I was cleaning out some sites that I have long abandoned and I came across my original post about a dream I had about Obama. (here) Since I know more about how Obama speaks, you know with umms and stutters, the question is: Should I rewrite it? Or maybe I should include an observation of a technician setting up a teleprompter?
I really thought about getting in line and having a prepared statement for the committee hearing on LD 1020. However, I came to the conclusion that with 60 sponsors, it was going to go to the legislature no matter what. Also, I could not have added anything of rhetorical substance that had not already been said and I would have had to address my remarks to the Chair. Instead, I want to talk to the supporters of LD 1020.
All you supporters for LD 1020 would balk if I express my beliefs while citing the Bible. Yet you want me to accept your “belief” that gay & lesbians were born that way, versus a life style choice.
If I express alarm at where this can lead, (polygamy, bestiality, etc.) or potential infringement of my First Amendment Rights, I am labeled a fear-monger.
Perhaps I should reference scientific data related to the increase risk of disease or shortened lifespans for those, that for whatever compulsion engage in homosexual behavior. Every time that tact was taken at the hearing, the bill’s proponents stood with their back to the speakers, symbolizing your unwillingness to face the truth.
This is not an honest debate. In a true contest of point and counter-point; facts and reasoned postulation is presented. When you introduce feelings and emotions, the exchange devolves into a lobbing of rants, clichés and stereotypes.
So, we are at an impasse! I believe that I was born a sinner, you believe you were born gay/lesbian. I want to be rescued from my inherent sinfulness, you want to everyone to “accept” you without condition. I have chosen to change. You all have chosen to be stiff-necked and make an attempt to change society, traditions and other people.
I read a post from the Lonely Conservative, ‘ Glenn Beck Tried to Print the Tax Code but Gave Up.’
It got me to thinking, what does 60,000 pages look like? So I started figuring with all the skills my public school education crippled me with. The result is the picture at the end of this post. Not only is the physical weight of the resultant stack about 300 lbs. The system is so complicated and burdensome, that even a so-called smart guy like Tim Geitner, was confused and missed paying some taxes!
For those of you that are environmentally sensitive, I did only used recycled paper in my graphic.
Fran
How does the U.S. Tax Code
It is a pleasant day when you wake up with thoughts like these about the person you love!
Seriously, I am Joe. Well, my middle name is Joseph. However, the point of this post is to identify as “Joe,” the common guy.
Most of the press and pundits totally miss the point of the question that Joe the Plumber (JTP) asked Obama. Joe was asking Barack why, if he succeeds like he hopes to, in his plumbing venture; does Barack want to tax him more? Notice that JTP did not ask Barack to help him succeed. Did not solicit a request for a hand out or demand that the candidate make someone else suffer so JTP could advance.
So, why am I “Joe?” Like JTP, I don’t want the government to provide me anything except what it is constitutionally bound to. We “Joes” do not want the government to help us. Risk, reward, and satisfaction are all apart of pursuing the American Dream. We don’t want safety nets, rubber bumpers or throttles put on us to make things fair or protect us from ourselves.
So, are you an average “Joe?” Here is an easy way to tell: If you are holding your hand out, you are not a “Joe.” Your are just another chump.
A government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take away everything you have — Thomas Jefferson
I consider this video an early birthday present!
I was thoroughly impressed with Gov. Palin’s speech the other night.
She could turn out to be the “Teddy” of the 21st Century!
Not sure, I think it is a "Donkabou!"
A lot will be said in reference to Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” Speech; on this the 45th anniversary. News commentators will be alluding to it, especially since the Democrats nominee for the 2008 election is showboating his acceptance speech on this historic day. (Talk about sacrilege!)
So, since I don’t expect anyone under the age of 25 has ever read the speech (assuming the public schools actually taught them to read), I am posting the whole text of the speech here:
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.
Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.
But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. And so we’ve come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.
In a sense we’ve come to our nation’s capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the “unalienable Rights” of “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked “insufficient funds.”
But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we’ve come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.
We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro’s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. 1963 is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. And there will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.
I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. And some of you have come from areas where your quest — quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.
Let us not wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends. And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today!
I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of “interposition” and “nullification”–one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today!
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.
This is our hope, and this is the faith that I go back to the South with.
With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
And this will be the day–this will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with new meaning:
My country ’tis of thee,
Sweet land of liberty,
Of thee I sing.
Land where my fathers died,
Land of the Pilgrim’s pride,
From every mountainside,
Let freedom ring!
And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado!
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California!
But not only that. Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.
And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”
