Sometimes you cannot hide from the truth.

Do not have much time at the moment, but the depths of hypocrisy coming out of some people cannot be ignored.

First though I have always believed most of the average Americans that historically have called themselves Republicans to me were never true conservatives. They were merely perservers of the status quo. Since the end of World War II until a few years ago, Republicans were joiners. They joined a church, a country club, their professional organization, the PTO, and many other organizations. The Republican Party became the party of people who wanted to fit in, be part of the correct group, be considered to be acceptable. And there is nothing wrong with this, society actually needs a status quo to measure itself against. Conservative was the buzzword they all used to be considered part of the proper group.

The Republican party during the 50′s and 60′s helped to foster this status quo. The party thrived on it and eventually this is what Nixon called the silent majority. Basically hard working Americans who supported what they thought was decent, proper, and acceptable in day to day activities. These are the people who do not want to rock the boat. There were always extremists on the right, but they were the minority. Now take note, I am not talking about racists. You have to separate that there are racists that are just racists. Extremism takes advantage of racism, but not all racists are extremists. Many are neighbors who keep it deep down, but just cannot accept others different from them. 

During the 70′s their world was turned slightly  upside down so they gravitated to the Reagan revolution. This was not a conservative movement, this was the first of the lets get back to my idealistic viewpoint of what America is, the American that fits all my preconceived notions about how you are to live etc...

These people still exist, but their dream becomes more fragmented every year. One problem was the wealthy in this country learned to take advantage of this group. So behind their back true education levels diminished, income stagnated, a slow erosion of wealth began for them, and the successful few even amongst their immediate peer group and friends still espoused the greatness of the American dream. 

As you know ignorance breeds hate and discord, so as their education became weaker and they retreated more and more into close knit groups for protection psychologically since their world seemed to be proper on the outside yet there were signs it was actuallly crumbling, but no one actually addressed it. 

Then came Fox so called news and tore into their myths and beliefs and created enemies for them to hate. The silent majority became the disaffected majority. 

Fast forward to now, they let themselves be manipulated by people who still espouse a bygone era and cannot come to grips the world is changing rapidly. This group makes up part of the support for Trump. They are not the problem.

The problem is the portion of the Republican party that spent the 70′s to the 90′s building a party infrastructure that fostered greed. The establishment of the party no longer supported market capitalism and big business; it supported wealth. The sheer notion that someone who had more money was better, the idea of earning wealth being a value decreased while the ideal of acquiring wealth was what made a person successful and “admired”. A nuance, but an important one. A market economy relies on many moving parts being successful. The accumulation of wealth for weath sake, requires less and discourages moving parts. The less people involved the more for the few. 

This group has become a disease on our country and the ugly boil of a visible sympton is our current President. This group is so insulated they have forgotten what made us a great country and in their isolated world they see only themselves. 

They have made the Republican Party the shining definition of hyprocrisy. This extreme has created the same problem that some in the party faced when Nixon fell from grace. His problem was his dying devotion to an ideal and some of the verbiage his people used is being regurcitated now to protect a real cancer and criminal in the White House. “We have to protect the President”. What they fail to realize the job is to protect the Presidency, not the man. If the person is defiling the office, then the protection is to remove the person so the office of the Presidency is protected. A true conservative would protect the office not the man; the constitution, not the words; the balance of power and checks and balances, not the abuses. Some of the people protecting the President are misguided by the corruption of Washingtion right now, some are downright criminals who know if he is exposed, they are exposed.

Either way the remainder of the party that protects him and does not hold him accountable are destroying the country. They must be held accountable. As you know I am not a fan of either Democrats or Republicans so the need for independents to counter these crimes is careening down on us like the rain in Houston this past week. (pray for them). Failue to act will create a political and country damaging event that will make the floods in East Texas and Houston look like puddles. 

So now is the time to call out the hyprocrisy of the this current Washington D. C. Republican party.

States rights, but now all of a sudden a state cannot do better than the rest of the country in protecting our air?

Do we have a balanced budget from them?

Are our values as a nation being treasured by them?

Is opportunity for all being developed by them?

Does the Republican party behave as Christians or as?

Are they showing a true respect for law and order and the rule of law?

Do they support the general economic health of the nation? Or who are they supporting?

Why are they saying that you must behave one way then in their actions behave exactly against what they preach?

If they believe the President is the leader of our country, why are they letting one man take down the office?

If you are an independent conservative such as myself, we can no longer sit idly by while Rome burns. And this message needs to be instituted into every average day to day Republican until they realize their party has left them and they can no longer accept the hypocrisy they live by ignoring the lies. Most of the Republicans you know at your work etc are hard working Americans that need to be awoken to this problem and either quit the party and create and join a new one or pull the rug out from under the cancer that now rules the party. 

I know many “Republicans” who worry more about their family, healthcare, income, their country than the group now in charge, but I must look at them in the eye and speak the truth. We all must. 

The Republican party is no longer the Republican party it once was and people like me are to blame for not calling them out sooner to this very point. The current President has committed treason against our country, us, our values,  many times over and the news of the whistleblower situation is just the latest in the demise of our country unless we act to take it back.

Sorry, the Democrats are lost in outer space right now and still driven by their own cancer of the pretentious left. They too have lost touch with the average American. Theirs is a different story though. Today we must come to the realization that a group of people are now deliberately protecting someone who by design or by default is tearing up everything we say we cherish. 

The Republican Party died a few years ago and the rotting stinking corpse is permeating an ugly cancer on us all. 

No cheers tonight. Tonight we must speak

Are the Republicans catching up to the cluelessness of the Democrats

What you say?

Usually the Republicans have their own set of problems and issues, for example making all sorts of campaign promises and still only spoon-feeding Wall Street and company whatever they want.

Now though they are making a run at avoiding the elephant in the room. 

Many people have questioned Trump’s cognitive abilities since he started running for President and this continues up till now. And the man continues to give everyone reason to question his cognitive abilities.

So, what gives now. The now is it is becoming increasingly apparent he is declining, not just little things anymore, no one word slip ups, misspelled words, he is at the point he cannot rant well or remember what he is doing. And this is becoming more and more public. In fact, I am going to guess that we will see less and less of him as the part of the Republican Party doing a power grab realizes how bad he has become. They need him something fierce and if the public, including his public, starts to realize that he is going south fast they are not going to re-elect him. This is just one part of the problem.

The developing problem is the Republicans have been working so hard to make sure he wins in 2020 including cancelling or trying to cancel primaries they may be caught with no back up plan. Well they do have one and that thought belongs in one of my infamous paranoid blog posts. I have a couple that are welling up inside my brain right now so you might see one you soon.

Anyway, if they go all in on Trump and he can’t get through till next November they are going to hand the country to the Democrats. And if you saw the Democrat debate last night you are realizing they do not have a true strong candidate. Or their policies are too far left for the general middle of the country.

The term “Dynamic leader” didn’t seem to fit the bill for anyone last night. And the pretentious left is all in on this group of candidates. They think they have a winner amongst this bunch. Scary, isn’t it.

You would think a rational and practical independent with a moderately conservative platform could thrive in this environment. Yet, where are we?

Well…. I wrote the above hours ago and I had to stop mid thought. We went out to fight the good fight in other areas then had dinner etc… with friends. So, stopping at above for now. Plus, I said I would try and keep my political posts to a minimum till 2020.

Okay okay one other thought, speaking of power grabs, McConnell seems to be creating his own as Senate Majority leader. I just hope the good people of Kentucky see fit to elect someone else to represent them. I do not agree with the Democrat/Pelosi’s platform, but sooner or later you do need to do something including write something better than their policy. He just cannot accept a leadership role and do absolutely squat just because it doesn’t benefit Wall Street et al. And besides his sitting on the election security bills, really gives credence to the nickname Moscow Mitch. He needs to go.

The Republicans need to look at having a full primary season or they are going to get caught with a dilapidated Trump.

Cheers

Happy Birthday to El Fenix

Got to enjoy the Cheese Enchillada plate for $1.01 as they celebrated their 101st birthday. One of Dallas’ great Tex Mex traditions. Here is to many more years.

Cheers

It appears I may be correct

Well for some things and if you count stretching stuff and maybe I might get some more topics correct…

Yet seriously, a couple of events have me going I told you, I told you

There is an article originally on I think Business Insider or some site called Axios where the Democrats are preparing an “embarrassing dossier” (there’s that word again) on Donald Trump. On the surface it looks like a gathering of the shallow items I keep telling the Democrats to avoid. A deeper read suggests they are realistically looking at where he is missing the boat and his policy failures. (forehead slap time). Are they becoming aware???? There seems to be much interest in all the lawsuits Trump is involved and it is to be unflattering, yet, according to the article “it is to make it about Trump’s performance, not his bigotry or his awfulness”. Okay who sold the Democrats a clue?  It seems to be circulated by the Associated Press also.

And as you know I have said the current economic situation, continued wealth gap, stagnant wages, the decline of our middle and working class is some of this country’s biggest problems. And lo and behold, rich and educated people seem to be agreeing with me. So much so, there is a website with podcasts and blogs dedicated to helping people understand this problem. They are not exactly on the same page as myself, yet they are producing content that is music to my ears. And they are much more articulate, well produced, and creative than I. I definitely recommend the site and hopefully they continue to attract a larger audience so we can get new leadership in our country to right our wonderful ship back onto a better path for mankind in general. The website is: pitchforkeconomics.com   Enjoy!

And now for predictions sure to go south. And I usually make my season forecast for the Cowboys before the first game so it may seem I am cheating to make a prediction after the first game. And since I think there are going to go 10-6 it might surprise you even more. I thought this yesterday morning leaning towards a possible 9-7 record. Honestly I do not know now. The Giants made way too many mistakes, a couple of calls went the Cowboys way, but nothing that would have changed the overall game too much. They did look good. Philly looked good coming back like they did. This will be interesting. If the Cowboys win the East, they will need to be 11-5 or better. Are they there yet? It will take a few more games to really see. They may prove me wrong and go 11-5 or even 12-4. I am still going with 10-6 and a wildcard birth. I do think they will win a playoff game or two. Their big game chances are still under 25% in my book, not out of the realm of possibility, but who knows. The one true prediction I can make is if Dak has truly turned the corner as a quarterback then they may be a much higher favorite to win it all.

Cheers

Abolish this, limit that,…what are the expectations?

For years people talk about term limits, now you can add to this madness abolishing the Electoral College.

You are always told do not insult your audience or say bad things about them, so I know the readers here understand that Democracy is a participatory sport. And that participation is more than just voting. You must get involved at the very least by being an informed voter and holding your representatives accountable. For a Republic like ours to be successful the citizenry cannot shirk their responsibilities and hide behind term limits.

I commented before on this topic and the main point was term limits will only change the name of the Representatives it will not change the behavior. It is the behavior that we need changed to take our country in a better direction. While the lobbyists have Congress ear, a new face will not make much difference.

And now we have some members of the Democrat party, Congress, and the Media telling us we need to abolish the Electoral college. And yes, they do have good points as to why, but do not address the complete picture. The whole point of the Electoral College was to balance the power between the less populated states and the more populated states. And recently we have had a couple of times where the popular vote went to one candidate and the electoral college voting went to the other candidate. And I agree a good campaign strategy can take advantage of the perceived problem and win an election they maybe should not have won (Trump; and yes, there is more, but for now one issue at a time).

This isn’t because of the Electoral College though; this is a bad campaign by the other candidate. The whole point of the Presidency is to find a united message for the country to rally around. The Presidency is only 1/3 of the government. Any presidential candidate’s goal is to create a message that resonates as a whole so the entire country, rural, suburban, urban, geographically, industry, new vs old, etc. can find some common themes that we, as a general whole, want our country to follow. Not everyone will be happy nor agree with the whole message. A good campaign addresses this philosophy and addresses the people. And it does not take for granted anything. (Clinton, she owns her campaign’s failures to be more proactive in the Midwest, no other excuses)

Right now, we have huge gaps in population density throughout our country so this creates a unique situation as to a small portion of the country could conceivably have overt influence over the rest of the country due to this population concentration. This means large swaths of the country would be run by a like minded group that does not have their best interests at heart.

Which leads to why people think we need to abolish the Electoral College. The opposite occurred where due to manipulation through gerrymandering and targeted propaganda large portions of the less populated regions control too much power indirectly. This is not because of the Electoral College, but rather because we fail to address the true problems we face in this country which is gerrymandering that protects power structures in these lower population regions and the grossly unjust power lobbyists have over our Congress.

Term limits and abolishing the Electoral Colleges are lazy ineffective ways to attempt to solve the real political problems facing our country.

The real solutions take work and yes I call the Democrats clueless and these are some of the reasons why. The pretentious left thinks they know all and all their policies are the correct policies and completely ignore the problems of what is now known as the rust belt and the plains regions where agriculture is the main industry. If we were allowed to let just a few densely populated regions control all the policy of this country, there would be gross inequities of resource distribution throughout the country. The Electoral College and two senators per state were built in as compromises to balance the power throughout the country. And yes, I am not naïve, I do know that some of the energy to get this compromise was driven by some representatives of the Constitutional Convention to protect slavery in their states. And yes it shouldn’t have been. The case though for a balance of power by having the Senators and Electoral College and having the House of Representatives to give equitable representation to the more populated regions was a compromise that was needed then and now.

So, it goes back to what is the work that is needed to maintain a government that successfully represents the country as a whole. As you know, it never will completely. The goal is to find solutions and policy that generally benefit the whole of the country, move us forward economically, socially, culturally, etc. all the while not infringing on others’ rights whether they be political, religious, race or creed, economic, geographical etc. This is the work of responsible citizens. It is our responsibility to remove public servants who fail the public. It is our responsibility to become the other set of checks and balances on our government besides the stated one between the three branches of government.

So why aren’t we, as a whole, not being this check and balance of our government. The reasons have simple sentences to write but are going to be extremely difficult to put back into play.

Our public education system has been on a decline for decades, when it should have been rising since the 1960’s. The ever-growing wealth gap has created a Congress more receptive to special interests than to the general populace.  I say repeatedly, capitalism is good, having the winners of a capitalistic system write the rules is horrendous. This completely destroys the higher goal of equal opportunity for all. Campaigns overly reliant on contributions causes even more divergence from our Constitution’s goals of equal representation. The list can go on, but the general principle is we, the people, need to be stronger, need to be more active, need to inform ourselves more, and we need to help each other accomplish these goals rather than promote changes that are based on knee jerk reactions to deep seated problems that have risen by us shirking our responsibilities as citizens.

The truth hurts and that truth is: doing what is right always takes more work.  

And on a side note, there are other issues with the growing divisions in our country but abolishing the Electoral College won’t fix the election problems from these issues either. Education and communication are the starting points for these issues.

Cheers

There is that word “sorry”

Oops it has been too long, finally got back the better computer to write on. The laptop always looked like it posted to the blog, but then I found out, by going back and eventually reading it that the post was a serious mess to read. Anyway, getting back into the swing of things again.

And since I have made posts about, we should have election reform where the election season is in the year of the election, I am going to minimize my political posts or election comments till next year. I would say I wouldn’t post any, but yeah, we know that won’t happen.

And what is it with the word sorry and why am I writing about it. I don’t know, but I have been thinking about it for awhile and to me the word is misused on way too many levels. I am going to talk about a couple of them.

Women and especially young women use the word sorry way too much. It seems like they cannot do anything without apologizing for something. So, I have a piece of advice for them. Find other words to match the scenario. The easiest choice is saying excuse me. The only time you may need to say I’m sorry is if you step on my foot by accident or something. If you step on it on purpose well then you may have to face the consequences of your actions, but on accident that is a simple sorry. Otherwise, pardon me or excuse me if you accidentally cut in front of me or whatever.

Or they say it without having done anything wrong. If something is out of your control, you do not have to apologize. You can acknowledge it. You might say that was wrong or I cannot believe that person did that or what fits the circumstances, but do not apologize because some other person screwed up. It is not on you. And if you think that is a polite thing to do, then so be it, but do not feel you must. 

Or even if you make a mistake in a work project or something, own up to the mistake. Try saying I could have done better or make a joke about it and hold yourself accountable, but do not say the word sorry for every little thing.

And then there is the flip side of the use of the word sorry where someone says it to basically get away with an inappropriate action like saying the word makes it all better. And this is a society problem. Too many times you see kids do something intentional to harm someone or get the better someone or get their way with something and the parent says tell so and so your sorry. And that is the only consequence the child faces. You know good and well that child did whatever on purpose and the parent says: “tell them you are sorry”. That child is growing up with some misguided ideas about how to act in public and with others.

I see it all the time and if you pay attention you will, too. Parents won’t hold their children accountable for their actions except for some trite acknowledgment of the other person and kids grow up to be adults and are utter screw ups, care not for others, and are just about impossible to hold accountable for anything. This includes work, social interactions, general lack of respect for rules, etc…. And this is not a rich person or poor person or this person or that person behavior, it is a lack of parenting behavior or parents who couldn’t handle their children or were just too lazy to deal with their children.

I am sitting here wondering as I type this if the women I spoke of above, were the sisters of the children who abuse the word sorry with no actual remorse about their actions and are making up for their siblings. Who knows, yet I doubt it. Overuse of the word sorry isn’t curing using the word sorry to get away with all sorts of minor insults to heinous acts.

So, I ask of you, if someone is abusive or rude or just downright ugly and uses the word sorry as if to act like they were remorseful or feeling accountable, hold them accountable. If you must get help, get help. Way too much we let these people as adults continue their pathetic behavior because it takes effort, and someone is going to get mad. And these people are always the first to point blame at others, so point it right back at them. I saw this, I observed that, and let them hear it. This is a huge problem for people in work environments because these types of people end up costing others either more work, more time, bad feelings about their employment, productivity, and more. Managers sometimes are as bad as the parents in the first place so if you see them struggle manage it up. This behavior wears on too many people, but we do not feel empowered enough to address it. We need to stand up or as the phrase goes “man up”.  

If you make this effort, you will need to have your facts straight and there will be people who say they will back you up but become eerily silent when you do stand up. So, make sure you do have all your facts, keep notes, do it when you can remain calm and not in the heat of the moment, but do not allow these people to bully the workplace or school or what social group you are in. It is hard, but your life will be more enjoyable when you get these people either out of your life or hopefully, they are still within reason and they become better persons.

I have done this too many times in my life so it drives me crazy every time I see this behavior, but when it hits home you cannot ignore it.  

Nothing wrong with telling it like it is and nothing wrong with saying you are sorry when it is appropriate and you mean it.

And there will be more commentary on the Cowboys as we get closer to the regular season, yet for now I say Jerry Jones drives me to drink.

Cheers

Lately it is too much

I had been planning to write three posts and could never find the time. One was on extremism on both the left and right.

Now I am just in shock.

Someone posted parts of a speech either today or yesterday by Texas Lt Govenrnor Dan Patrick that I read. The part that was posted is worth reading. Please look up his speech. I do not have a direct link to it to add to this blog. I usually do not support Republicans or Democrats for general sake, however, he made some good points and they need to be discussed.

It is neither here nor there. I wasn't in El Paso or Dayton this weekend. I have no idea how those communities feel. I do have my memories and I spent 7 years living in El Paso. I have a video of my son not even a year old crawling through a store in Cielo Vista Mall then out into the mall. I was walking behind him just filming him to see what he was going to do. He was head down and just crawling away. Eventually I stopped filming and went and picked him up. We went back to the rest of the family who were shopping for clothes. I have no idea of what I would have done if this happened while I was with my family just enjoying the day. And enjoying the day was what thousands of families and people were doing on Saturday and then the people enjoying a good time in Dayton late Saturday.

We have problems in this country now that have nothing to do with guns or hats or scarfs or flags.  There are ugly deep rooted problems we are afraid to address. I do not have answers. I have some suggestions, yet even those are for another day.

Today we pray we can find a better way to solve our problems than what is not being done by our leaders and ourselves. Remember you know yourself and your family better than anyone. Now is the time to be honest with yourself, if something seems amiss for you or another please search for help. People will deny they need help. You may have to find strength within yourself. I am not one to talk, but we all need to talk. And this talk needs to include discussions on hate, isolationism, violence, mental illness, suicide, and any other anti social behavior interferring with a person's ability to participate in life and the respect of others.