Shot with our own gun...

 

 

"This time I was the citizen, and they were pointing their guns at me..."

Readjustment Blues

John Denver

When you take gun safety classes, it is stressed how important proper the safeguarding and usage of your weapon is. In particular, it is important that you don't get shot with your own gun. Today, on a much larger scale, that is exactly what is happening with some of our weapons of war. Many of these weapons are not "old junk" - some is fairly new and in good condition. Some of it is now aimed at the citizens of this country.

Two news stories this week will help make my point:

• Domestic - Many have posted pictures on the internet of light and heavy armored vehicles being shipped to police forces or DHS around the country. When I first saw them, I thought the pics went through some kind of photo shop process. It was too incredible to be true. Then the Ferguson riots happened this week. The local police showed up looking like the First Cavalry ready for battle.
• The purpose of the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 was to limit the use of the Federal Government, in particular the military, to enforce state laws. In my humble opinion, when you have local police using military type weaponry, ranging from tanks to snipers, it comes close to being a violation of that law.
• Foreign - People should either lose their jobs or face jail time on this one. When we pulled out of Iraq, we left so much stuff, so many heavy as well as light arms, it could outfit an army. And that is exactly what it is doing. ISIS, whose numbers now exceed 10,000, have so much of our stuff, they are advertising on the internet for mechanics to help maintain it. This is a travesty. These thugs are using our weapons to kill innocent people. Besides the extraordinary cost of this equipment (thank you taxpayers and debt), many of these weapons are the most lethal on the market.

We need to first get out military supplies back from the local police departments and either transfer them to the National Guard or put them in surplus. That is, unless there is something else the government knows which we do not. In that event, a strong case needs to be made why our local police need to be better armed than many countries are.

Next, we need to either recapture or destroy all weapons left in Iraq. We simply cannot allow this to happen. If we are not careful, the same thing will happen in Afghanistan when we pull out. We either need iron clad safeguards, or we take everything with us. Being shot is one thing - being shot with your own gun is even worse. 
  

How do we become post racial?

 

 

"When Rodney King asked why can't we can't all get along, I thought it was a very good question..."

I have often said I am only concerned with one race - and that is the human race. Why the Lord created people of different colors in this world is a mystery known only to Him. But I am fine with it. Not to sound too "PC", but I like something other than a homogeneous society. I like our diversity.

That being said, when our current President was elected, he was going to catapult us into "post racial America". Some even thought we were going to revisit the MLK days of judging others by the "content of their character, rather than the color of their skin." Sign me up for that one - I have been a believer in that since the 1960's.

So what happened? Why are we still so divided? We have a black President, black Attorney General, we have had a black Secretary of State (twice), and a black female talk show host is one of the richest people in Hollywood. I beleive we have made significant progress with the exception of one key ingredient - poverty.

Poverty is the cancer that eats away at many of our large cities. It traps people - people with no hope for the future. This is why all it takes is a spark, and you end up with a huge problem in St. Louis. When we hollow out cities, when we leave people there who are stuck with low wages and high unemployment, this is a result. Many of the problems which are race related will be fixed if we can fix persistent poverty.

In this morning's paper, there was an article about our chronic "achievement gap" in the Minneapolis schools. The powers that be have a plan to eliminate this gap by 2020. This subject drives me crazy. I have no idea why this gap is so vexing to so many. I have served with, worked with, and worked for many people of color. There is not a wit of difference between their intelligence than any other race. Some say kids of color learn differently than white kids. That may be true, or it may not. Dr. Shockley's theory of an IQ difference between blacks and whites has been proven false over and over again.

My solution for the inner cities is simple - fix poverty and you will fix the achievement gap. It will start to stem the violence with drugs and gangs. What is the first step? According to many leaders inside and outside of the inner cities - stop having kids out of wedlock. That is not the solution, but a solution.

Fix the schools. Private and charter schools all over the country are showing they can teach all children - black, white or whatever. Our current schools in many cities are a mess. Chronic low graduation rates year after year - many kids just give up and drop out. The current recipe does not work. Change the recipe and get better results. We owe our kids much better than this.

We can fix this. It is within our power. It is not just a matter of throwing more money at programs which don't work. We need to be strong as a nation. The world is changing. The world is becoming more dangerous. We need leaders who can lead, who can inspire. The time is long overdue to be a post racial America.

Onward and upward!

 

 

"The endorsements have now been confirmed. Our journey forward is onward and upward!"

All I can say is this - thank goodness this primary is over! Not a fan of it since the get-go, I thought it was a huge waste of time and money. However, it did one thing - it reconfirmed the endorsing process. Unlike what happened in the DFL four years ago, our primary proved the legitimacy of our endorsements. I was proud to have been a delegate. I did my homework and vetted as many candidates as I could. I thought we picked the best of the best to represent us. Now that the primary is over, I have no hard feelings for anyone who ran. Onward and upward!

What were some lessons learned, if any from this August 12th exercise?

• Money - Money did not buy votes this year. In 2010, the Dayton camp used a significant amount of wealth to win the DFL primary. This year, Matt Entinza used some of his wife's wealth to unseat Rebecca Otto - it did not work. Scott Honour bought huge amounts of air time for commercials - he came in fourth.
• 11th Commandment -  For the most part, the Republicans followed Reagan's all important 11th commandment. It was a clean race with good ideas brought forward and discussed. I was pleased that powder was kept dry, and for the most part, sights were set on the Democrats.
• Hurtful Words - Something we all learned as kids is words can hurt. Don't say things that you will regret later. Words can heal and well as hurt. One of my former managers would often say, "Large minds discuss ideas, small minds discuss people". Even when engaging the Democrats, we need to remember they are fellow citizens with different ideas. It is the ideas we need to engage.

Today, I celebrate with the victors and console those who fell short. I have met some very fine and capable people this year involved in various campaigns. Our bench strength is strong, and that spells hope for our future. Our eyes remain on the prize - and that prize is a better Minnesota and a safer and stronger America. All are welcomed to join in this quest. All are needed to prevail. Onward and upward folks. The journey ahead will be daunting, but will be worth it. 

Are we Revere or Chamberlain?

 

 

"Turning a blind eye or a deaf ear has never worked well in dealing with ruthless people..."

Whatever else Neville Chamberlain did in his career, he will forever be remembered as the leader of the United Kingdom who turned a blind eye towards the growing menace of Nazis in Europe. He thought a policy of appeasement would protect the UK from any truculent threat the emerging Nazis movement might make. He was dead wrong. Once the Nazis invaded Poland, the UK realized the real goal of the Nazis. England joined the battle and was very late to the party.

The rest is history. In the 1940s, the world came within a whisker of losing itself into the cauldron of totalitarianism. Genocide was being committed in Europe, and many in the world knew about it. After the hangover many had from World War I, most of the world had no interest in more war. Some saw what was coming - they were the Paul Reveres of the 40s. However, many like Chamberlain, thought if we just ignored it, this new Nazi threat might just go away.

What we need to understand is very simple - evil will take on different forms, in different lands, in different people. The Nazis were just one form, in one land, and one time. Pure evil knows no boundaries. To ignore evil has never worked well in the past, will not in the future, and certainly will not work today.

One of the advantages we have today is total connectivity of media. We do not have to rely on antidotal or second hand evidence to witness evil. We can see it up front and personal. There is hardly a day which goes by that another barbaric act is not posted on the internet. And yet even with that, some people would rather talk about something else - ignore this evil. You know, happy talk. This stuff happening in Iraq and Syria, well - that is their problem, not ours. Many of the Left still blame George W. Bush. If we had not meddled in Iraq by getting rid of that nice guy Saddam Hussein, these problems would not be happening. And so the debate goes on, while evil grows like germs in a petri dish.

The news flash is not good folks. This is not the fault of any one person or any one country. This evil has been growing for years, and it now has visible form. This is the caliphate - some in Islam even believe it is arrival of the Twelfth Inman. Yesterday I addressed this new breed of terrorists, ISIS, are coming for you. They are. They are coming for everyone who believes differently than them. To use a Chamberlain type of appeasement will not save us. To ignore them will be deadly.

So the Paul Revere in me will say this: I know we are war weary. I know Afghanistan has gone on much too long. I also know the reason both Iraq and Afghanistan went on too long was our generals were not allowed to fight those wars to win. As General Powell would say, "We don't like fair fights. We like to use overwhelming force to win."

This is a war we must fight to win. We must take the battle to them, right where they are. No more pin prick bombing with 500 pound bombs dropped from F-18 jets. It is time to unleash total hell on ISIS, and do it now. To save millions of lives, we must once again take some lives. If we don't, we will be fighting these ruthless murderers on our own soil. And it will be sooner rather than later. 

  

They are coming for you...

 

 

 

"They are coming to take us away..."

Yesterday, on the Lord's day, I saw yet another video on the internet which turned my stomach. Some young children were lined up in a ditch and executed. By ISIS. No remorse, no sadness, just a bullet to the brain for each of them. And what was their crime? Being born on the wrong side of the street. Not being "pure" enough for the religion of peace. I wanted to puke.

A much as our President would like us to believe this group is "JV" or just a blip on the radar, others have quite a different take. In a column published over the weekend, Maureen Dowd nails it in Trouble, no matter how you spell it:

We never know what we're getting into over there, and this time we can't even agree what to call the enemy. All we know is that a barbaric force is pillaging so swiftly and brutally across the Middle East that it seems like some mutated virus from a sci-fi film.

 

In addition, this group which started out so radical, so extreme, Al Qaeda wanted nothing to do with them. No longer. This group has grown so big, so fast, it is now reported that many Al Qaeda fighters have been absorbed into it. And unlike the Taliban who are regional fighters, this new group of killers has their gaze set on Europe and the United States. Over the weekend, one pundit opined that this group is even more dangerous, more of a threat to the world than the Nazis were. Once again, that is quite a statement to say about a group our Commander in Chief referred to as "JV".

 

At first I was repulsed that people posted smuggled in videos of heinous acts committed by ISIS. Now I feel quite differently. We need to see what is coming for us. We need to understand the unbounded evil which exists today in Syria and Iraq. We need to take this new war over there as serious as a heart attack. We need to treat them (as Dowd said) like a "mutated virus from a sci-fi film".

 

If Russia was smart, they would also join us in getting rid of this group. Russia has its own problems with radical Islam. Russia is not immune from this type of violence. It is time to unite and take a stand. Christians are being exterminated. Sunnis are being exterminated. Kurds are being exterminated. This is ethnic cleansing live and in color, taking place right before our eyes. And we can't just turn the channel on the TV - it is coming here. And according to some experts, it might be here already.

 

Sorry to start the week out on such a dour note. But this really is serious. So serious, I would expect our leaders to get off of vacation and come back to work. The enemy is not on vacation - they are training and preparing. If we are not prepared for them, they will come for us - they will come for us and take us away, dead and dismembered.

 

    

The day after...

 

 

"All good men, however only one has the imprimatur of party recognition..."

None of us knows for sure what is going to happen next Tuesday. Some of the poll guessers are fairly confident on some of the races, but others are just to close to call. I have a mild and tepid interest in Tuesday. Like I have said, to me having a primary after the endorsing convention is like candidate double jeopardy. Even though we already know who the winning candidates are, we are going to re-vote anyhow. What a waste of time and money.

Coming out of Rochester, the party had a modicum of solidarity as to who the torch bearer was going to be for each race. Jeff Johnson was not my guy for governor going in to the convention, but he was coming out. Two of the candidates in the governor's primary race skipped the convention all together. Another, who was losing more votes each time the ballots were counted, said "See you later - like on August 12th." Only one of the four candidates played by the endorsing rules from the get-go. He won, fair and square. Like myself and others, he won people over. In my opinion, he is the best hope to unseat our current Governor.

Four years ago, the Democrats went through the endorsement process and came up with a good candidate. An experienced woman who was tough as nails. Then all of a sudden, out of the woodwork comes Mark Dayton. A man who many thought was done after he was voted (by TIme Magazine), as one of the five worst senators of all time. However, with money comes power. The primary was held and a flawed candidate beat out the endorsed candidate. It made a mockery of the Democratic endorsement process.

My biggest concern is what will happen on August 13th. Will the Republicans coalesce around the victor(s) of the contested races, or will feelings be hurt. When I say hurt, I have heard from some if "so and so" wins, they will sit out the general. Or they will vote third party. Or they will write someone in.

As for me, if the endorsed candidates do not win, I want my time and money back. Many of us went though this sometimes bruising and lengthy process to come up with viable candidates. Some have said the endorsing process is not fair. To them I say "crap". Everyone had the opportunity to go to the meetings on caucus night. From there, the BPOU convention. Some have said this process is flawed. If so, we should fix it, or scrap it. But to have both the endorsing process AND a primary is madness. And an expensive madness to boot.

So bring on next Tuesday. The pundits are saying very few will show up. We shall see. Then after Tuesday, let the healing begin on Wednesday. If we cannot heal, we might as well just hand over four more years to Dayton and six more years to Al.  

It time to get it on!

 

 

"If it is war you seek, then it is war you shall receive..."

We may have one more battle to fight. Only this one is as old as Ishmael and Isaac. Some may call it a continuation of the Crusades, fought under Richard the Lionhearted. I am okay with that. Today this battle is good against evil. And evil today is very, very evil. I hear things, I see things, and I read things that are so heinous, I can barely believe them to be real.  

Enough is enough. As much as we want peace, the other side does not. They hate us, they hate our country, they hate our Christian and Jewish faiths. In fact, they want us dead. They don't want to sit and talk; they don't want a cease fire; they don't want peace. If that is indeed the lay of the land, then let us get it on.

I, like many, have reached the limit of tolerance. Every night on the news, we hear about horrible and unspeakable acts of barbaric violence unleashed upon innocent people. Many of these people live in the Middle East and Northern Africa. Their crime? They happen to worship a different God or belong to a different tribe. Executions, rape, mutilation, slaughter, beheadings, you name the barbarism, and it has most likely been perpetrated.

Call me old fashioned, I grew up watching Superman on TV. His motto was he fought for "truth, justice and the American way". We need to recapture that. In years past when the world was threatened, people all over the world looked towards America as being the Superman. Today, freedom loving people of the world are not accustomed to seeing their Superman reduced down to "super bystander". No, the world needs a hero, and it needs one now.

What to do. First, reaffirm to Israel that we are in this TOGETHER. In a joint press conference, inform Hamas that their days of terror are over. The next missile that gets fired into Israel will be met with an overwhelming response. It will truly be shock and awe. It will be so strong, it will make the last Israeli incursion into Gaza look like a cake walk. It is up to the people of Gaza to take back their government from these thugs.

Next, we have let this evil in Syria and Iraq go on long enough. Declare an all out air war on ISIS. We can give it to them all the way from carpet bombing to precision bombing with our smart to brilliant bombs. We will use every arrow in our quiver, from bombs to cruise missiles. We will tell the Saudis we need to use their air fields for staging. Since ISIS has declared war on us "to the death", so be it. It is their wish, not ours.

Finally, Iran. We all know what their game is. Call them on it. We will tell them in no uncertain terms that if they don't stop funding terror networks in the region (and the world), we will bomb them back to the stone age. We will also tell them their work on nuclear reactors is over. Period. This canard about needing nukes for energy is just so much BS, and we all know it. Israel, the United States, and our Euro allies will stand together on this issue.

It is time to get off the golf course, get in the situation room, and wear your job like an American President. Be the Superman. Get it on. We did not start this war, but we can sure finish it. I don't EVER want to see one more kid getting shot or beheaded by some nut ball. We paid for our military, now let us use it to rid the world of this evil!