White Christmas

This isn't how we planned to spend Christmas this year. My Lady Love and I are sequestered in our cozy little nest while a raging blizzard blocks all the exits. We were scheduled to attend Christmas Eve services at our church last night. It is always a very special service, with a candlelight segment, and I always enjoy blasting out the high notes when we sing the Lord's Prayer. Because of the weather, the church cancelled all of the services. Then, today we had planned to travel to our daughter's home and celebrate with her family. Not to be. Instead, we occasionally look out the window and watch the snow blowing around, knowing that we won't be going anywhere until the storm stops and we can dig ourselves out. It is easy to feel sorry for yourself, but I can't help noticing how absolutely spellbinding the landscape is outside our window. Everything is fresh and clean, with no trace at all of the dirty slush that filled our streets just a couple of days ago. We should enjoy this pristine, wild beauty while we can.



You guys all know that I am an old fogey, don't you? Well, let me tell you about the Big Blizzard of 1947, a storm that would dwarf this current storm by somewhat. I was about eight years old, and we had rented a farm house that was located in the center of a section of land. A section is a measurement of land that encompasses 640 acres, and each side of the square is one mile long. Since we were in the center, the lane to our house was one-half mile long. My brother and I had to walk this lane every day to catch the school bus. I remember that the temperature was so cold that if we wanted to go outside, we had to wear about all the clothes we owned, or at least several layers, with a dishtowel wrapped around our face leaving only our eyes exposed, and a couple of pairs of Dad's heavy work socks for mittens. The snow was so deep that it covered all the fences, and the wind blew a big drift against the south side of the corn crib. My brother and I were able to climb to the very peak of the roof and slide back down on a piece of a pasteboard box. I don't think Mom knew what we were doing, or I'm sure she would have had a fit. Our car, a 1932 Chevy coupe, was buried to within a few inches of the top of the roof, and the inside was completely packed full of snow. The house itself was slightly more than a shack, and I remember that the wind blew snow through the windows and made little drifts on our bed. We had a pot-bellied heating stove in the living room and a wood burning stove in the kitchen to cook on. To keep warm at all, you had to keep very close to the stove. We certainly didn't have much money during those times, but we had novel ways to keep food on the table. Before the storm, Dad would set traps and snares around the house and would catch rabbits and squirrels (and an occasional skunk or opossum). Since we didn't have a refrigerator, he would hang the carcasses from nails around the edge of the porch, where they would freeze and be preserved. I remember that when the storm came, the pheasants that had hunkered down to keep warm poked their heads up out of the snow. This was a Bonanza for my hunter-gatherer father, who just had to grab the bird by the neck, give it a little twist and add it to the critters hanging around the edge of our porch. There were huge drifts, ten or twelve feet high, on the county road in front of our house, and it was about a week before they were able to open it up. The farmer we rented from eventually brought over his tractor and scoop and dug out our lane. Finally our life could slowly get back to normal. Ah, the good old days!!

Merry Christmas, and may God bless every one of you.
Grandpa Ron

Win for the Tea Party

I saw a poll the other day that asked the public which party they favor. Overwhelmingly, the Tea Party won, with 41 percentage points. The Democrats came in second, with the Republicans slightly less in third place. Inasmuch as there is not an official "Tea Party", this poll is relatively worthless. However, it does a great job of reflecting the mood of Americans in general. We are really getting tired of "politics as usual" that is going on in Washington now. Other than spending like drunken sailors, the Republicans did OK during the first six years of the Bush administration. Unemployment was at 4.6%, and the Dow reached 14,000 for the first time ever. The argument could be made that things went to heck when the Democrats took over Congress in 2006. But, the recession did start during Bush's watch, so I guesss the Republicans get blamed for it. The Democrats are now in power and seem to want to bring about radical change, spending wildly and expanding government to such an extent that the average American, as well as several foreign countries are starting to lose some sleep over it. In the old days, I guess, people didn't really pay much attention to politics. But now, with 24 hour news channels and with everyone carrying small communication devices, we are much more aware of what is going on around us. The politicians are finding it harder and harder to pull the wool over the eyes of the people on Main Street. The people are no longer uninformed and apathetic, and are demanding that their elected officials toe the line.

These newly energized and enlightened folks are the ones that have started the Tea Party movement. This is a grass roots organization that has strong conservative principles at its core. They want to reduce the size and influence of big government. They want lower taxes in order to stimulate the economy. They want the government to quit squandering the taxpayers' money and become fiscally responsible. They believe that the politicians were hired to represent THEM, and not a political party, and they expect to be listened to. They are tired of being lied to and want the spinning to stop NOW!

There are some that think that a conservative candidate, possibly like Sarah Palin, could attach herself to the Tea Party and run as a third party candidate in 2012 against incumbent Obama. My view is that this would be a terrible idea with terrible results. The Republicans and the "Tea Party" would end up splitting the electorate and leaving the left-wing Democratic party intact to take home the election. From my standpoint, the only option is for the Republican party to adopt all of the conservatism of the "Tea Party" and run vigorously on those values. Shouldn't be that hard to do. The "Tea Party" people have made it very clear what they stand for, and the mainstreet folks have made it clear that they like the message. Sounds like a "Slam-dunk" to me.

Ben Done Us Wrong

Last Sunday, I attended a "Give Ben the Boot" rally. Our Senator, Ben Nelson, had just sold his soul to Harry Reid and agreed to vote for the health care bill. He had been loudly proclaiming that his pro-life beliefs would not allow him to sign on to any bill that allowed for government payments for abortions. Well, Harry evidently came up with the magic amount of monetary incentive, and Ben put his moral principles aside and caved in. At the rally, which drew 1800 people on very short notice, featured speaker Mike Huckabee gave a rousing speech to an enthusiastic crowd, calling for us Nebraskans to vote Nelson out of office at the earliest possible opportunity. He recalled that two thousand years ago, Judas also succumbed to the lure of money and sold out Jesus to the Romans. In the end, it didn't work out too well for Judas, either.

So, why is this such a big deal? Polls here in Nebraska show that we are against Harry's bill to the tune of 67%, so if Ben was representing his constituents, he should vote against the bill on that basis alone. Also, his stand on abortion should have been inviolable, not subject to negotiation. Publicly he has said that if our Governor Heineman asked him not to accept the pork present, he would reject it. (I don't remember if he said he would change his mind about his yea vote.) Gov. Heineman was on "On The Record" last night and said that we Nebraskans wanted absolutely no part of the bribe money, and that he should give it back. Bully for him!!

Here is my view. I don't know anyone that doesn't want to reform the health care system. What we want are changes that will actually improve the way we receive our medical care, and we don't want to bankrupt our nation in the process. People who agree with me are really angry with the partisan, closed-door, secretive process that spawned this bill in the first place. We don't like the fact that special deals were cut with the pharmaceutical industries, the insurance companies, trial lawyers, labor unions and others just to move the process forward. This bill should die on the vine and we should start over. It would be a good thing to introduce more competition amongst the insurers, maybe by letting companies sell across state lines. Let's get the employers out of the business of providing health care. Employers are just one more layer of insulation between the insurance company and the insured. The person to be covered should be the one that makes the deal with the insurance company. Ending frivolous lawsuits could save billions of dollars a year. This could be as easy as stipulating that the loser must pay all the fees and court costs. It works in Texas. I like the idea that you cannot be denied coverage for pre-existing conditions, even though this would mean higher premiums. I have mixed thoughts about setting up a separate pool for people with high-maintenance health problems. The insurance companies could use this as a convenient loophole to get rid of anyone with even a marginal problem. Anything I have mentioned could be handled on a step-by-step basis, and we could keep the costs down to an amount we can afford. You get the point - there is definitely another way to go about this. Unfortunately, unless Ben does the right thing, Harry's ridiculous bill will be voted in on Christmas Eve and it will be too late.

Iran, the Mighty

Well, the nutjob-in-chief of the Islamic Republic of Iran seems to want to raise the stakes in his quest to become Supreme Ruler of the Middle East. First, he conducted a test firing of the new rocket that has a range of 1200 miles. We all know that he wants to be able to wipe out Israel, which is easily within the range of this missile. But, we shouldn't forget that this range also includes all of our interests in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is especially dangerous, because it appears that they have improved the guidance system to the point that that they could actually hit something. The Iranians don't have a nuclear weapon yet (we think), but an accurately delivered conventional weapon can still do a lot of damage. Scary stuff - but what are we are we going to do about it? As I see it, we could do two things. We are probably too late to do the first one, which is to get behind the protesters and see if we can change the regime. Last summer, when the masses took to the streets in Tehran, our own nutjob-in-chief chose to distance himself from the movement. I don't know if our support would have tipped the balance, but now we will never know, will we? Obama didn't want to do anything that could possibly interfere with future negotiations between the two countries. How's that working out for us, now that a little time has passed? The second thing we could do is to encourage Israel to take action. I don't mean a few quiet meetings in secret with the Israelis. I mean we should make it known that we plan to back Israel all the way, and we won't back off until Iran no longer poses a threat in the region. It wouldn't hurt to punctuate the statement with the Sixth Fleet cruising around the Straits of Hormuz. For Heaven's sake, we are the most powerful nation in the world - why don't we act like it? You see, Israel's time to act is very limited. Iran has purchased a bunch of missiles from Russia, similar to our Patriot system, that will soon be deployed. If they become operational before Israel strikes, it will be infinitely more difficult for them to reach their targets. I look for the attack to come within the next few weeks - they have no choice.

The second thing Iran did was to cross the border into Iraq and take control of an oil well. That was just yesterday, I think. Iraq's response was to say, "We strongly disapprove of your recent action. Please give us back our oil well, and we will forget it ever happened." The proper response should have been to send in an assault helicopter full of Special Forces, grab the infiltrators quick while they had their noses to the ground facing Mecca, haul their butts back to Baghdad and give them a very public trial. That is how Iran is handling the three hikers that wandered across the border. If it works for them, why wouldn't it work for our side?

It is time for some decisive action over there. Are we going to get it? I wouldn't hold my breath!

Mano a Mano

A couple of things happened since I last posted here. President Obama held a jobs summit, gave a speech on jobs at the Brookings Institute, and I bought and read Sarah Palin's new book, "Going Rogue". I haven't been able to find out what went on at the jobs summit, but I did watch his speech on TV. Also, I went to the White House website and read the speech again, because I didn't want to miss something important. Mostly, he outlined proposals to spend a bunch of money to "pay for" jobs that he wants to create. But, he finally added that he was going to propose a couple of tax incentives (something the Republicans have called for since day one) to help the businesses expand and hire new people. This was the only bright spot in the speech. Of course, he whined again about the last administration leaving him a mess, and he bragged about how his enlightened team had saved the day. Once again, he went on about saving or creating 1.2 million jobs with his stimulus package. I just don't see how he rectifies that with the fact that roughly 4 million more jobs were lost since he took office. All in all, it was a typical Obama speech, carefully written to avoid addressing the problems, and giving himself a lot of credit for whatever, if any, successes there were. Oh, what I wouldn't give for an honest politician!!

Now, about Sarah Palin. I will admit that I didn't know what to expect when I bought the book. Since it was number one on the best-seller list even before it was released, I was fully prepared to be disappointed by either poor writing or just a lot of boring, chronological facts. Happily, the book turned out to be a terrific read, written in the straight-forward, and sometimes humorous style that we saw when she was on the campaign trail. She has a degree in journalism, you know, and it shows in the way she put this book together. When I finished the book, I knew all I needed to know about her upbringing, her work ethic, her devotion to her family, her faith, and the ambition she brought to her life in public service. As far as being poorly "handled" in the campaign, she tells it like it was, and she makes it clear who the bad guys were.

Fast-forward to 2012. These two charismatic icons could feasibly face each other in the presidential election. By then, I know that I will have had all of Barack Obama that I could stand. I am already tired of the partisanship, the lies and misleadings, and all of his questionable dealings and relationships. It is hard to imagine that the folks in general will not have seen through his far-left agenda by the time they need to decide about another term. On the other hand, Sarah's conservative message will be well received, and she will no longer be perceived as a ditsy outsider from the Far North. People will know that she has a solid record of governing achievements under her belt, and the fortitude to deal with any of the problems facing our nation. I, for one, would be very excited to see a nose-to-nose face-off between these two. Let's just hope that there is still a country left to be President of.