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From time to time, my opinions and remarks elicit criticism, as they are intended to do so for several reasons. I have strong convictions on subjects that affect the safety and welfare of all people, my family and friends. I have acquired them over eighty years of analyzing past and current events and a passion for truth and honesty that stands the test of basic elementary common sense. Safety first has always been an important part of both my personal and working life, and I learned long ago that safety systems have to be tested periodically. I test mine by soliciting the opinions of others.
My first article appeared on April 18, 1995 in the Express thirteen years ago, and I have enjoyed everything about the experience. I have learned a lot about human nature and people, somewhat along the lines of the late great Will Rogers. I continue to write it for the many who tell me they enjoy it and for those I know it antagonizes. I learned from personal experience and intuition that nothing infuriates people more than the realization that some of their long-held philosophical beliefs are not shared by others.
I have had a lot of worthy opponents over the years and have had it out in print with many who later became friends with me. They were people who were big enough and intelligent enough to understand that people do not always have to agree on everything to get along. They were people who did not begin their rebuttals with personal attacks and call for censorship of what they label hate speech for any thinking that does not meet their exact thought process, even if it is the truth. I learned a long time ago that dignifying any response of that nature only brings you down on their level, and they have done more to discredit their argument than anything you might say to point out the obvious. An old-timer pointed out to me long ago that when you argue with a fool, you end up with two fools arguing.
Some groups and cliques have a propensity for expressing themselves in what can only be described as playing fast and loose with the truth and reality. It seems to me, for the most part, the further to the left they lean the more they tend to do so. Elites seem to be particularly adept at same. Kathleen Parker in a recent article pointed out that being effete comes naturally to Democrats while Michelle Malkin claims the odor of elitism is like onion breath: It’s quick to acquire, hard to mask.
The present chase for the Democratic presidential nomination presents a troubling conundrum for the party. They have long courted and exploited race and gender and now that the only two viable contenders fit both categories, how are they to choose? As Reverend Wright, Obama’s pastor, so less-than-eloquently put it, in another context, “The chickens are coming home to roost.” What’s the old saying? Race trumps gender? Where will it all end up?
On the subject of Reverend Wright, Barack might be better off if he had learned of George Washington’s advice before associating himself with Reverend Wright. Washington once wrote: “Associate yourself with men of quality if you esteem your own reputation, for tis better to be alone than in bad company.” Party faithfuls, in trying to spin the reality of the situation, remind me of an observation Whittaker Chambers once made, “Innocence seldom utters outraged shrieks. Guilt does.”
Many of my opinions have been reinforced and supported by famous people who do not fit the mold envisioned for them by the conventional left wing mind-set. Two that come quickly to my mind are Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams, present day black columnists. The following is a sample of their observations on the passing scene.
Thomas Sowell: “The political left has long favored putting more and more decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong—not only judges but zoning boards, environmental commissions and, internationally, the United Nations and The World Court.” He also states: “It’s usually futile to try to talk facts and analysis to people who are enjoying a sense of moral superiority in their ignorance.”
Walter Williams: “The environmental extremist’s true agenda has little or nothing to do with climate change. Their true agenda is to find a means to control our lives, the kind of repressive human control, not to mention government-sanctioned mass murder, seen under communism that has lost any measure of respectability. So, people who want that kind of control must come up with a new name, and that new name is environmentalism.”
One thing we should be aware of when choosing a president is that one cannot be stupid and become president, but one can be articulate and stupid. I have come to know a great many of those personally in my lifetime.