Today is the eleventh anniversary of the 9/11 attacks that changed our lives and our country in enumerable ways. I should be writing about the valiant actions of passengers on flight 93 or about the firemen and first responders who gave their lives trying to save as many as they could from the Trade Center towers. Instead of thinking about them, I find myself feeling anger over our governments reaction to that terrible day. I am angry that they decided to go to war against terrorism instead of going to war against Afghanistan. A war on terrorism, by design, will never end. It was Afghanistan that harbored the Taliban who harbored al Qaeda who harbored bin Laden. We should have gone into Afghanistan and done what needed to be done and had our troops home in no more than three years. Instead we are still there after all of these years. I am angry that our government passed the Patriot Act which led to the creation of the Department of Homeland Security and TSA. Our rights are being eroded in the name of security which few of us feel. I feel like the terrorist have won. They have us terrorized.
And so, instead of writing about the events of 9/11, I come to you, the handful of loyal followers who see fit to comment here on a regular basis, to ask if you think I have gotten too close to the edge and that maybe I should take a break from blogging until I get control of troubling thoughts I am having? Allow me to explain what has lead me to ask this question.
Yesterday started out as a normal day for me. After publishing my post for the day, I began my rounds of my blogroll as well as visiting other customary haunts looking for source material for future blog posts. The only difference yesterday was that I told myself that I didn’t need any new sources because I already had several posts worth of material. However, among other articles, I read three that…well, they sent me into a ucommon rage. I am going to give you a brief summary of each article and then I will explain my reaction to them.
Article 1. Reconquistas Helping to Write California Law
This is an article from the blog, rjjrdq’s America II. Yes the author¡s handel is five consanents. I have been a follower of rjjrdq since my earliest days of blogging. rjjrdq lives in southern California. Although he writes on many subjects, I would guess that about 80% percent of the time he writes on the subject of illegal immigrants. He strongly believes that if we don¡t get control of this problem in the not too distant future they will be able to out vote us and I agree with him. In this article, rjjrdq inform us that California has a bill before its legislature, SB 901, that would make California a sanctury state. In short, the law if passed would allow all the illegals that want to, to enter California freely and then the state would ignore federal laws and give them all the documents they need to live in the US without fear of deportation. The Mexican American Legal Defense Fund (MALDEF) is working with the California legislature to find a way to do this without any system to track their where abouts. In other words, once the illegals have their documents they could move on to any state they wish with their documents in hand.
Article 2. Chicago Bled Dry By Striking Teachers¡ Unions
In this National Review Online article we learn about Chicago teachers going on strike for the first time in twenty-five years. We are told that these teachers salaries of $76,000 a year before benifits, they pay only 3 percent of their health-care costs and out of every new dollar set aside for public education in Illinois in the last five years, a full 71 cents has gone to teacher retirement costs, and they turned down an offer of 16 percent salary increase over four years.
Article 3. Insight: GM’s Volt: The ugly math of low sales, high costs
This Reuters article is quite long. Rather than try to summarize it, suffice it to say that the story of General Motors and its Chevy Volt is not a pretty one. The bottom line is that the public finds the Chevy Volt to be cost prohibitive.
Okay. Normally, anyone of these article would have served as a source for writing my own article. I would parse them, make some snide remarks and offer up my opinions. That is what I do here at Conservatives on Fire every day. Not this time. This time I felt a surge of rage and a desire that people suffer and pay the price of their stupidity.
I found myself wishing the Peoples Republic of California would finally go bankrupt and that California would come crawling to Washington begging for a bailout and wishing we would have a president that would tell them where to go.
Now that Chicago is facing some of the same problems that Scott Walker faced in Wisconsin and Chris Christie face in New Jersey, instead of swallowing my pride and throwing my support behind their Mayor, I found myself hoping that Rahm “Never let a crisis go to waste” Emanuel would fall flat on his face and that the City of Thugs would go bankrupt.
As for Government Motors, I want them to fail and go bankrupt again. It ¡s not that I want to punish the people of GM. It is that I want the history books to tell the true story of the arrogant corrupt and stupid Barack Obama who played politics and wasted our money to reward his big union friends.
What is most disturbing about having these thoughts of revenge is that I know full well that many innocent people would be hurt. Yet, I find myself rationalizing that these or similar things must happen. How else will California or Chicago ever come to their senses? How else will the average American learn just badly Barack Obama broke the laws and screwed America for his own gain?
So, I ask you, dear friends, am I standing too close to the edge? Have I already gone over the deep end? Am I alone in feeling these things or have some of you ever entertained similar thoughts? Do I need to step back and take a break from blogging until I can get these thoughts under control? I could use your help today.
Well, that’s what I’m thinking. What are your thoughts?
silverfiddle
September 11, 2012
You’re not off the deep end, Jim, and I don’t think you’re motivated by revenge. Failure teaches us, we learn from it, but we’ve set up a system to delay failure and mask it, which means we learn nothing. That is what is so frustrating.
I was going to write something similar, but much angrier than what you have written, but decided instead to keep my mouth shut and just post a tribute video and turn comments off. I don’t want to deal with it today.
So, my friend, you hit the bullseye today, as you do so often. This self-esteem nation needs a big dose of failure that puts us into shit up to our necks and forces us to dig out or die. Only an experience like that can turn this nation around.
Conservatives on Fire
September 11, 2012
Thank you, Kurt. You can not know how much your words have helped me today! Judge Roberts was right about one thinf in his decision on ObamaCare. People’s votes have consequences.
Infidel de Manahatta
September 11, 2012
Your anger is well-placed. Terrorism is a tactic, not an enemy. Our former President should have declared war on that pre-medieval shithole of a country known as Afghanistan, bombed it into the stone age and left.
Conservatives on Fire
September 11, 2012
“Terrorism is a tactic, not an enemy”
That, my friend, is the best explanation I have ever heard. Excellent!
Bob Mack
September 11, 2012
Thanks to the socialists … uh, Democrats … we’re all standing on the edge. They’d know it too, if they had the sense to look down.
Conservatives on Fire
September 11, 2012
Where do they think they are going to kick the can when they reach the end of this blind alley?
john galt - America's Chronicle
September 11, 2012
it wouldn’t be off-track to suppose that many more people have the same feelings and reaction but who are a bit more shy of expressing them than you are.
People’s bad choices need to have their consequences on them if we want lessons-learned.
Conservatives on Fire
September 11, 2012
Decision’s come with consequences. Chief Justice Roberts gat that right, at least.
5etester
September 11, 2012
“And so, instead of writing about the events of 9/11, I come to you, the handful of loyal followers who see fit to comment here on a regular basis, to ask if you think I have gotten too close to the edge and that maybe I should take a break from blogging until I get control of troubling thoughts I am having?”
I don’t know about you Jim, but I see blogging as an outlet for these types of things. Otherwise you’ll just explode. Unless you plan on shutting off all of your news sources to keep fanning the flames, I say keep up the venting. No way are you alone on this one.
Conservatives on Fire
September 11, 2012
You’re right , of course, 5ester. Venting the anger is heakthier. I think I was feeling alone and needed to hear that others have similar feelings. Thanks, my friend.
Steve Dennis
September 11, 2012
Hang in there Jim, you are not too close to the edge and I know exactly how you feel. Every once in awhile I feel like stepping away for good and giving up because I get so damn frustrated but then I think about my boys and I know that I must continue on. There are days when I simply decide the fight isn’t in me and I take the day off from posting, perhaps you just need a couple of days off. It does do wonders to step back for a couple of days and it may reinvigorate you.
Conservatives on Fire
September 11, 2012
Thanks, Steve. I think I just needed to know that I wasn’t the only feeling so frustrated.
BTW, I was just at your site and read your post on the Middle.Wast and after writing a short comment I tried to post it and there came a message that says; mpinkeyes.wordpress.com is no longer avalable. it goes on to say : This blog has been archived ot suspended for violations of our terms of service.
I hope this is a wordpress mistake.
Goodluck!
Steve Dennis
September 12, 2012
Thanks for your concern Jim, it was quite harrowing to see so much work disappear in an instant while my blog was suspended. Apparently by posting six links in the same story my blog was reported and shut down while I was investigated. Thankfully WordPress acted quickly and got me back online!
And no you are not alone, sometimes when you follow this stuff as closely as we do it can get overwhelming but we must fight on. While I was shut down I actually thought about how I told you to hang in there and thought that if you visited my site and saw it was down that you might have thought I didn’t take my own advice from you and gave up–all sorts of thoughts were running through my head during those few minutes which seemed like forever..
republicanmother
September 11, 2012
Maybe I’ve gone off the deep end, but I’m loving it! As a proud citizen on flyoever country, I know the Jonah-esque shadenfreude of waiting for God’s wrath to shave off the sinful parts of this country.
I take the eternal perspective, knowing that all this was totally foretold and I’m getting to witness it. I think that’s pretty cool and sombering at the same time. What we’re witnessing is evil unleashed. All those demons are running around down here and they made their way from the swine into our leaders over the past centuries. That’s all I can figure out anyway.
Writing is my outlet for the frustration, as it’s all we’ve really got left.
Conservatives on Fire
September 12, 2012
Several have reminded me that writing is the healthy way to vent our anger. Thanks, rM.
Matt Ross (@MrEvilMatt)
September 12, 2012
I’d like to repeat what Kurt said. You’re pointing out the inevitable results of cronyism, government interference, and general moonbattery.
Conservatives on Fire
September 12, 2012
Thanks, Matt. I apprecite hearing that I haveb’t gone off the rails. Not yet anyway.
Conservatives on Fire
September 12, 2012
Thank you for a great comment, Bob. I didn0t want to take a break from blogging. But, I was worried about the level of frustration I was feeling and wondering if I had gone off the rails. It helped greatly to hear that I was not alone and the others share similar feelings to mine. This election is so important and because of where I live, I do not have my finger on the American pulse. Over the years, we Americans have elected some terrible people to go to Washington. We are going to have to aceppt the consequences of what we have done as a people. Whoever coined the phrase “There is no such thing as a free lunch” was exactly right. I want to encourage to accept that it is time to pay the piper. If not, our children and grandchildren will have to pay.
Thanks for your kind words, Bob.
theCL
September 13, 2012
You need to go over the edge. So I say, “jump!” It’s the only way to break yourself free of this Orwellian dialectic we Americans like to call politics.
As for revenge … There is no need to desire revenge, because the consequences are baked into the, uh, “solutions.” In other words, they can’t succeed in any meaningful sense. Innocent people will be hurt, but not out of spite. They will be hurt by the very “solutions” our bipartisan Rulers enforce.
I think frustration in this game stems from mostly a) battling the day-to-day soap operas instead of ideas; and b) the gut (and correct) instinct that partisan politics can’t – and won’t – provide any genuine solutions. Arguments are much harder to make when you’re tied into a partisan box. You find yourself making excuses for that which just yesterday you swore to God to be eternally against. Which can put any decent man into the nut house.
Conservatives on Fire
September 13, 2012
Hi, CL. I know you are right. I can not rebutt your arguments. But, going over the edge seems to mean you have to accept that the country must collapse before it can get better. For now I must hang on to the hope that the country can still be saved against allodds. Thanks for your comment, CL.
theCL
September 13, 2012
Well, I don’t think it has to collapse, I’m just certain it will. That is, as long as we stick with the Status Quo.Which, apparently, is what most voting Americans desire.
Then again, when you consider that more than half our income gets sucked away in various taxes, that everything we see, touch and imagine is regulated by bureaucrats, a central bank centrally plans our corporatist economy (and blatantly counterfeits trillions), our “peace officers” have not only been militarized, they act as abusive thugs, invasive government snooping is accepted, execution by Executive fiat is the norm, and the federal debt is so large only clinically insane psychopaths attempt to justify it … One could argue – quite convincingly – that America has already collapsed. It certainly isn’t the America I grew up in and thought I knew.
And that list, btw, barely scratches the surface.
Think of “going over the edge” as the breaking point that allowed you to finally see the world for what it is, instead of what it was, what you wanted it to be, or what you wish it had been. This isn’t negative, but liberating. It makes you a leader, not a follower. It allows you to define the fight instead of bowing to the Status Quo.
It had always been a tenuous relationship, but for me, it was the ’08 crisis and subsequent bailouts (particularly TARP) that pushed me over the edge. Sure, the PATRIOT Act, DHS and war lies pushed me to the brink, but I’m a finance guy. I saw the banking collapse, TARP and all its evil spawn for what it was … a blatant power grab (hmmm, just like PATRIOT and DHS), outright theft for the b enefit of the ruling class, and a gift for Obama’s social democracy wrapped in a bow. I went over the edge. Then I studied history, particularly movement history, and learned a lot.
If you want to know who your real enemy is, don’t bother with the sands of the ME. Check the banks of the Potomac. The enemy is there. It goes by the names, Republican and Democrat.
Good night my friend.
Conservatives on Fire
September 14, 2012
It must be very frustrating for you, CL, to know that there are people like me who know better, but won’t givr up. In discussions with other Libertarians, when they try to convince me to vote on principle and vote for Gary Johnson, I tell them that I am working to change the Republican party. They tell me it is hopeless. I tell them when the Libertarian Party has elected enough members to the House and Senate to make a difference to let me know. mean time I will keep working to change the Republican Party and hope that America doesn’t run out of time. Has America already run out of time? Maybe. But we won’t know until the fat lady sings.