THIS IS AN EDITORIAL – Coming At You Straight From The Middle Of The Road

I am fortunate enough to live on one of our nations barrier islands. Small narrow strips of land running along the coast with the ocean on one side and a quiet river on the other. Admittedly I have over the years become a bit of an “island snob”. In other words, I make every attempt to not cross the bridge over to the mainland. The pace here is much slower and laid back and the lifestyle has attracted some of the more colorful characters that would seem out of place anywhere else. Kooky is the new normal. It’s still one of those communities where people still leave their front doors unlocked and kids play in the streets after dark. My neighbor across the street had just moved in from one of those cities on the mainland and on Halloween night expressed with some degree of confusion how strange it was that the teenage kids walked along the path to his front door instead of the much shorter route across his lawn and actually said ‘thank you” after getting their handful of candy. I laughed and told him to look out for the fire truck flashing its lights, a police escort, Christmas Carols playing over loudspeakers, fully decked out with Santa as it makes it’s way through the neighborhood stopping at homes with small children on Christmas Eve. Yes, I live in Mayberry with surfboards and I like it.

On Veterans Day I had to venture out over that bridge and run some errands on the mainland. On my way I went down Main Street and it was just as expected. Even though it is a small town with an even smaller budget, American flags were flying at every intersection from one end of Main Street to the other. Being a veteran myself it made me feel good that my community still takes time to demonstrate their appreciation to those that have made the ultimate sacrifice. That feeling of pride and appreciation was quickly squashed as I made it across the bridge to the mainland.

The town at the end of the bridge was easily 4 to 5 times the size of the one where I live. The old main street has gone through a revitalization and is in full swing. Although on a smaller scale there are a couple of places that remind me of Bangers in Austin, TX. Plenty of little shops and lined with old growth trees. The blockades had just been moved after the Veterans Day parade had finished. The thing is that as we drove through there wasn’t a single flag, sign, or piece of bunting anywhere in sight. The reproduction gas lamps along the sidewalk were bare. The banner arms bare since the last summer festival.

So what does Veterans Day mean anymore? Another excuse for a sale or a floating holiday we can use on the Friday after Thanksgiving. I’d say it’s forgotten. Forgotten just like duty, honor, country…

November 10, 2016

Around 2:30 AM when the news broke that Hillary had conceded I was relieved. I was relieved because this completely over the top hostile election was finally over. Unfortunately I could not have been more wrong. Pence introduced the new President elect without a single harsh word about the opponent. Trump came out and gave a reconciliatory acceptance speech that started off with thanking Hillary for a hard fought campaign as well as her 30 years of service to the nation. Oddly enough, there was no sighting or word from Hillary until the following day.

The posts on social media had already started but have now gone into full swing. People that I once thought to be not only educated, socially concerned, and generally speaking good people have turned into vile creatures using language that pales by comparison to anything used by the candidates. I do understand what it feels like when your candidate has lost but this is inexcusable. Encouraging violence and demonstrations against the very process they pretend to idealize.

My concern began to grow as the morning came and no word from Hillary. After being nearly 2 hours late to the morning announcement that Hillary was going to speak at 9:30 Kane takes the stage and cannot help himself and has to slip in a few backhanded swings at the opposition. Hillary herself never really comes clean and one can definitely sense that she is angry and simply cannot believe that she had lost. She does offer the ”open mind” and “give him a chance” gesture but never really gives in.

Result, exactly what one should expect when the campaign on both sides is based on garbage and not the issues. Surrogates have run amok encouraging hateful angry rhetoric and so called celebrities calling people stupid, ignorant, racists for voting for the opposition. Kids are out in the streets repeating the trash they have been fed “Misogynist”, “Bigot”, “Homophobic”, “Racist”, and worse. Where is the leadership from the left speaking out and actually admonishing this behavior? No celebrities on the television reaching out to the same followers they had during the campaign, halfhearted Hillary concession speech, or limp transition talk from the White House. Even the responsible media at MSNBC cannot help themselves by finding surrogates to interview that actually justify riotous behavior. This nonsense should not have gone on during the campaign and is unacceptable after the process has taken its course.

I have tried to remember and I can’t recall any protests much less a riot after Obama was elected (either time). Shame on the so-called progressive leadership, shame on the leftist media.

November 4, 2016:

Internet trolls and bullies of all types. So what is the deal with these people on the internet? Then again none of this is really new. Whenever people are given the opportunity to spew hateful thoughts/words/ideas without the threat of reprisal they will. It doesn’t matter if it’s the 30 year old looser on their computer living in his parents basement, that big kid in 4^th grade that everyone was afraid of, the grande dame hiding behind a pile of money and lawyers, the nasty pack of 13 year old girls in some nameless junior high, or meddling soccer mom with nothing better to do. They all find ways to lash out be it verbal, written, or physical. They only do it because they can and because we let them. There is nothing wrong with having a difference of opinion. Believe me when I tell you it’s okay not to agree on everything. Matter of fact, it’s rather boring when everyone agrees on everything.

October 30, 2016:

Sorry folks, real life has a habit of getting in the way of things. Maybe it was a good thing since it has given me some time to read, listen, and digest what has been transpiring lately. What I am about to say may be blasphemous to some but I’ll say it anyway. If I were a card-carrying member of the Democratic Party I would be losing my mind. Forget about the Tea Party and how it has turned things upside down over at the GOP, what has happened to the Democratic Party has few comparisons in our lifetime. The cast of characters reads like a most wanted list of collaborators, liars, and cheats. Hsu, Wasserman Schultz, Brazile, McAuliffe, Abedin, Band, Blumenthal, Podesta, Tanden, Warren, the media as a whole, and even Bernie have been more than happy to sell their souls to help ole Hillary. Payoffs to Iran, inappropriate handling of classified material that would have put anyone else in jail, Clinton Foundation, Benghazi, and let us not forget all that fun during the WJC White House days starting with Travel Gate and ending with cleaning out the White House when they moved out. There isn’t a lie these people will not jump behind or a dollar they will not take. This makes Nixon and his team of break-in artists look good.

There was a time when Democrats actually tried to help others and provide opportunities for those who did not have them. This is no longer the case. The new Democratic leadership has discovered that the best thing to do is promise everything to everyone but in the end give nothing to anyone except a select few. Keep the downtrodden underfoot by promising a helpful hand while stepping on their necks. The New Democracy.

September 25, 2016

Yes it is the night before the first in of a series of debates before the presidential election. The talking heads are almost in full swing trying to out guess what the candidates will do tomorrow night. So does it really matter what they say or how they say what they will tomorrow night. To be honest I have to admit that I have, to a great extent, “prejudged these two candidates.

I expect Mr. Trump to continue doing what has worked so far and that is for him to be himself. He will come in direct and with likely little filter. As he has done forever he will be the multi-millionaire (or is it billionaire?) that says exactly what he is thinking at that moment in time. He has as high of a 50/50 chance of being wrong and will have to correct himself in subsequent interviews.   This worked during the campaign because people were sick and tired of politics as usual. Tell people what they want to hear and once in office figure out how to talk it all away, how the opponents undermined your authority and so on. What made him so well liked out on the campaign trail has also become his greatest problem. As president of the United States one must have a filter, one must think before speaking.

Now we come to Madam Secretary Clinton. I too have some expectations with regards to her performance and to be frank, I expect her to remain the same as always. Speaking truthfully and honestly is like Kryptonite to Superman when it comes to her. There is not an utterance that escapes her lips that has not been through focus groups, gone through judicial review, and rehearsed at least twice ahead of time. She is the consummate politician that assumes to know what I need, what I want from my elected leadership, and how I expect to be spoken to.

In the end I see two candidates that do not really appeal to me. One has a big mouth but I can believe what he says. Yeah he is a screw up in that way but I can overlook that sort of behavior since it can be corrected. Now the other candidate cannot be trusted to tell you the time of day. This I cannot overlook since it isn’t a behavior that can’t be corrected. We are talking about a character flaw of the deepest nature and that is exactly what I expect from her.

September 24, 2016

Yes this is what we used to call an editorial. I kind of miss that opening statement qualifying that the following was an editorial and that it did not reflect the point of view of the network or the show sponsors. Remember those days? You first had the news, straightforward facts about what was happening around me. The news was structured: International, national, local, sports, and weather. Then almost as if it was a different show somebody else came on the news. Sometimes it was the news anchor, or other such individual and they gave you an interpretation of the facts or their opinion on a particular topic and what it should mean to you. I remember those editorials were polite opinions and not too much of a departure from the facts that had been recently presented.

We no longer have that reliable news at 6 or 11pm. What we have today are nothing but grossly biased broadcasts of something that might have once been a news story until it was dropped in the laps of often frustrated political hacks that don’t even attempt to veil their own bias and attempt to pass off the garbage they espouse as genuine news. It’s so bad that I find myself needing to listen and read from “news” networks from both ends of the political spectrum (and sometimes international) in order to collect enough factual pieces of information in order to come up with what is close to the truth.

Now I will tell you that I am a card-carrying member of the Republican Party. This of course does not mean that I am a rich, bigoted, bible carrying, machine gun wielding, redneck. As I call it out in the subtitle, “Coming at you straight from the middle of the road” I am a fiscally conservative, socially liberal, educated, veteran, pro gun, pro choice, willing to listen, middle of the road Republican. I believe that my liberal friends are very well intentioned but more often than not lost when it comes to actual execution. They press for issues that make them feel good about themselves but often forget about the disasters that trail behind the good intentions they legislate. On the other hand I shake my head in frustration when some of my extremely “right minded” friends talk about what God intended. I do believe that your faith, race, education, and sexual orientation have nothing to do with what kind of jackass you can be. Equal opportunity in its purest form.

With all that said I will now begin to espouse my interpretation of the news and society as a whole. My bias is that I find myself in the ever-shrinking middle. We here in the middle are not afraid of hard work or reaping the rewards of our endeavors. We do not fear change but we do look at it with skepticism and prefer to understand it before jumping off the proverbial bridge. We listen to others but we speak our own mind. We can be people of faith but never be confused with zealots. We take care of those that are in need but we don’t make them our dependents. We respect for our elders and those that have served our country. It’s a little box we live in but it is ours to keep. Here we are, it’s a straight up editorial, and I am “coming at you straight from the middle of the road”.