As a European, despite what reservations I ever may have had about Senator McCain, I want to salute his courage, tenacity and decency which never once wavered during this atrocious campaign. A victory at his age would have been the crowning achievement of a lifetime in the service of the country he so passionately loves. It would only seem fair that a man who survived the Forrestal fire, a SAM the size of a telephone pole through his wing, and five years of torture in a facility that makes Abu Ghraib look like a Best Western, would finally make it President. But then, no one ever said that life was fair. Over at CDR Salamander, the CDR urges us to "also take a moment to give Sen. McCain a nod for his Shakespearian run". I think that's too modest and I would wager that rather a deep bow is in order. Kudos also to that most remarkable, still young, beautiful and hyper-American combination of career woman, symbol of motherhood and quintessential role model John chose as his running mate: Sarah Palin, the Governor of Alaska. While John McCain may now venture into quiter political alleys, I hope and suspect that of Mrs. Palin's career into US politics, we have only seen the beginning. Eternal shame and damnation for the MSM SCUM who deem a wardrobe more newsworthy than terrorist links, and who think that "to serve and protect" includes tasering a 10 year old stepson.
As for those who voted for Obama, I personally have no congratulations to offer you. Mssrs. Qaddafi, Mullah Omar, Ahmadinejad, Chavez, Morales, al-Sadr, an estimated 500 million impotent Zeropeans and the Federation of Chairmans of Socialist Parties from NORK over La Paz to Byelorussia are right now doing that in my place. Enjoy the glow. To vote for someone who could live with twenty years of God daaaaaaaaaaaaamn America sermons in his local church, sit for years on end on the boards of two "charities" with a guy whom he KNEW had MURDERED innocent American citizens, and publicly regretted there hadn't been more of them, funneled money to a PLO operative, thought it was cool to choose his friends among Marxist professors, and to top it all off married a woman who was NOT proud of the Moon Landing or bringing the Iron Curtain down, is the height of folly. I shall have zero tolerance for your fucking wir haben es nicht gewusst excuses when the elephant's bowel contents will hit the Osprey rotors because you all had an internet connection and a mouth to ask questions during the terrible ordeal of 7 years of having to watch uniforms on TV. You had the choice between victory and baloney, you chose baloney and you will get taxes. You were sooooooooooooo angry at PRESIDENT BUSH because your fucking Oprah show was interrupted now and then with flashes from the front, basically your only nuisance. By contrast, the men and women who year after year risked their lives to preserve your right to listen to that cunt, hunting down islamic terrorists who would kill you in a heartbeat if they could, voted massively not for your Golden Boy, but for his contender... and still it doesn't ring a bell. Well then, change is what you wanted, and you will get plenty of it. You just hope that at the end of it, you have some change left.
I will make an exception for those people who thought along the lines of what we call in Belgium de "kortste pijn" (shortest pain), among them our valued reader and link and content provider Mark. The sermon above is definitely not for him, nor for the others who followed the same logic. A logic which by the way is perfectly reasonable, it's just that reason sometimes cannot beat the emotional foolishness of millions.
As for the men and women who did the real fighting over the past seven years, and who happen to stumble on this blog, compared to you, Ladies and Gentlemen, I am but a (book)worm. After all, the time and effort I have put in this little blog (which is not even mine), means nothing to your sacrifices. Next to Joe Cook's testimony, the text above is but wind blowing through November woods. At the cost of more than 4,000 lives and countless more maimed bodies, you have bought National Security for your country and its citizens. Congratulations. I am humbled.
The young man above is Bobby Warns. He was a US Marines Corporal. He fell in 2004 in Fallujah and left behind a pregnant wife. I hope and pray his wife and, IIRC daughter, are in good health. After 9/11, it became clear that America had been attacked by an enemy different from Nazi Germany and the USSR. It was a callous enemy who preferred to kill innocent citizens since it was incapabable of engaging US professional military. It was also an enemy who reckoned on its non-state nature for the US not hitting back, fully expecting America to look weak and disoriented and unsure how to retaliate. The enemy was gravely mistaken. America hit back hard by doing what it best does militarily, liberating other countries. In so doing, contrary to their initial intent tens of thousands of the enemy were lured to the battlefield... where they met their end. Today, the enemy which so out of the blue attacked the US on that fateful day in September 2001, is in total disarray. Alas, a heavy price was paid for it. 4,100 soldiers, among them Bobby Warns, are not among us anymore. I want to find the correct words to express my gratitude, I cannot. Maybe posting this photo and remembering people there once was this very fine young man, is the best I can do.
Let me conclude by posting a story of another man, a typical American, who fought his own fight. It is a most inspiring story. Especially at a time when half of America seems hell bent on following Obama's siren song down a path where for once, the EUSSR is ahead of the US. It is a path that ends on an economic, demographic and moral graveyard where shame for whiteness and concern over an ecological footprint, whatever that may be, has replaced the will to procreate and the hopes and virtues christianity offers for free. It is the Story of Cory Miller. Via Francis Marion:
Mr. Obama,
Given the uproar about the simple question asked you by Joe the Plumber, and the persecution that has been heaped on him because he dared to question you, I find myself motivated to say a few things to you myself. While Joe aspires to start a business someday, I already have started not one, but 4 businesses. But first, let me introduce myself. You can call me 'Cory the well driller'. I am a 54 year old high school graduate. I didn't go to college like you, I was too ready to go 'conquer the world' when I finished high school.
25 years ago at age 29, I started my own water well drilling business at a time when the economy here in East Texas was in a tailspin from the crash of the early 80's oil boom. I didn't get any help from the government, nor did I look for any. I borrowed what I could from my sister, my uncle, and even the pawn shop and managed to scrape together a homemade drill rig and a few tools to do my first job.
My businesses did not start as the result of privilege. It is the result of my personal drive, personal ambition, self discipline, self reliance, and a determination to treat my customers fairly. From the very start my business provided one other (than myself) East Texan a full time job. I couldn't afford a backhoe the first few years (something every well drilling business had), so I and my helper had to dig the mud pits that are necessary for each and every job with hand shovels. I had to use my 10 year old, 1/2 ton pickup truck for my water tank truck (normally a job for at least a 2 ton truck).
A year and a half after I started the business, I scraped together a 20% down payment to get a modest bank loan and bought a (28 year) old, worn out, slightly bigger drilling rig to allow me to drill deeper water wells in my area. I spent the next few years drilling wells with the rig while simultaneously rebuilding it between jobs. Through these years I never knew from one month to the next if I would have any work or be able to pay the bills. I got behind on my income taxes one year, and spent the next two years paying that back (with penalty and interest) while keeping up with ongoing taxes. I got behind on my water well supply bill 2 different years (way behind the second time... $80,000.00), and spent over a year paying it back (each time) while continuing to pay for ongoing supplies C.O.D.. Of course, the personal stress endured through these experiences and years is hard to measure. I do have a stent in my heart now to memorialize it all.
I spent the next 10 years developing the reputation for being the most competent and most honest water well driller in East Texas. 2 years along the way, I hired another full time employee for the drilling business so that we could provide full time water well pump service as well as the well drilling. Also, 3 years along the path, I bought a water well screen service machine from a friend, starting business # 2. 5 years later I made a business loan for $100,000.00 to build a new, higher production, computer controlled screen service machine. I had designed the machine myself, and it didn't work out for 3 years so I had to make the loan payments without the benefit of any added income from the new machine. No government program was there to help me with the payments, nor to help me sleep at night as I lay awake wondering how I would solve my machine problems or pay my bills. Finally, after 3 years, I got the screen machine working properly, and that provided another full time job for an East Texan in the screen service business.
2 years after that, I made another business loan, this time for $250,000.00, to buy another used drilling rig and all the support equipment needed to run another, larger, drill rig. This provided another 2 full time jobs for East Texans. Again, I spent a couple of years not knowing if I had made a smart move, or a move that would bankrupt me. For the third time in 13 years, I had placed everything I owned on the line, risking everything, in order to build a business.
A couple of years into this, I came up with a bright idea for a new kind of mud pump, a fundamentally necessary pump used on water well drill rigs. I spent my entire life savings to date (just $30,000.00), building a prototype of the pump and took it to the national water well convention to show it off. Customers immediately started coming out of the woodworks to buy the pumps, but there was a problem. I had depleted my assets making the prototype, and nobody would make me a business loan to start production of the new pumps. With several deposits for pump orders in hand, and nowhere to go, I finally started applying for as many credit cards as I could find and took cash withdrawals on these cards to the tune of over $150,000.00 (including modest loans from my dear sister and brother), to get this 3rd business going.
Yes, once again, I had everything hanging over the line in an effort to start another business. I had never manufactured anything, and I had to design and bring into production a complex hydraulic machine from an untested prototype to a reliable production model (in six months). How many nights I lay awake wondering if I had just made the paramount mistake of my life I cannot tell you, but there were plenty. I managed to get the pumps into production, which immediately created another 2 full time jobs in East Texas. Some of the models in the first year suffered from quality issues due to the poor workmanship of one of my key suppliers, so I and an employee (another East Texan employed) had to drive across the country to repair customers' pumps, practically from coast to coast. I stood behind the product, and made payments to all the credit cards that had financed me (and my brother and sister). I spent the next 5 years improving and refining the product, building a reputation for the pump and the company, working to get the pump into drill rig manufacturers' product lines, and paying back credit cards. During all this time I continued to manage a growing water well business that was now operating 3 drill rig crews, and 2 well service crews. Also, the screen service business continued to grow. No government programs were there to help me, Mr. Obama, but that's ok, I didn't expect any, nor did I want any. I was too busy fighting to make success happen to sit around waiting for the government to help me.
Now, we have been manufacturing the mud pumps for 7 years, my combined businesses employ 32 full time employees, and distribute $5,000,000.00 annually throughout the local economy. Now, just 4 months ago I borrowed $1,254,000.00, purchasing computer controlled machining equipment to start my 4th business, a production machine shop. The machine shop will serve the mud pump company so that we can better manufacture our pumps that are being shipped worldwide. Of course, the machine shop will also do work for outside companies as well. This has already produced 2 more full time jobs, and 2 more should develop out of it in the next few months. This should work out, but if it doesn't it will be because you, and the other professional politicians like yourself, will have destroyed our country's (and the world) economy with your meddling with mortgage loan programs through your liberal manipulation and intimidation of loaning institutions to make sure that unqualified borrowers could get mortgages. You see, at the very time when I couldn't get a business loan to get my mud pumps into production, you were working with Acorn and the Community Reinvestment Act programs to make sure that unqualified borrowers could buy homes with no down payment, and even no credit or worse yet, bad credit. Even the infamous, liberal, Ninja loans (No Income, No Job nor Assets). While these unqualified borrowers were enjoying unrealistically low interest rates, I was paying 22% to 24% interest on those credit cards that I had used to provide me the funds for the mud pump business that has created jobs for more East Texans. It's funny, because after 25 years of turning almost every dime of extra money back into my businesses to grow them, it has been only in the last two years that I have finally made enough money to be able to put a little away for retirement, and now the value of that has dropped 40% because of the policies you and your ilk have perpetrated on our country.
You see, Mr. Obama, I'm the guy you intend to raise taxes on. I'm the guy who has spent 25 years toiling and sweating, fretting and fighting, stressing and risking, to build a business and to get ahead. I'm the guy who has been on the very edge of bankruptcy more than a dozen times over the last 25 years, and all the while creating more and more jobs for East Texans who didn't want to take a risk, and wouldn't demand from themselves what I have demanded from myself. I'm the guy you characterize as 'the Americans who can afford it the most' that you believe should be taxed more to provide income redistribution 'to spread the wealth' to those who have never toiled, sweated, fretted, fought, stressed, or risked anything. You want to characterize me as someone who has enjoyed a life of privilege and who needs to pay a higher percentage of my income than those who have bought into your entitlement culture.
I resent you, Mr. Obama, as I resent all who want to use class warfare as a tool to advance their political careers. What's worse, each year more Americans buy into your liberal entitlement culture, and turn to the government for their hope of a better life instead of themselves. Liberals are succeeding through more than 40 years of collaborative effort between the predominant liberal media, and liberal indoctrination programs in the public school systems across our land.
What is so terribly sad about this is this. America was made great by people who embraced the one-time American culture of self reliance, self motivation, self determination, self discipline, personal betterment, hard work, risk taking. A culture built around the concept that success was in reach of every able bodied American who would strive for it. Each year that fewer Americans embrace that culture, we all descend together. We descend down the socialist path that has brought country after country ultimately to bitter and unremarkable states. If you and your liberal comrades in the media and school systems would spend half as much effort cultivating a culture of can-do across America as you do cultivating your entitlement culture, we could see Americans at large embracing the conviction that they can elevate themselves through personal betterment, personal achievement, and self reliance.
You see, when people embrace such ideals, they act on them. When people act on such ideals, they succeed. All of America could find herself elevating instead of deteriorating. But that would eliminate the need for liberal politicians, wouldn't it, Mr. Obama? The country would not need you if the country was convinced that problem solving was best left with individuals instead of the government. You and all your liberal comrades have got a vested interested in creating a dependent class in our country. It is the very business of liberals to create an ever expanding dependence on government. What's remarkable is that you, who have never produced a job in your life, are going to tax me to take more of my money and give it to people who wouldn't need my money if they would get off their entitlement mentality asses and apply themselves at work, demand more from themselves, and quit looking to liberal politicians to raise their station in life.
You see, I know because I've had them work for me before. Hundreds of them over these 25 years. People who simply will not show up to work on time. People who just will not work 5 days in a week, much less, 6 days. People always looking for a way to put less effort out. People who actually tell me that they would do more if I just would first pay them more. People who take off work to sit in government offices to apply to get free government handouts (gee, I wonder how things would have turned out for them if they had spent that time earning money and pleasing their employer?). You see, all of this comes from your entitlement mentality culture.
Oh, I know you will say I am uncompassionate. Sorry, Mr. Obama, wrong again. You see, I've seen what the average percentage of your income has been given to charities over the years of 2000 to 2004 (ignoring the years you started running for office - can you pronounce "politically motivated"), you averaged less than 1% annually. And your running mate, Joe Biden, averaged less than ¼% of his annual income in charitable contributions over the last 10 years. Like so many liberals, the two of you want to give to the needy, just as long as it is someone else's money you are giving to them. I won't say what I have given to charities over the last 25 years, but the percentage is several times more than you or Joe Biden (don't you just hate Google?). Tell me again how you feel my pain.
In short, Mr. Obama, your political philosophies represent everything that is wrong with our country. You represent the culture of government dependence instead of self reliance; Entitlement mentality instead of personal achievement; Penalization of the successful to reward the unmotivated; Political correctness instead of open mindedness and open debate. If you are successful, you may preside over the final transformation of America from being the greatest and most self-reliant culture on earth, to just another country of whiners and wimps, who sit around looking to the government to solve their problems. Like all of western Europe. All countries on the decline. All countries that, because of liberal socialistic mentalities, have a little less to offer mankind every year.
God help us...
Cory Miller
just an ordinary, extraordinary American, the way a lot of Americans used to be.
P.S. Yes, Mr. Obama, I am a real American...
OK. Nuff said. Now, let's pick up the pieces and define a strategy for 2012. Methinks we need to defeat the media and the whorenalists for starters. We also need a new Buckley, and not Christopher for heaven's sake. Ideas? C'mon people, cheer up!!!
MFBB.
