Apolitical Rant #5150

Most Americans want to live in peace, side-by-side with other peace-loving Americans of every race and creed.  Then, at election time, we rush out to vote for some of the most divisive, fear-mongering demagogues ever to make a speech.  Why?  

Trump sounds like he's cutting a bush-league pro wrestling promo every time he opens his mouth.  Harris delivers speeches like a slightly unhinged, rookie sports commentator.  Both of them support big-government overreach.  Feels like they want us to choose between the blue caps and brown shirts...  We have to choose THEIR side... OR ELSE!  

Neither of them care about working folks or the future of our grand experiment.  Individual freedom was born here and has continued to grow here, in spite of the best efforts of these leeches to rob every penny of the fruits of our labor.  With each step forward, though, they steal a step or two back.

If the American people want to have a future for themselves or their posterity, they MUST throw off the chains of political parties.  Parties do nothing but make you poor and keep you poor.  They'll give you just enough to keep you alive, and try to make you fight each other over crumbs to divert your attention away from what they're doing to you.

Want to move up?  Too bad.  Think you can get there with merit?  Too bad.  You have to bow down and kiss the ring of the politicians... Who have done nothing of merit.  All they've done is kiss the rings of power, themselves.

Dragonfly 4th of July

Happy Fourth! Have a look at this picture I took when I went out to grab something from my pump house, this morning, and found this giant dragonfly dessicating in a spider web:

 

Dumped On

Someone either lost or illegally dumped a bunch of stinky, nasty garbage on the side of the road right in front of the gate to my property.  I had to smell that mess the whole time I fixed my gate.  

There was hair weave, Newports, and used feminine hygiene products, along with assorted fast food containers.  I imagine it's what the free clinic smells like.

Wet Varmint

I don't know if it's ever irritated me more to start cutting the grass and have to stop than it made me today.  

When I got home, the sky was clear.  One small, puffy, little white cloud hung cheerfully in the sky above my house.  The air was hot and the ground was very dry.  

Quickly, I changed clothes and readied my mower, stopping only to fill my stainless cup with a half gallon of water.  As I pulled out of the garage, the clear blue sky greeted me warmly.  

On my first pass, I felt something wet hit my arm.  "Big bug," I thought.  As I came around for the second pass, the were a couple of taps.  Looking directly up, there was nothing in the sky above, not even a cloud.  As I rounded the corner, halfway through the pass, however, I looked back towards the house.  

Hovering there, menacingly, was the ugliest, gray cloud.  All around it was blue, though.  Surely it would blow over.

Wrong.

Midway through my third pass, I was almost swimming.  

I have no memory of pulling the soaked and grass covered mower back into the garage.  Yosemite Sam had been channeling through me since midway through that second pass.  I heard him say, "Ooo... I hate you" as I glanced back out from under my dripping hat at the rain-soaked yard.

On Memorial Day

A lot of people died to make it possible for me to post this.  Not specifically, of course, but, as the title says, it's Memorial Day, and many patriots gave their future, fortune or lives fighting to protect these freedoms we now take for granted.  One of those is the freedom to say whatever I want without fear of reprisal from government.  

More accurately, it's the freedom to say whatever you want, so long as you don't lie with the intent to defraud or defame anyone in doing so.  It's codified in the very First Amendment to the Constitution, a part of the Bill of Rights, which the individual States required before ratifying it:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or preventing the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

An honest assessment of the current respect for this document leaves a bit lacking.  The government is full of life-long politicians and lawyers whose full-time occupation is finding loopholes to further usurp the rights of the taxpayer, funded by the taxpayer.  Most don't care, as long as they have access to the latest pop-culture thing.

That's not the point of today, however.  Today, no matter who you are, if you are able to open your mouth and say what you want in your country, you owe a debt to the people who gave their lives for that.  Remember them well, or you'll only have yourself to blame when you lose that freedom.

Tossing Bones

Well, I guess that's how life goes.  We're all just making educated guesses, anyway.  Hitting the bullseye is just a matter of luck, no matter how much you put into it.

Buy a few extra lottery tickets.  You've increased your chances of winning about as much as you'll increase your chances of guessing your path by trying.  Still, thirteen out of three hundred million is better than one.  

It's understandable that hitting that groove can make it seem deserved, or at least earned.  To a degree, it is.  To a larger degree, in most cases, it's not.  

Give credit where it can be given.  Gratitude, if called-for.  Enjoy it and toss a bone once in a while, if you can.

Happy Easter

How've you been?  How did another whole month pass so quickly?  Time's too fast.

Salvation and forgiveness are the order of the day.  You'll have to forgive me for not posting for a while, I suppose.  If not, I forgive you.

Forgiveness always requires a sacrifice, though.  Thankfully, that price has already been paid, if you're a believer.  Even if you're not, you're good in my book.  Who am I to judge?