Friday, November 27, 2015

Our 2016 World

On this day after the 2015 Thanksgiving Day, ones mind cannot not think about the world as it rolls into a new year only weeks away. The world is still reeling from the Paris massacre, the latest killings in the Murder Capital of the World, Chicago, Europe has rolled up its walls and shut out the rest of the world quaking in fear of ISIL thus ISIL has won without firing a shot.  We see the bawdy, blatant aggression of Mother Russia led by King Putin surging forward unchecked for the great checker, America, has pretty much checked out if you get the play on words. Global warming seems to be the Obama landscape to escape his Commander-in-Chief role when it would seem to me that every meeting and gathering should be focused solely on the elimination of this scourge to mankind called Daesh or ISIL or whatever you choose to called this menace to mankind running apparently unabated.

Earlier this week I watched an interview on Charlie Rose with General David Petraeus in which is articulated as clearly as I have experienced the multifaceted spider web of killers most of which are affiliates of none other than Persian now known as Iran. Yes, that same Persia our President and his minion John Kerry, have negotiated an immense nuclear pact for it is "the best we can do and we must ratify it" for some strange reason I still do not understand. And, oh by the way, this agreement frees up somewhere around $150 billion to Iran and we know now where some of that will go which is to fund the terrorist groups linked and aligned with Persia's intention well stated to remove Israel from the face of the earth. This is the same Persia that is thumbing its nose at the Great American Satan; that would be We the People. It simply is beyond my level of understand to grasp what this President's real agenda is for with seemingly each day, he says and does things that seems shadowy and almost sickening supportive of our sworn enemies.

As a man of passion and patriotism, this POTUS behavior and agenda is not only frightening but downright angering knowing so many have given so much for this wonderful gift of Freedom. Now with the Paris attacks and others no doubt being planned for execution soon, the Government will be seeking more and more access to our personal information thus infringing on certainly inalienable rights granted us by our Bill of Rights.  We see all too clearly the failed of institutions in our nation such as the VA, the IRS, the Post Office, Amtrak, and the list goes on. We see and hear so much about "shovel ready" infrastructure work needed in America which I agree with but have you driven by a work site lately to actually see actual work being done? Earlier this week I did see several road projects underway and what I saw was invariably one person working, one person standing and chatting, one person on break, one person checking the person working and two persons getting read to go to break. It really is actually sort of funny to witness the lack of energy, push to get the work done but then I realize it is a metaphor for where America has evolved to.

I think about things strangely for I take the long view of what I see. For example, it has now become commonplace to see panhandlers at major intersections with signs asking for financial handouts and in all configurations of sad faces, torn, dirty clothes, animals, old Army camouflage passing as an old veteran, etc, etc.  Each time I witness this act playing out I find myself wishing I had ten job cards in my pocket I could hand to the poor begging soul and then see if there would be any effort to actually go earn a wage. I am convinced the great, great majority would throw the card away and just occupy the corner begging perch. When I see the same beggar on another corner I know then there is organization, planning, transportation, logistics invested in this begging venture. Sound cold?  I implore you to check me out on this non-work institution.  When people do not have to work, they will not work for when We the People are paying them not to work; well, you get my drift but sadly that is where we have evolved to.

In my naive belief that police are fundamentally good and seek to keep the peace, with each highly publicized shooting with police involved, I sincerely get sick of the same rhetoric and poison stirrers that work people into a frenzy that leads to blatant harassment of police all on national television.  CNN has become, sadly, the chief culprit in the stirring with the likes if Suny Hosten, Charles Blow, Don Lemon; all black, all with an agenda and all creating more angst and accusative narrative about "all" police that is getting more and more of them killed as they sit upon their perch pontificating angst and hate aimed at the very people that get up each day to protect us.  

It is beyond me, frankly, why a sane, normal young person would choose police work as a career in this cauldron of hate spun by media in the midst of blatant abuse and criminal activity by those, some of which end up shot or killed in the line of duty. But the police, regardless of circumstance, is guilty and drawn and quartered by the CNN butchers I have grown to loathe.  I know so many police and deputies and see how hard they work, how dedicated to their mission and I love and admire each. Yes, there are bad ones as with any profession but this is a very, very small percentage but it is they ghat get all the television time thus broad-brushing the great majority of great police.

If I have a deep concern for our nation, and I do, it is with the overworked and overwhelmed all-volunteer military construct. Ten deployments is simply wrong for the service person and their tortured families.  It is illogical to me for less than one percent of the US population to protect the 99% of Americans. I understand fully the logic for going to the AVA but that was before the days of multi deployments in never ending conflicts in a world gone mad with weaponry never thought feasible. I think it criminal in a nation as great as America to know have a system where every single America male and female must serve our nation for two years at an early age.  We are one of the very few if not the only nation in the G20 that does not have a conscription system to bring fresh minds and bodies into the role of protecting our nation. We see all too clearly the downside of multiple deployments and this will only worsen.

During my ten years teaching university level students I found a way to trigger the conversation about the above paragraph meaning their thoughts on taking on the responsibility of protecting our way of life from foreign and domestic enemies. Easily over 99% saw no reason nor any desire to step up to that noble task which saddened me but allowed me to project that that is our America today. We are an aging empire that, like all other empires will collapse from the inside due to the weight of government cost, entitlements and no internal armed force to fight back the enemies that would wish to destroy our way of life. Does that not depict America today?

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