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confederacy of fools

2/24/2015

HAVE YOU LOST YOUR MINDS?

By Jim Lyde
Chief Operating Officer
[First Published April 18, 2013]

Following are excerpts from Mark Twain’s short story “Captain Stormfield’s Visit to Heaven.” In this classic, the deceased Stormfield, a sea captain, had deviated from his course to heaven by only slight degrees so that he could have racing competitions with various comets.

When he arrived in Heaven he encountered a gatekeeper who asked, "Did you come STRAIGHT HERE from your system?" Stormfield answered, [No,] “But I only fell off just a bare point, and I went right back on my course again the minute the race was over." The gatekeeper responded, "No matter - that divergence has made all this trouble. It has brought you to a gate that is billions of leagues from the right one. If you had gone to your own gate they would have known all about your world at once and there would have been no delay. But we will try to accommodate you.” So the gatekeeper sent an assistant to locate our Solar System. After days of searching a map as big as Rhode Island the assistant located Earth, telling the gatekeeper, "Oh, I know the one he means, now, sir. It is on the map. It is called the Wart."

There are those of us conservatives who act as if even the slightest deviation from our political beliefs might result in the dilemma encountered by Captain Stormfield. If we hear a statement or position that is even one degree away from ours, we almost lose our self-control. It’s as if we are proclaiming “listen up – everyone is wrong but me!” This attitude reminds me of a cartoon in which two mothers are watching a parade. One says to the other “Look Gladys, my son is the only one in the band who is in step!” We already are hearing a raucous clamor of complaints about the behaviors of Senators Rubio, Paul, Cruz, Lee and others whom just the other day we were praising as the new and true leadership to deal with the past and current betrayals of the “Rinos.”

Folks, we need to be reminded of the nature of our heritage. It was exactly this kind of rigid, unyielding behavior that our forefathers defeated to provide us with our freedom-loving society. The Constitution itself was forged from bitter divisiveness and unsavory compromise. TLC has encountered fellow conservatives who are so convinced that they are the only ones who can think that they refute input from others even when the others are agreeing with them! The citizens of this country will not ever get everything they want every time; they never have; and they never should!

The view here is that this dogmatic behavior cost us conservatives the last presidential election. Too many of us voted for third party candidates. In the history of this nation there have been exactly ZERO successful third party presidential campaigns! Too many of us, angry because Romney was not conservative enough, stayed home. Boy, we really showed them, didn’t we? Consider the words of Gary DeMar:

To all those who threw their votes to third party candidates, and to those who did not vote, when those of us who are fighting to protect the system hobble away, I hope you have enough of your mindset to keep it together because there is a whole host of us that are too bloody to walk another step. We could have held Mitt Romney's feet to the fire while we brought in our Tea Party candidates, protected the Supreme Court and the nation from a fifty years of aggressive evil influence of Obama Court nominations, rid ourselves of the redefinition of marriage and monstrous late-term abortion. Whomever amongst us that is glad of this turn of events with the election for some 'high' principled idea, I can only say an entire nation, countless unborn and many who will be exposed to the judgments of death panels in the Obamacare will suffer from such thinking.

A colleague and I were on a business trip during which we found ourselves seated next to a woman who was on her very first flight. Of course, we subjected her to a little kidding about the safety of the plane, etc. As luck would have it, the plane hit a small air pocket, terrifying the inexperienced traveler. She said to my colleague, “Joe, if that happens again, I will grab hold of you.” To which he jokingly replied, “Lady, I’m scared. We can talk trash when we get on the ground!” There is an analogy here. Our “airship of state” is under an ominous threat, the face of which is Barack Obama. We must unify to neutralize that threat. We can squabble about the fine points of immigration or abortion policy after we have prevented our airship from crashing into, uh, Greece, for example.

Then there is this from an editorial in the Prague newspaper Prager Zeitungon:

"The danger to America is not Barack Obama, but a citizenry capable of entrusting a man like him with the Presidency. It will be far easier to limit and undo the follies of an Obama presidency than to restore the necessary common sense and good judgment to a depraved electorate willing to have such a man for their president. The problem is much deeper and far more serious than Mr. Obama, who is a mere symptom of what ails America. Blaming the prince of the fools should not blind anyone to the vast confederacy of fools that made him their prince. The Republic can survive a Barack Obama, who is, after all, merely a fool. It is less likely to survive a multitude of fools, such as those who made him their president."

We, the angry conservatives who stubbornly protested by staying home or by voting for third party candidates, became members, along with the takers, the socialists and the liberals, of that “vast confederacy of fools” that caused Barack Obama to be the President of the United States. It is as simple as that. We need to pull our heads out, lest we be collectively remembered as “the Wart.”

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political correctness

2/18/2015

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                                                   By Jim Lyde,
                                                   Chief Operating Officer

                                  FIRST PUBLISHED DECEMBER 17, 2012

How It Was (1954)
That is a Colored water fountain, Son. You can't drink there. Little Henry accepted that admonition from his mother, but not without a second thought. Born in 1945 in north central Texas, Little Henry knew that "Colored" water fountains and restrooms were indicators of the way things were.

Why was the 80 year old shoe shine "boy" called by his first name?

He noticed there were no "coloreds" in the café where he dined with his family. He wondered why, in a society that demanded respect for elders and fair play, the 80 year old shoe shine "boy" at the barber shop was called by his first name (Doug), even by children. Why was Doug called "N* Doug" outside his presence? Why were all coloreds usually called "N*s" except in polite company, where they were called coloreds or "Nigrahs?"

Three colored boys were allowed to join Little Henry's baseball team. He was surprised that he didn't "catch something" when he quenched his thirst from the lid of the big water jug after they did. Why then, were there colored water fountains?

            Nigrahs are alright, as long as they know their place.

Little Henry knew nothing about the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision calling for the end of school segregation; it certainly had no effect on the all-white school he attended, or anything else in his world. He had heard hundreds of times that "Nigrahs are alright, as long as they know their place." Where was that "place?" From his family and their friends there was no animosity. The "understanding" was that coloreds were inferior and should not interact with white people.

                 Political Correctness was designed to end
               traditional references to Black Americans.

This has been a tiny snapshot of the atmosphere from which evolved "political correctness." Little Henry was just one of millions beginning to realize the illogical nature of race relations in America. The productive work of Martin Luther King, Jr. and others failed to displace the traditional references to Black Americans. The concept of political correctness was designed to change that.

How It Is

Political correctness has gone far past that worthy goal. From a historical perspective, the changing of traditional references has been blindingly fast. We have gone from darkie, Negro, N*, nigrah, colored, Black, to African American. Beyond efforts to bring discredit to those who make disparaging references, PC has developed into a primer of admonishment to any negative reference to African Americans, then to females and Latinos. It seems that any publicly made disparaging remark must be subjected to the gauntlet of "insult inspection," regarding race and/or gender. If either exists, those who disagree with the premise of the remark label the spokesman (whoops, spokesperson) as a racist or a sexist. More recently there have been those who search for "code words" in statements with negative references that might be construed to refer to Blacks or any other minority. These exercises are virtually always generated by liberals. Now, Hillary Clinton has expressed a preference for Senator John Kerry (white male) to replace her as Secretary of State, rather than UN Ambassador Susan Rice (black female). Therefore, according to PC dictum, it is logical to conclude that Ms. Clinton is both a racist and a sexist! PC has further expanded to include rules to avoid "offending" people or organizations who do not believe in deity. For example, the Governor of Rhode Island insists on calling the state's Christmas tree a "Holiday Tree," so as not to offend atheists. Bill O'Reilly has pointed out that by doing so the Governor has offended about 95% of the American people. However, Christians and Jews are the only religious groups that may be maligned under the guidelines of PC.

Thomas Sowell has written "... episodes of unprovoked violence by young black gangs against white people chosen at random on beaches, in shopping malls, or in other public places have occurred in Philadelphia, New York, Denver, Chicago, Cleveland, Washington, Los Angeles, and other places across the country. Both the authorities and the media tend to try to sweep these episodes under the rug." The view here is that the entire reason for the "sweep" is political correctness.

              Has PC blocked our ability to find solutions?

How Is It Going To Be?

Have problems arisen? You bet! What if negative references to minorities or minority organizations are true? After all, it seems to be perfectly acceptable to denigrate other segments in our society; some say even at the expense of the truth. Perhaps we have gotten so caught up in the idea of avoiding insult that we have linguistically blocked our ability to find solutions. Have tiny portions of our society gained the ability to force changes on others, even if those others find them unacceptable, or even if the changes have historically been detrimental to societies? Undoubtedly! Has the quality of education in the United States for African Americans improved? No! Why not? In this country, a small of minority of the population gets arrested for a very disproportionate number of crimes committed. Why? Have Black community attitudes toward narcotics and traditional relationships heightened the wall that has to be climbed to achieve social equality and economic success? How can we address these or any similar perceptions or situations if PC forbids us to even state the problems?

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THE RIGHT TO EXIST

2/18/2015

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                                                        By Jim Lyde

                                         Chief Operating Officer

                              FIRST PUBLISHED JULY 7, 2014

Let’s assume a belligerent dog attacks, you provide the dog with a little space and he continues to attack. He attacks your children from the bed of his puppies, and if you injure a puppy when you respond, the dog howls about your cruelty. Suppose a neighbor suggests a solution that is agreeable to you but not to the dog? What do you do? Would it be appropriate to ask the dog to discontinue the attacks as a prerequisite to further discussion? What about providing the dog with more space, closer to you, hoping that the dog with change his behavior? Perhaps, after repeatedly trying unsuccessfully to reason with the dog you should kill the dog and take back your space.

Israel now and historically faces this situation with its Islamic neighbors. The current aggressor is Hamas, a terrorist organization that is attacking from Gaza that was given to the Palestinians by Israel.   President Obama treats this latest conflict as being between adversaries who each have a valid agenda.   It most certainly is not. The rightful “ownership” of the territory Israel now occupies is a moot issue.   Would it be appropriate to demand the resurrection of the Weimar Republic? Considering the issue on a local level, what about the land of Canaan or the Hittite Empire? The truth is that the geo-political landscape in the Middle East historically has been in constant transformation forever. Diplomatically, common sense related to this situation is in very short supply. How would the world react if Israel acted on the decision that Hamas/Palestine did not deserve to exist?

When analyzing Obama concerning the Middle East and elsewhere the tendency is to characterize him as being incompetent.   He does radiate the odor of incompetence but the belief here is that the smell is that of arrogance. The incompetence characterization would be correct if Obama’s agenda involved objectives that are in accordance with American tradition. However, Obama has no such objectives. He is fine with what appears to “right thinking” Americans to be cowardly folly regarding “negotiations” with Iran. He has no objections to Iran having military nuclear capacity. Likewise, he is OK with the strife between Ukraine and Russia. This president has no qualms about the mess on our southern border, either. In fact, he is the principal creator of the mess. International turbulence is his preferred state of affairs.

Colonel Peters, who is a hero of mine, underestimates the President. The depth of the negative reaction may be more than he anticipated, but otherwise all is well in Obama's eyes thus far. The internal scandals and world situations fit nicely into his plan to reduce the economic power, political strength and exceptionalism of this nation. The only appropriate response is impeachment. Even if Speaker Boehner’s lawsuit against Obama achieves legal standing, it would not be resolved until years after Obama’s Constitutional term of office has expired. If Boehner should happen to "grow a set" and initiate impeachment proceedings the belief here is that Obama will try to declare martial law. He will use the international turbulence previously mentioned and growing national “lawlessness” as excuses. He may do so anyway if he sees a need to attempt to avoid the consequences of November's elections.

TLC has often opined that if one assumes Obama is a Muslim many things are better explained. Obama is an avowed Christian, but his Christianity is that of Jeremiah Wright, who espouses what is known as Black Liberal Theology. This “denomination” was founded by Marxist James Cone, and is at least as similar to Islam as it is to Christianity. Colonel Allen West is sharing an article he found by Thomas Lifson in the American Thinker. Lifson lists many Obama quotes on Islam and Christianity and offers comments. The first two presidential comments on Islam are: #1 - “The future must not belong to those who slander the Prophet of Islam.” #2 - “The sweetest sound I know is the Muslim call to prayer.”

Democrats are currently softening the jaded appearance of the Obama fundraising tour in the face of crises the world over by using the term “optics,” as in “the optics are bad, but Obama is great,” etc. Let’s look at some “optics” related to Islamic symbolism and the President.

We begin with what could be called the “classic crescent.” The crescent is a misnomer because it actually is the space between two circles and symbolizes Islamic domination of the world.

Just below is the insignia of The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Note that the crescent has entirely surrounded the smaller circle. Does the white shape on the left remind you of Israel?

The logo of the Islamic Palestine Block leaves no room for doubt. Here we have the earth resting on the Quran and encircled. The methodology for the takeover is war, as illustrated by the automatic weapon.

Next let’s take a look at the icon for the Muslim American Society. Once again we have global domination depicted, in this case with special attention to the Americas.

Finally, let’s look at the modern symbol for the United States Missile Defense Agency, then compare it to the icon for the Obama presidential campaign.

How does this progression of symbols relate to your view regarding America’s continuing right to independently exist? To quote Colonel West: In my assessment, there is a very clear and evident bias, and when combined with certain actions — as in Libya, Egypt, and towards Israel — well, you assess for yourself. Be an American Thinker. And then be a Guardian of the Republic.

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