world pay attention, just like you did for Trayvon.
I won’t hold my breath.
I don’t have to anymore.
Part II:
7/18- Jimmie Norman, white male murdered by black male. No national news.
7/18- Terry Taylor, white male murdered by black male. No national news.
7/17- Cindy Raygoza, white female murdered by black male. No national news.
7/11- Luis Aguilar, 91 year old hispanic male murdered by black male. No national news
7/10- Brittany Simpson, white female murdered by black male. No national news
7/6- Sarah Goode, white female murdered by black male. No national news.
7/6- Jeffrey Westerfield, white male murdered by black male. No national news.
7/5- Perry Renn, white male murdered by black male. No national news.
7/3- Laurey Kennedy, white female still in coma from beating by black male. No national news
7/3 Eric Mollet, white male murdered by black male. No national news.
7/2 Rupert Anderson, white male murdered by black male. No national news.
7/2 Jennifer Kingeter, white female murdered by black male. No national news.
6/30 Jim Brennan, white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/29 Paul Shephard, white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/27 Shirley Barone, white female, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/27 Penelope Spencer, white female, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/27 Inga Evans, white female, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/26 Jake Rameau, white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/25 Gina Burger, white female, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/24 Nathan Dasher, white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/22 Jonathan Price, white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/20 John Whitmore, white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/18 John Yingling,white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/17 Allyn Reeves, white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/15 Michael Beaver, white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/11 Angela Cook, white female, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/11 Nathan Hall, white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/7 Harry Briggs, white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/5 Laura Bachman, white female, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/2 Robert Mohler, white male, murdered by black male. No national news.
6/1 William Headley, white male, murdered by black male. No national news
All this in just 48 days yet no national news. Want to know why?
Because this happens EVERY single day in America and we are used to it.
Yet a THUG getting shot by a Police Officer doing his job, 20 minutes after the THUG committed a robbery, makes national news!
Welcome to America !
So why is this everyday phenomenal rate of blacks killing whites, not to mention the far worse rate at which blacks kill each other in America never generates riots or is addressed by black leaders as a problem within their community, but an occasional killing of a black by a white police officer, a black who is usually doing something dangerously criminal, becomes a riot?
When the statistics speak we see that there is an epidemic of violence coming from within the black community that seriously endangers the remainder of the population. So, where is the true injustice and tragedy???????
Just six years of Obama, Holder, and Sharpton, and America has essentially been destroyed…
Fw: Stolen Purse in Brunswick, Georgia
Subject: Stolen Purse in Brunswick, Georgia
Date: Fri, 11 Oct 2013 23:08:47 -0700
Fw: Fwd: Meeting Notice
Subject: Fwd: Meeting Notice
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From:
Date: Tue, Jul 2, 2013 at 9:31 PM
Subject: Re: Meeting Notice
To:
From:
Date: Tue, Jul 2, 2013 at 9:31 PM
Subject: Re: Meeting Notice
To:
Subject: Meeting Notice
Paula Dean – I hope some network and sponsors pick her up and she makes 10 times the money she made with the Food Network. Her disgraceful treatment by the hypocritical, sanctimonious left is just another example of how wussified this country has become!PQSubject: Fw: Meeting NoticeThe Southeastern District meeting for P>40WHNSTNW (people over 40 who have not said the ‘N’ word)
will be held in the phone booth at the corner of Peachtree St. and Ponce De Leon Ave in Atlanta on Monday, July 8.
We apologize for the size of the accommodations but a smaller venue could not be secured.
Fw: We Need More Gun Control!
Subject: We Need More Gun Control!
'In God We Trust!'
a 13 month old baby who was sitting in a stroller.
Elkins shot the infant in the face after the mother refused to give him money.
He also shot the mother in the leg and the neck in Brunswick, GA.
De’Marquis Elkins is not a member of the NRA.
He did not use an assault rifle.
He did not get his stolen pistol from a gun show.
His favorite music is rap.
He did not attend Christian school, nor was he home schooled.
He did attend multicultural public education,
and was not instructed in the Ten Commandments.
His Momma was on welfare, got food stamps, and lived in public housing.
His daddy was not around, and his two brothers have a different daddy.
He already has a record for violent crimes.
He is gang member.
His mom, grandma, and Aunty all voted for Obama.
He never earned his hunter safety card, nor did he shoot CMP,
Junior NRA, or 4H Air Rifle Competitions.
He was never instructed in gun safety from his father or grandfather.
His public education and family taught him that the white man owes him something.
He went to collect it.
He has no plans on getting married, but does have a Baby Momma, and no,
he is not supporting her baby.
He smokes dope.
He does respect Kayne West.
While he has no job, nor is looking for one, he is well fed.
He has no skills outside of crime.
He speaks Ebonics, and is not capable of doing a professional
interview, even though he spent 11 years in public education.
He is one of millions.
This is what we are up against. Make no mistake that people like
Elkins will have their guns. There are people wanting to deny
you the right to arm yourself. Your tax dollars are paying for
the continuation of a system that breeds pieces of shit like this one.
Fwd: Calhoun Times Column 443 The Nation of Argentina
Subject: Fwd: Calhoun Times Column 443 The Nation of Argentina
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From:
Date: Sat, Feb 9, 2013 at 7:00 AM
Subject: Calhoun Times Column 443 The Nation of Argentina
To
From:
Date: Sat, Feb 9, 2013 at 7:00 AM
Subject: Calhoun Times Column 443 The Nation of Argentina
To
#443 The Nation of Argentina
While I was attending Georgia Tech, there was an Argentine student in the Textile School that had some classes with me. In conversation with him one day I asked him about the government of Argentina. He told me that it was a democracy. I asked him about the length of the President’s term. His answer was that the President was elected for life. I was surprised and looked at him quite puzzled. He then commented that the term usually lasted two or three years and someone would kill him.
During my research for this column, I learned that only a few former presidents of Argentina were assassinated but a large majority were removed by military coup. In 1994, the Constitution of Argentina was amended to provide for a four year term as President with one additional term possible. The current President is a lady – President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner. Her husband was President Nestor Kirchner. He preceded Cristina as president and supported her run for the presidency. He had been diagnosed with cancer and died during her first term in office. She is serving her second term which will expire in December of 2015.
In 1910 the economy of Great Britain was the largest in the world with second place being a race between the United States and Argentina. International trade in Argentina was prominent with excellent ports and rivers that were easy to navigate. They were exporting beef and wheat in large quantities. They had railroads to get their products to the ports.
In 1916 while the economy was still very good the country elected Hipolito Irigoyen as President. His was a new political party called “The Radical Party.” His campaign promise was that he was going to “Fundamentally Change” the nation of Argentina. He began to move the country away from free enterprise into socialism.
One of his first actions was to provide health care to everyone in the nation. He also provided pensions to every person who reached the age of retirement. In order to stimulate the economy, he provided financing and subsidized the cost to build better housing for the low income citizens. He started a payroll tax to pay for these additional benefits. President Irigoyen served for six years between 1916 and 1922. He was elected again in 1928 and served two additional years. By 1930 the economy was already on a severe downturn with the amount being paid out not being covered by the amount of taxes coming in due to the continuing increase of the entitlements being supplied by the government.
In the next 16 years there were ten presidents elected or appointed in the nation of Argentina and the economy continued to get worse. In 1946 at the end of WWII Juan Peron was elected president. His theme in his campaign was to “Tax The Rich” and make the wealthy pay their fair share. When taxing the very rich did not supply enough funds, the income level for being a part of the rich was lowered until it covered a good portion of the middle class. The new income tax rate was over 500% of the original rate started by President Irigoyen. President Peron increased the size of government substantially even though the government was operating with a substantial deficit. Argentina has been unable to make payments on its national debt and the interest rate on their debts now exceeds 12 %. The United States pays an interest rate on its debt in the range of 2 %. If this rate were raised to 12 % our country would collapse in 4 or 5 years.
President Peron’s policies made it difficult to make a profit by farming and the younger members of the operators of the family farms began to move to the city and go to work in the expanding government agencies. Many of the family farms closed and the beef and wheat production was greatly reduced. A country that had earlier been exporting farm products to the rest of the world could not supply food for their own country. Meatless days became a common occurrence in Argentina. Peron promoted and supported the labor unions that became a base of support for his presidency.
Peron instituted a Value Added Tax (National Sales Tax) on all products sold. He taxed the value of each citizen’s assets. He taxed the value of the sale of investment assets whether it was a profitable sale or not.
After he was removed from office the government economy continued to decline. The current president and her husband considered themselves Peronists and believed that his policies were proper. In 2001, the government seized the public retirement funds and put them into the national treasury to help pay the government’s debts. They left an IOU from the government for the value of the funds. In 2002, Argentina experienced an economic period equal to the Great Depression in the USA.
In recent years, Argentina printed billions of dollars worth of their currency and used it to pay the debts of the government. This caused an international lose of confidence in their currency and in one year they had over 3000 percent inflation. The price of every product was changing on a daily basis.
President Irigoyen promised in 1916 that he would fundamentally change Argentina. In a hundred years it went from the world’s second or third most successful economy to one of the worst in the world. It sure is good to be in America and know that nothing like this could happen here. Our government would never follow any of the policies that were used in Argentina. Would they?
Fwd: Two Tragedies Two Interpretations:
Subject: Fwd: Two Tragedies Two Interpretations:
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From:
Date: Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 7:50 AM
Subject: Two Tragedies Two Interpretations:
To
Two Tragedies Two Interpretations:
Fwd: Infidels
Subject: Fwd: Infidels
By Major General Jerry Curry, USA, Ret. Published: 7:12 AM 01/28/2012
The great British poet Rudyard Kipling, understanding today’s situation in Afghanistan better than our State Department wrote, “I have eaten your bread and salt. I have drunk your water and wine. The deaths ye died I have watched beside. And the lives ye led were mine.”
There are two points the President and the Secretaries of State and Defense may want to keep in mind as they evaluate future problems in the Middle East and how to successfully address them. Both are easiest illustrated by real life happenings.
Many years ago I attended the Infantry officer Advanced Course at Fort Benning , Georgia . Probably ten percent of the students attending that ten month course of instruction were from foreign countries. For about half of the course my tablemate was an Arab. We studied together, completed homework assignments together, got to know each other’s families and generally enjoyed each other’s company.Part of that time we students were immersed in reading about, researching and discussing wars and problems of the Middle East . By this time my Arab classmate and I had, I thought, become close friends. A question popped into my mind and without evaluating it I said, “I have a question to ask you, but you may find it a little impertinent … or, perhaps, offensive.”
“That’s quite alright,” he replied. “We know each other well enough to be honest with each other. So go ahead and ask your question.”
“Well,” I began. “Each time you Arabs start a war with Israel , they beat your socks off. Why don’t you learn your lesson and quit making war on them?”
The words hadn’t passed my lips before I knew that I shouldn’t have asked that particular question. But I was wrong. My Arab officer friend didn’t get angry. He didn’t even think before replying.
“My dear friend,” he said in his British accent, “You are absolutely right. Each time we attack the Israelis they whip our asses. But have you noticed that with each loss we get better. We get whipped not as badly as in the war before.”
Then he got a faraway look in his eyes, pounded on the table and said, “Sometime in the next thousand years … we will win!”
Up until then I had never thought in terms of a thousand years, and I don’t think I’m very good at it today. But for those formulating foreign and defense policy for the nation, it is worth making the effort. For it is difficult to think in terms of the immediate future while negotiating with a nation whose leaders are thinking in terms of hundreds or thousands of years.
Point two: during the first Gulf War, U.S. and Arab forces fought side by side and some of the officers became close friends. When the war ended in victory there was a celebration in the officer’s club with everyone congratulating each other. A lot of handshaking and hugging was going on. It was a time of displaying real brotherly love.
Seeing this, one of the senior Arab generals felt the need to set the record straight. “Look,” he said to a small cluster of American generals. “We have fought together and some of us have died together. I know you feel that that makes us brothers. But that is not the way it is in my world.”
He looked around the circle making eye contact with all of them. “I don’t want to see you hurt so I need to share this with you. There will be no tomorrow for us jointly. No matter how much you have helped my country — and you came and helped us when we desperately needed your help – and no matter how friendly you feel toward us, we are still Muslims and you are still Christians. That means that in our eyes, we can never be brothers. I’m sorry but, to us, you will always be – Infidels!”
And so we Infidels have liberated Iraq and Afghanistan , but we have not made their countries nor their people depositories of freedom and liberty. No matter how hard we work to rebuild their governments, infrastructure, educational and medical institutions, and no matter how desperately they need our help — as the Arab general pointedly noted – we can never be brothers to each other.
Also, I learned what Kipling meant when he wrote, “East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet.” He was pointing out to the western world that to Muslims, we Christians will always be infidels!You can ignore reality; you can’t ignore the consequences of ignoring reality – Ayn Rand
Who cares what Michael Moore thinks about Georgia?
In case you were rearranging your sock drawer and missed the big announcement, filmmaker Michael Moore, who is about as relevant as a female appendage on a boar hog, is asking “all Americans with a conscience to shun anything and everything to do with the murderous state of Georgia.” I can hear the shudders from Aragon to Zebulon.
Moore didn’t approve of the execution of Troy Davis, convicted a couple of eons ago for the murder of off-duty Savannah police officer Mark Allen MacPhail, the father of two young children and a former Army Ranger, and has decided to take it out on us.
Who cares what this liberal weenie thinks? His opinions belong in the Pantheon of Pompous Pontificators along with Our Ambassador to Outer Space Cynthia McKinney, Ted “Looney Tunes” Turner and President Peanut. Taken all together, their collective views on anything and everything don’t amount to a jar of warm spit.
However, as one who sees the good in everything and everybody — one of my many redeeming qualities — I hope there are those who will take Moore’s advice and stay away from Georgia. High on my wish list is Al Sharpton.
Moore is so angry he has demanded his publisher pull his book, “Here Comes Trouble,” from every bookstore in the state and if they can’t, he says he will “donate every dime of every royalty my book makes in Georgia to help defeat the racists and killers who run that state.” Dang, the man means business. That could run into the tens of cents.
Gov. Nathan Deal’s office is taking Moore’s threats with the seriousness they deserve. Says Brian Robinson, the governor’s spokesperson, “We think it is cute he thinks anyone in Georgia would buy his book, but if any Georgian does, I’m happy to double the royalties and buy a pack of gum for a charity of Michael Moore’s choice.” I think I like this guy.
I asked Junior E. Lee, general manager of the Yarbrough Worldwide Media and Pest Control Company, located in Greater Garfield, Georgia, what his opinion polls were showing on the damage that Moore’s comments could have on future economic development in Georgia. Junior doesn’t believe anybody in Georgia gives two hoops and a holler what Moore thinks. He says Moore should have stay married to Bruce Willis instead of taking up with that silly kid with the beard on “Two and a Half Men.” I didn’t have the heart to tell him that he was thinking about Demi Moore, not Michael Moore. I fear Junior has been inhaling too much cypermethrin, trying to get the cockroaches out of Arveen Ridley’s basement.
Nobody likes being fussed at, but as my daddy used to say, “Consider the source.” In this case, being criticized by Michael Moore is like being called ugly by a frog and the only people that would take him seriously we wouldn’t want in the state anyway.
His crowd probably thinks Social Circle is where you sit around and puff a toke and Thunderbolt is where Captain Marvel lives and that if you go to Alamo you may see Davey Crockett. I wouldn’t begin to try and explain Montezuma and Arabi to them. It would just hurt their brains.
If they have even set foot in our great state it was probably to change planes in Atlanta and as we all know Atlanta — aka Malfunction Junction, where the sewers don’t work and neither do a lot of its citizens — is really not a part of Georgia. It’s just a place to send our legislators every year to get them out of our hair so we can get some work done.
There is always a chance that Michael Moore was misquoted. (I told you I try to find the good in everything and everybody.) When he was talking about racists and killers, there is the possibility he might have been referring to his hometown of Flint, Mich. Flint has had a long and sordid history of racism and last I looked, the FBI says the city has the seventh-highest homicide rate in the nation. The city’s most redeeming quality is that it makes Detroit look like Xanadu. But being the nice guy I am, I’m not going to ask all Georgians with a conscience — and that is most of us — to shun the state of Michigan like Mr. Puffenstuff wants to see happen here. Michigan has more than enough problems already. It has Michael Moore.
Fwd: In lieu of flowers
10:14 AM
To: undisclosed recipients:
Subject: Fwd: In lieu of flowers
 |
FW: The Wild and Free Pigs
The Wild and Free Pigs of the Okefenokee Swamp
based on a telling by George Gordon
Some years ago, about 1900, an old trapper from North Dakota hitched up some horses to his Studebaker wagon, packed a few possessions -- especially his traps -- and drove south. Several weeks later he stopped in a small town just north of the Okefenokee Swamp in Georgia . It was a Saturday morning -- a lazy day -- when he walked into the general store. Sitting around the pot-bellied stove were seven or eight of the town's local citizens.
The traveler spoke. "Gentlemen, could you direct me to the Okefenokee Swamp ?" Some of the oldtimers looked at him like he was crazy. "You must be a stranger in these parts," they said. "I am. I'm from North Dakota ," said the stranger. "In the Okefenokee Swamp are thousands of wild hogs." one old man explained. "A man who goes into the swamp by himself asks to die!" He lifted up his leg. "I lost half my leg here, to the pigs of the swamp." Another old fellow said, "Look at the cuts on me; look at my arm bit off!" "Those pigs have been free since the Revolution, eating snakes and rooting out roots and fending for themselves for over a hundred years. They're wild and they're dangerous. You can't trap them. No man dare go into the swamp by himself."
Every man nodded his head in agreement.
The old trapper said, "Thank you so much for the warning. Now could you direct me to the swamp?"
They said, "Well, yeah, it's due south -- straight down the road." But they begged the stranger not to go, because they knew he'd meet a terrible fate. He said, "Sell me ten sacks of corn, and help me load it in the wagon." And they did. Then the old trapper bid them farewell and drove on down the road. The townsfolk thought they'd never see him again.
Two weeks later the man came back. He pulled up to the general store, got down off the wagon, walked in and bought ten more sacks of corn. After loading it up he went back down the road toward the swamp. Two weeks later he returned and again bought ten sacks of corn. This went on for a month. And then two months, and three.
Every week or two the old trapper would come into town on a Saturday morning, load up ten sacks of corn, and drive off south into the swamp. The stranger soon became a legend in the little village and the subject of much speculation. People wondered what kind of devil had possessed this man, that he could go into the Okefenokee by himself and not be consumed by the wild and free hogs. One morning the man came into town as usual. Everyone thought he wanted more corn. He got off the wagon and went into the store where the usual group of men were gathered around the stove. He took off his gloves.
"Gentlemen," he said, "I need to hire about ten or fifteen wagons. I need twenty or thirty men."
"I have six thousand hogs out in the swamp, penned up, and they're all hungry. I've got to get them to market right away." "You've WHAT in the swamp?" asked the storekeeper, incredulously. "I have six thousand hogs penned up. They haven't eaten for two or three days, and they'll starve if I don't get back there to feed and take care of them."
One of the oldtimers said, "You mean you've captured the wild hogs of the Okefenokee?"
"That's right." "How did you do that? What did you do?" the men urged, breathlessly. One of them exclaimed, "But I lost my arm!" "I lost my brother!" cried another. "I lost my leg to those wild boars!" chimed a third.
The trapper said, "Well, the first week I went in there they were wild all right." "They hid in the undergrowth and wouldn't come out. I dared not get off the wagon." So I spread corn along behind the wagon. Every day I'd spread a sack of corn." "The old pigs would have nothing to do with it."
"But the younger pigs decided that it was easier to eat free corn than it was to root out roots and catch snakes. So the very young began to eat the corn first." "I did this every day. Pretty soon, even the old pigs decided that it was easier to eat free corn." "After all, they were all free; they were not penned up. They could run off in any direction they wanted at any time." "The next thing was to get them used to eating in the same place all the time. So I selected a clearing, and I started putting the corn in the clearing." "At first they wouldn't come to the clearing. It was too far. It was too open. It was a nuisance to them."
"But the very young decided that it was easier to take the corn in the clearing than it was to root out roots and catch their own snakes. And not long thereafter, the older pigs also decided that it was easier to come to the clearing every day." "And so the pigs learned to come to the clearing every day to get their free corn." "They could still subsidize their diet with roots and snakes and whatever else they wanted. After all, they were all free. They could run in any direction at any time. There were no bounds upon them." "The next step was to get them used to fence posts."
"So I put fence posts all the way around the clearing. I put them in the underbrush so that they wouldn't get suspicious or upset."
"After all, they were just sticks sticking up out of the ground, like the trees and the brush. The corn was there every day. It was easy to walk in between the posts, get the corn, and walk back out." "This went on for a week or two. Shortly they became very used to walking into the clearing, getting the free corn, and walking back out through the fence posts." "The next step was to put one rail down at the bottom. I also left a few openings, so that the older, fatter pigs could walk through the openings and the younger pigs could easily jump over just one rail."
"After all, it was no real threat to their freedom or independence. They could always jump over the rail and flee in any direction at any time." "Now I decided that I wouldn't feed them every day. I began to feed them every other day." "On the days I didn't feed them the pigs still gathered in the clearing. They squealed, and they grunted, and they begged and pleaded with me to feed them." "But I only fed them every other day. And I put a second rail around the posts."
"Now the pigs became more and more desperate for food. Because now they were no longer used to going out and digging their own roots and finding their own food. They now needed me. They needed my corn every other day." "So I trained them that I would feed them every day if they came in through a gate. And I put up a third rail around the fence." "But it was still no great threat to their freedom, because there were several gates and they could run in and out at will." "Finally I put up the fourth rail." "Then I closed all the gates but one, and I fed them very, very well." "Yesterday I closed the last gate. And today I need you to help me take these pigs to market."
-- end of story --
The price of free corn
The allegory of the pigs has a serious moral lesson. This story is about federal money being used to bait, trap and enslave a once free and independent people.
Federal welfare, in its myriad forms, has reduced not only individuals to a state of dependency. State and local governments are also on the fast track to elimination, due to their functions being subverted by the command and control structures of federal "revenue sharing" programs.
Please copy this flyer and send it to all your state and local elected leaders and other concerned citizens. Tell them: "Just say NO to federal corn."
The bacon you save may be your own.
Fw: Leadership
Our President Needs Real Leadership Skills By Major Gen. Jerry Curry <http://www.humanevents.com/
There were many occasions, during my thirty-four or so years of serving in the U.S. Army, when I took command of failing military units and nursed them back to good, sound health. I did it so often that it became one of my specialties.
If you tell soldiers or units often enough that they are failures, they will become failures even when they are not. A real leader must instill within his subordinates the feeling and knowledge that they are or can quickly become certain “winners” and that if they do what he tells them to do they will not only succeed, but will set the standard for other units to emulate.
The worst thing a new leader can do is to start off by blaming others, threatening punishment or, as President Obama so smugly puts it, “kicking ass.” Obviously he is still in the process of learning that no one can effectively build a unit and motivate their subordinates to successfully attack and solve major problems if the subordinates are in constant fear of being fired or publicly humiliated. Experience also teaches that sometimes when you assemble a group of brilliant authorities who expertly wrestle their way through a problem and come to a brilliant consensus they are sometimes wrong. Thus you may suffer through the embarrassment of having kicked the wrong “ass.” Experienced leaders know that it is much more effective to motivate your subordinates through reward than through punishment.
The mission statement for every leader from President of the United States to CEO to Boy Scout leader is “well developed skills of persuasion and openness to working through controversy in a positive way.” That is, everyone has their say and dissenting views are openly examined, discarded or expanded upon and adopted. Most of the time an authoritative leadership style is less preferred than a participatory one. Unfortunately for Obama, who still has so much to learn about leadership, there is no substitute for a lack of seasoned instinct and the ability to identify and deal with ever increasing challenges.
Fort Benning, Georgia, is the home of the U. S. Army’s Infantry School. I have been assigned to or visited it many times; its motto is “Follow Me!” Those who attend the school major in “LEADERSHIP, LEADERSHIP, and LEADERSHIP!” To help vividly impress the importance of leadership upon the minds of the students is the statue of an infantry leader caught in mid stride, clutching a rifle in his left hand and signaling with his up-raised right arm for those behind to follow him. Appropriately it is named “Follow Me!”
We have a saying in the Infantry. To really know what’s going on in battle you must go to the sound of the guns, the rifles, the machine guns, the pounding mortars, and the screaming “incoming” artillery shells. There is no substitute for going where the action is! Dithering in your headquarters or in the White House for weeks or flying around the country attending parties, social events, speaking at political fund raisers or playing basketball and golf simply doesn’t cut it.
A real leader immediately goes to the sound of the guns, the disaster area, and when he gets there he talks directly to those who are leading the battle – those directly in charge of stopping and containing the oil spill. He purposes to talk to the “James Carvilles” who speak for everyone living and making a livelihood along the Gulf Coast when he cries out, “We’re dying down here!” A true leader recognizes and responds to the pleas for a personal visit and measurable, immediate help.
The worst thing to do is to fail to give the “first responders” and the Governors at the oil spill whatever they request. Most request made by those involved in close combat are for necessities but some are just morale building. I remember my soldiers during one of my tours in Vietnam asking for ice cream to go with their “Thanksgiving” meals. They certainly didn’t need ice cream and it wasn’t on the menu. In fact, it was a real challenge and inconvenience to locate and helicopter it in; but it gave them a sense of home and put a light in their tired eyes. Those who face death daily deserve all the ice cream they can eat and I got it for them.
Our President has yet to learn that a true leader gives his soldiers -- those fighting and winning the battle -- and his subordinates whatever it takes to cause them to rise up and slay the dragons. Or, in this case, oil spills and plumes. That’s how leaders motivate their followers to successfully tame catastrophic disasters and to snatch success from the jaws of failure.
In the meantime, to the dangerous detriment of our country, Obama is on a very sharp and short learning curve. It is time he either learned his job, or turned it over to someone who can.
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