Hope Springs Eternal

I am a Texas Rangers fan.

When I first began paying attention to baseball when I was 8 or 9 living in Maryland, I was not attracted to the successful Baltimore Orioles, but to the hapless, hopeless Washington Senators.  I don't know why.  Maybe I like the idea of being the perpetual underdogs, fighting against larger market teams and the bottomless pockets of some AL East teams, especially the "Damn Yankees".  I watched on TV as they lost their final game to the hated Yankees by forfeit in the 9th inning while actually winning.

I followed the team to Texas in 1972 and for the last 40 years I have loved this team.

When I was in college in the 1980's, I was a regular "bleacher bum" in the old Arlington Stadium, enduring the sweltering heat of August in those old aluminium benches, cheering on my team to repeated last place finishes.

In the late 1990's I thought we had arrived, but again, the Yankees shattered our dreams.

I watched great players, Mike Hargrove, Fergie Jenkins, Jim Sundberg, and of course, Nolan Ryan.

I saw management trade pitchers for hitters then hitters for pitchers, year after year, never finding the right balance.  The seemingly endless parade of Managers and the ridiculous A-Rod fiasco.  Still I watched, went to as many games as I could, bought the merchandise, and prayed for "next year".

The last three years have been ones of emotional highs and lows.  Thrilling victories and heartbreaking defeats.  Losing the AL West in the last game of the season was especially hard.  I am not a "boo-bird", but if anyone has a right to be disappointed, I do.

That being said, baseball is a game of hope, and each spring is a fresh start.  Only 5 months until pitchers and catchers report and Spring Training will be a time of joy again.

Here's to next year!

P.S.  I'm not sure whether I will be supporting the A's or the O's in the playoffs yet.  Both teams played with lots of heart this year and deserve to do well.

P.P.S  If Josh Hamilton wants to leave the team that gave him a chance when no other team would, then I wish him better luck than Albert Pujols has had with the Angels.

P.P.P.S.  No matter what, I still HATE THE YANKEES!!

A Plague on both their houses...

Almost every day, I read comments to this or that news story and I am struck by the number of people who seem to think that the problem with our government is not enough cooperation between the parties, or that both parties are equally corrupt and ineffective and to blame for the problems in our country today.  You know those people.  What I call the "plague on both their houses" types or to coin a moniker: plaguers.  The offer no solutions to the problem, but heap condemnation.

I have come to the conclusion that, in reality, these people are lazy citizens.  Not lazy in the way that they are not hard working, but lazy in their thought processes and political awareness.

Let us take for example our current economic "recovery".  The plaguers would have us believe that: 1. The Democrats haven't done enough to help the economy, and 2.  The Republicans have prevented solutions to the problem.

Let's see, when the Democrats poured almost 1 Trillion in borrowed money into the economy promising that unemployment would not rise above 8 percent, the Republicans had no power to stop them.  Obviously, just by basic observation, it is clear that this money did not do what the Democrats promised that it would do.  Yet, the plaguers don't seem to attribute blame for this failure to the Democrats.

When the Democratic Congress tried to come back for a "second bite" in 2010, the people rose up and gave Republicans control of the house.  It is at this point that the plaguers say the the Republicans became the party of NO!  Blocking the President's "effective" policy solutions.  You know, the ones that worked so well in 2009 and 2010.

Now really, seems to me that these people are either: 1. Stupid or uninformed, or 2. Really Democrats who like to pretend that they aren't.  While I can understand that, the are being disingenuous.

I had a conversation online last night wherein a fellow challenged me, insinuating that I had never voted for a Democrat, therefore making me some kind of a hyper-partisan biased against one party or another.

I tried to explain to him that I was a Conservative, not necessarily a Republican, and that I tried to vote for the most conservative candidate available.  I also tried to explain to him that in many cases in Texas, particularly in county or local elections in the rural area where I live, there is ONLY a Democratic candidate and that I had, as recently as this year, voted for that person.

At that point, I turned the question back on him.  He admitted quite quickly that he was a liberal Democrat and had NEVER voted for a Republican.  Yet, he could not admit the hypocrisy of his question.

When I was in boot camp many years ago, when we were marching and someone messed up, turning the wrong way or getting out of step, the Company Commander would stop us and provide some corrective "motivation".  But if EVERYONE in the company did the wrong thing, no one noticed, and even the CC was left scrambling to catch up.  Thus I learned the lesson:

If everyone is wrong, no one is wrong.

There must be responsibility.  In our two-party system, there has to be political accountability.  You cannot blame everyone for every problem.  You must discriminate the noise and attenuate the message.

There is Right and Wrong in the political spectrum.  Stop being lazy and uninformed and FIND IT!

What were they thinking?

Yesterday on the steps of our nation's capitol, a group of activists held a rally that they entitled "We are Women".  The poorly attended rally...

was billed as an opportunity to tell Congress, who by the way is currently in recess, to stand up for what the feminists claim are their "rights" to free contraception and free abortions.  Some of the more creative women, shall we say, dressed the part, literally.

Donning the costume of, well, their private bits.  They were joined by others from the group Code Pink later to reinforce their demands.

Now let me make something completely clear:  I am a man who fully supports EQUAL rights for women.  There is no reason that women shouldn't be treated, hired, fired and promoted on an equal basis with men.  The law has NO business discriminating against anyone because of their gender.

That being said, I have a question.

After years, no decades, of being told that women do not want to be treated as sexual objects, WHY are then now presenting themselves as nothing more than SEXUAL OBJECTS?

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood...

"Two roads diverged in a yellow wood..."

Well, it certainly looks like President Obama has gotten what he wants.  He has been doing his utmost to make this election a choice of ideologies between conservatism and his own brand of "pragmatism" which is of course thinly veiled liberalism.

So a stark choice then.  Fine.  That's what we conservatives have wanted since the day Ronald Reagan left office.

In the last 80 years, we have had only 8 years of conservative stewardship.  8 years when the power of the private sector and the strength of the individual were set free and allowed to grow.  Those 8 years under Ronald Reagan set in motion 27 years of success, wealth and prosperity for our nation.

In 2007, when the liberal party gained control of both houses of Congress, they began to turn the nation away from the path of success.  In 2009, by taking the Presidency they had two years of unfettered control to "turn the ship of state" and turn it they did.

Look at any economic measure, employment, poverty, business activity, anything and you will find that in 6 years of liberal stewardship of our economy we are right back where we started in 1980.

So yes, let's make this election a choice.

Let us be bold and take the road "less traveled by"

4 more years of Democratic disaster, or a return to the policies of conservative success.

As Frost said, it will make "all the difference".

The Myth of the Undecided Voter

As the presidential election approaches, I have seen more and more articles about the "undecideds".  This morning, Politico had an article about "The disappearing undecideds..."  In the article, the author basically lamented that our country has become so polarized that the "middle" where these undecideds supposedly reside are becoming fewer and fewer.  But seriously, let me ask you...

Is there any INFORMED citizen in this country that hasn't already made up his or her mind?

I will agree that there are those who adhere to the extreme, those Democrats that would never vote for a Republican for any reason, and vice versa.  Call that 1/3rd of the voting public.

There are also those who really try to understand the issues, weigh the people and personalities of those running, and make the best decision that they can, though they tend to "lean" to one side or the other.  Call that also about 1/3rd of the voting public.

That leaves a third of the voting eligible population who are either too clueless, too self-absorbed or honestly too stupid to have an opinion.

You know some of these people.  They live in their own world, oblivious to virtually everything around them.  They seldom watch news programs, never read newspapers or magazines, have no opinions, and feel strongly about nothing.  If it weren't for the relentless efforts of political parties, they wouldn't even be registered to vote, let alone actually take part in an election process.

Are THESE the people you want choosing your next president?

You know, THESE PEOPLE!



OK, so call me a snob, but I'm not sure I'm comfortable with these people breeding, let alone electing our president.

If ANYONE can live in this country at this time and NOT have an opinion about anything, something is seriously wrong.

So, the next time YOU come across one of these clueless creatures who know more about who is on "The Bachelor" or "American Idol" than who their Senator or Congressperson is, PLEASE politely encourage them NOT to vote.

This has been a message in the public interest.

Go back to your lives citizens...

Just a helpful hint...

For those LGBTQ folks trying to raise the awareness of the rest of America through their "Kiss-In" at Chick-fil-a this week, just a bit of advice.  If you want to influence your average straight male in this country into being more open to your cause, post more pics like this...

This one...  Not so much...

Now... who will see humor in this post?

I'm a HATER!

That's right folk, I'm a hater!  At least that's what I've been called by people who don't agree with my opinions. Funny thing is that I was raised in a country where I was taught there was a thing called "free speech" where you could openly express your opinions.  Others didn't have to agree with your opinions, but they should at least respect your right to have them.

"I may not agree with your opinions, but I will defend to the death your right to them!"

No more!  If your opinion differs, then you are beyond the pale.  You are a hate filled non-person who does not deserve any consideration other than to be dismissed and disdained.

So, when I question the President's "evolution" over gay marriage as being political, I am a gay hater.

When I caution people not to jump to conclusions in the Treyvon Martin case, I am a racist hater.

When I question the so called "scientific consensus" of Global Climate Change, I am a "flat-earth" denying hater of the planet!

I was reading an article this morning in the New Yorker Magazine Online (I do my best to read BOTH sides of the political press) and the author quoted his wife as saying "People are really willing to vote for Mitt Romney? They hate Obama so much they’d vote for Romney?"  Really?  REALLY?


Why is the assumption that my political motivations are all based on HATE?  Can't I have a policy disagreement or dislike his leadership style, or his foreign policy?


Seems like just a few years ago, the press was trumpeting that "dissent is the highest form of patriotism".


I guess that only applies when your "dissent" is against a Republican president.  

Francisco Franco is still dead...

Back in 1975, when Saturday Night Live was still funny, Generalissimo Francisco Franco, leader of the Spanish Civil War and ruler for almost 40 years, died. I suppose that this in itself was not funny, and Chevy mispronounced Generalissimo, but it was an admitted turning point in world history.
For what seemed like a year afterwards, Chevy began Weekend Update with "The top story tonight; Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead". A running gag as it were.

 Fast forward 36 years. On May 2, 2011, President Obama announced that the Navy SEALs had dropped into a compound in Abbotabad, Pakistan and killed Osama bin Laden. I don't have to remind you that he was the person who plotted the attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001 and most assuredly deserved to be killed.

I congratulate President Obama for having the political courage to take a risk. It has been his only major foreign policy achievement of his term.

One year later, as the anniversary of this accomplishment approached and in the midst of a political year, our President released an attack ad against his Republican rival asserting that Romney wouldn't have "pulled the trigger" and made the "gutsy call" to send in the SEALs and kill bin Laden.
 
I think Romney summed up my reaction very well: "Are you kidding? Even Carter would have done it!" So much for a gutsy call.

THEN, the President jets off to Afghanistan to sign a new agreement with their supposed leader and spends some more time patting himself on the back on his great accomplishment. It seems like we hear something every day about himself or one of his spokesmen reminding us about the success of the raid.

I'm afraid that for the next six months we are going to be hearing: "The top story tonight: Osama bin Laden is still dead".

Where's Chevy when you need him?

P.S. Sorry for being away for so long, but I promise to do better as I seem to have somewhat more time on my hands of late.