Hey Jacob! All that and a bag of chips!

                                       

                                            

"You might have to resign over this one Jacob, put your tail between your legs, and head back to New York. Your reputation has been sullied beyond repair. You have a law degree - go practice law on the east coast. On final thing - don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out."   

That poor man-child mayor of Minneapolis. He wants so hard to be a major player in DFL or DNC politics. But the past couple weeks have not been kind to him. First, he allowed a police precinct to be overrun and torched by the miscreants who were causing trouble. Then he allowed hundreds of shops and businesses (many of them minority owned) to be looted, trashed, and burned. Then to top everything off, he was "booed off the stage" by protesters yesterday, as he was the sole dissenting voice to de-fund the cops. 

Where does that leave Jacob Frey? In no man's zone. The Republicans can't stand him, and the Democrats now think he is weak. What do I think? And I have said this before many times. Electing Jacob Frey was the same as electing Omar or AOC. How so? Totally unqualified for the positions they hold. Now we have circus clowns rather than adults in civic leadership. And that Star Wars bar crowd called the Minneapolis City Council? Please - don't get me started.

Running a big city, even a deep blue one like Minneapolis, takes some chutzpah and know how. Unfortunately young Mr. Frey - you have neither. You are a fish out of water in the City of Lakes. When those of us who grew up either in Minneapolis, or close to it, saw the lawlessness and brazen disregard for authority the nights of the riots, well, it was hard to watch. Rather than have law enforcement go into that melee, crack some heads, and then take people to jail, you had your police force watch as spectators. It was the most shameful act of civil disobedience I have seen in my lifetime. And the resulting damage is all on you brother.

Don't expect Uncle Sam to be generous with the $55,000,000 you are asking for in aid. I mean, why should someone else dip deep into their pockets to pay for the mess you created? Much of the bill will come from city taxpayers. Hope they are happy with it. Why? Because once the police department is de-funded and total anarchy rules the streets, the bills the fix the mess left behind will be never ending. 

No Jacob - you broke it. Not only did you break the city you were entrusted to run, you broke the confidence of the people who elected you. If you had taken civics and history while in school rather than gender studies, you would have learned about Mayor Fiorello La Guardia. He was the Mayor of New York City from days gone by. He was a progressive Republican, yet both sides of the aisle loved this man. He was able to make things work in that massive city, and to this day, is considered one of the finest mayors in American history. Instead of fashioning your leadership after someone like La Guardia, you instead used Nero as your mentor. All you were missing was the fiddle as your city burned.

You might have to resign over this one Jacob, put your tail between your legs, and head back to New York. Your reputation has been sullied beyond repair. You have a law degree - go practice law on the east coast. On final thing - don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out.   

Knee Jerking (again...)

"What is next? Undo the Second Amendment? Good luck with that one. People, people - years of knee jerk voting for lunatics have given us what we have now in city and state government." 

In the business world, there is a term for over-reacting (quickly and without too much thinking) to a situation. It is called a knee jerk reaction. Seasoned managers seldom do knee jerks. Rookie managers, as well as managers who don't think strategically, are known to act this way. Nothing good usually comes out of knee jerk reactions - except more knee jerk reactions trying to undo them.

The way much of the country has reacted to the sudden onset of the COVID - 19 virus demonstrates knee jerk in many states. It sure did in Minnesota. The knee jerk was to shut just about everything down, and have the citizens huddle in their basements. Meanwhile, our economy ground to a halt, and going to the grocery store to buy the barest of essentials, was iffy. Meanwhile, many red states which practiced common sense safety, and gave the virus a wide berth, kept on doing what they do, and life went on somewhat normal. 

But the knee jerk reaction to the virus was NOTHING compared to the knee jerk reaction to the death of George Floyd. First off, let me say this. What happened to George Floyd was terrible. I think so, and everyone I have talked to feels the same. There is simply no debate on that issue. However - the aftermath of his death is up for debate. The burning, the looting, the mayhem - that was bad enough. But the politics which have come, and which are yet to come - are way, way beyond the pale.

What do I mean? First off in DC. Painting a street for two blocks, in the heart of our capitol, which spells out in large letters, "Black Lives Matter". Why? It was a message to our President from the Mayor of DC. Like President Trump was the one who authorized the killing of George Floyd. Here is a news flash for the loony Mayor of DC. That is the nation's capitol. It is not your driveway, you can graffiti up with chalk. This President is NOT a racist. There is not a shred of evidence he ever has been. Before the flinch from came from COVID, people of color have never done so well economically. This graffiti on the streets of our nation's capitol needs to come off NOW! Your reaction Mayor, war totally knee jerk.

Then there is the call to disband the police. Get rid of them. Replace them with community organizers. Normally, a suggestion like this would have been laughed at, or put on Babylon Bee for sarcasm. Unfortunately, because we have let the infestation of socialists get so deep in many city governments (hello, Minneapolis), goofball City Councils might actually get this passed. No more cops in cities which are already crime ridden. Can't wait to see the stats in Chicago it they also get rid of their cops. What is dystopia like? We will soon find out.

Another goofy knee jerk idea was to disarm the National Guard. What? The National Guard is part of the armed forces. Get that? Armed? Do the kooks want the National Guard to go around handing out flowers to law breakers? Good flipping grief people - wake up! Our nation is on the verge of total lawlessness and anarchy right now. And we want to get rid of cops and disarm the National Guard? This is enough to make Canada look normal!

What is next? Undo the Second Amendment? Good luck with that one. People, people - years of knee jerk voting for lunatics have given us what we have now in city and state government. It has given us Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer. If we are not careful, it will also give us Joe Biden. Remember that in November. No knee jerking voting this time. Vote for sanity. Vote for the adults.   

Re-opening Minnesota

"What have we learned about this COVID - 19 experience? Tons. Books will be written on the lessons learned from this virus. Books will be written on the social disruption which happened after Memorial Day. Are the two related? They might be." 

Okay. Now we have lost our Penny's store. Our once busy shopping area is still not looking as it once did. Why not? We are not back to our previous "normal" yet. Wisconsin is well on its way to being back to its original normal. South Dakota is at its normal, as it never left. But Minnesota took the "No Balls Walz" blue pill, and now we are still in la-la land. It has been reported that today, the great and powerful wizard of Minnesota, will allow more of our previous "privileges" to return. We will see.

Sorry, it that sounded a bit snarky. It was meant to be. If anyone is wondering why so many citizens are taking their ire out of our governor, let me put it this way. Minnesota, which has been locked down tighter than a drum, has almost as many COVID deaths as Wisconsin, Iowa, North Dakota and South Dakota combined. What does that mean? Our stats on this disease suck, and we have sacrificed a chunk of our state's economy for nothing. A big flinch.

Enough about the past. Now to look forward. Like now that we are in summer, what is there to do? Many beaches and pools are closed, and our parks have tight restrictions on them. Baseball is still a mess, and how this shortened season will play out is still a mystery to most. Football in the fall? Who knows. 

The big question in many parents minds - is school. After this most strange school year, what happens next fall? More distance learning? And who will be the home monitors for that? More and more parents, who had been off this spring due to COVID, are being called back to work. Even those who can work from home, can't focus on their work AND be a tutor to their students at the same time. Plus, it has been reported that if schools do open up fully, up to 20% of the teachers will quit rather than go back into the classroom. Why? Too risky.

We need our restaurants opened up fully - and now. In order for us to truly be re-opened, it has to FEEL like we are normal once again. Restaurants today feel anything but normal. Stores? Same way. I guess one of the lessons we learned from the past week, is since protests and funerals for martyrs are except from social distancing and face masks, then none of the other restrictions should be enforced. No masks, no social distancing. Open the churches, the ball parks, the beaches, the state fair. LET'S GO!

What have we learned about this COVID - 19 experience? Tons. Books will be written on the lessons learned from this virus. Books will be written on the social disruption which happened after Memorial Day. Are the two related? They might be. In any event, first things first. Open up Minnesota, then we can write our books about lessons learned. Please Walz, do the right thing - just once.

 

Defund the police!

"I mean, I thought I was immune from over-reacting to hearing the crap the loony left spews. But this one really took the cake. Right now, the city of Minneapolis is on life support. Defunding the police would a the dagger in the heart. Taps. No more City of the Lakes."

Just when you think you have heard every nutty idea coming out of the Democrat left, a new, more nutty idea comes along. Defund the police? What in the world does that mean? Total anarchy? A lawless society? According to the nut balls on the Minneapolis City Council, once the MPD is eliminated due to no funding, a new organization could take its place. A group of community organizers who could reason with law breakers instead of using force. Maybe use pixie dust instead of guns and tasers.

Right now, many of the folks I know who live in Greater Minnesota don't like going downtown because of the crime. And that is with Minneapolis having a police force. If you take the police away, Minneapolis will turn into a modern day version of Tombstone, long before Wyatt Earp tamed it. Once the police are gone, and word gets out nationwide, there will be a non-stop caravan of cars coming into town from points east and beyond. Why? Easy pickings. Very easy pickings.

This is the dumbest idea since the New York City idea of not charging folks with misdemeanors or non-violent felonies. That great idea was put to the test just recently when the thugs and punks looted and torched sections of the SOHO district. A looter would be caught, thrown in jail, and released the next day with no charges. That night the looter would be back on the streets, looting once again. How is this possible? Mayor de Blasio. He and Small Frey are the two most un-qualified mayors in the known universe.

I suppose I should not get too hasty in my criticism of this fine idea. After all, there will be this group of community organizers who will replace the police. They will be dressed in pastel colors, not to offend anyone, and also to relax people. They will have pamphlets to hand out to law breakers. Pamphlets of poems by John Lennon, text from Kahlil Gibran, some profound statements from Mao's Little Red Book, and so forth. They will also have incense to pass out for the people. Once someone is robbed of their life's savings, they will need to be soothed.

The Minneapolis jail can be re-purposed into something much more useful. The cells can be used for meditation and mindfulness. Or counseling rooms, so we can reason with people who have committed multiple crimes. All they need do is promise they won't do it again, and they can be on their way. Ah - Nirvana! I love it!

When I first heard of this idea, that famous line from the movie Full Metal Jacket came to mind - "You got to be shitting me Pile!" I mean, I thought I was immune from over-reacting to hearing the crap the loony left spews. But this one really took the cake. Right now, the city of Minneapolis is on life support. Defunding the police would a the dagger in the heart. Taps. No more City of the Lakes. No more anything. The Democrat left would have ruined it all.    

 

Today, hate is best served hot

"The human heart was built for love. That is how and why God created that way. It is natural to have love in your heart when you also have God in your heart. However, when God is ushered out of the heart, it becomes occupied with dark and sinister forces."

Many of us have heard that old expression, "Revenge is a dish best served cold". The origins of that expression go back centuries, from France in the 1800's. Today, we have tried to replace revenge with justice. For the most part, that works. But hate? The dish which is best served hot? What have we replaced hate with? We have replaced hate with more hate. Yes, hate is our favorite four letter word.

This past week, we witnessed Exhibit "A" of hate in action. Young people (of a certain political stripe) from all over the place, gathered to cause damage, injury and mayhem. Why? Hatred of the American system. Hatred of a system which has given them the best lifestyles the world has ever known. Hatred against police, whose sworn duty is to protect and serve them. Hatred against WASPS (White Anglo-Saxon Protestants), and all they stand for. And hatred of God, our giver of all good things.

Someone asked the other day if it was spiritual warfare, which was at work during last week's riots. Those in the faith know the answer to that without a moment's hesitation. Absolutely. Hate is the number one tool in Satan's toolbox. When our hearts are filled with hate, love has no place. And love is what God commanded us to do. Those young rioters have only hate, with no forgiveness, no mercy, no anything.

We have seen hate in our nation's capitol. Hatred for our President for doing the unthinkable sin of beating Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. Hatred for this President, because everything they have tried to do to unseat him - has failed. Besides this hatred of our President, the disdain for each party by the other is palpable. Washington DC has become a toxic stew of raw and unhealthy emotions, rather than a place of fellowship between people of different political persuasions. Because of that, much of our government has become vapid and useless.

In a land so blessed with so much, how is it possible that hate can exist this strong? Where we are inches away from being embroiled in a hot and bloody civil war? Where in the words of one Antifa member, "We are going to start throwing acid in people's faces to blind them." Where does that type of thinking come from? Sadly, some believe it comes from our colleges and universities. By the leftover twisted thinking of the 1960's. 

The human heart was built for love. That is how and why God created that way. It is natural to have love in your heart, when you also have God in your heart. However, when God is ushered out of the heart, it becomes occupied with dark and sinister forces.

One final thing. This is the most vile thing about hate. It is a reverse emotion. When you have hatred towards a person, that hatred is more damaging to the hater than the hated. It is poison. It is like battery acid in the heart. Hatred will destroy us, whereas love will save us. No matter how bleak thing look right now, love will save us.      

Turning the clock back...

"We are stuck with this new 'thing' some call reality. How is this going to end? This dual curse of pandemic and social unrest? Your guess is as good as mine. But failure is not an option. We must go on. We must heal. We have no choice."  



One of the internet games I play has kind of a neat feature. If you go on a losing streak, and your fortune starts to evaporate, a message appears on the screen. "Want to go back in time? For $7, your balance of {whatever} can be restored." Then if you want, you can pay the seven bucks, and be back in the dough again until your next losing streak.

Back in time. Sounds pretty good these days. Yesterday was the first of June. This year of 2020 is now five months old. Think of what you were doing five months ago on New Year's Day. What your thoughts were. Your plans. I know what mine were. My wife and I were getting ready for our grandson's birthday, and then leaving town. We were going to visit her cousin in Kansas, her brother in Florida, and then some friends further south in Florida. We were going to get our Global Traveler pass in Alabama (for our upcoming cruise to Europe), and then relax in our Florida condo until early March. 2020 was going to be a great year! 

Then the speed bumps started to appear. While in Florida, I got sick with something. It turned into pneumonia. It (along with skunky weather) caused our trip to be cut short by a week. On the way home, my wife was not feeling well. Turns out she had bronchitis. In any event, we barely make it home, and then started hearing about this Chinese virus which had infected so many in Washington state. Little did we know that the "normal" in our year had just left the building.

The rest is all history, which is common to us all. Pandemic, followed by supply chain issues for needed items, social distancing and all the crap that came with it. Our cruise was cancelled due to the pandemic. Then out of the blue, after a very pleasant (yet weird, due to the virus) Memorial Day weekend, came the unexpected. The George Floyd issue in Minneapolis. Out of this most unique year, of now having to live with this Chinese virus, came some of the worst civil unrest most of us could ever remember. And that brings us to today.

Five months. We have gone from la-la land, the sky is blue land, to back-to-back crisis' which has taken this great nation to the brink. It is getting increasing harder for many of us to remember what our "normal" was these days. Can't dine indoors at a restaurant, need an appointment to get a routine haircut, still can't find some items at the store, sports is still at a stand still, and most church services are only online.

In addition, most major cities in the country have been through some kind of social upheaval. Many now have new areas of burned out or trashed buildings, which are the building blocks of blight. We have roving gangs of youth, Antifa, BLM, socialists - you name it - going from city to city to cause havoc. Guns and ammo have been flying off the store shelves, and it is just a matter of time before our cold civil war becomes hot and bloody.

Do I want the clock turned back five months? As Steve Austin would say, "Oh, hell, ya!" But as much as most of us would like to, we can't go back in time. We are stuck with this new "thing", some call reality. How is this going to end? This dual curse of pandemic and social unrest? Your guess is as good as mine. But failure is not an option. We must go on. We must heal. We have no choice.  

"We will bury you!"

"We are now reaping what we have sown. The seeds of socialism we planted in the 1960's are now bearing bad fruit. How this will end, I don't know. But if we are not careful, our society will be "buried" as Khrushchev warned. And the great American Experiment will be over."  

Many years ago, long before some of you were born, the Soviet Union was run not by Putin, but by another dictator named Nikita Khrushchev. It was in the 50's and the 60's, and things were not going well between the Soviets and the US. Like, how bad? Like, practicing nuclear "duck and cover" bad. In fact in November of 1956, Khrushchev uttered that famous line which still resonates today in our history - "We will bury you!"

Two things which became myths in our nation's history concerning the Soviets are 1) Khrushchev never took off his shoe and pounded the podium at the UN, and 2) he never said "We will bury you" in the context of killing us and then throwing dirt over us. The context he intended was because his form of government was so good, so pure, it would outlast our system of capitalism. Soon, capitalism would be in the dust heap of history. Or - buried there. 

Over the years, some have said that what he really meant was America would defeat itself. Because our system produced more for some than for others, we would have a system of the haves and the have nots. Of course that would never happen! Our system is based on equal opportunity, not equal outcomes. That is the way our system was set up by the framers. But over the years, some Presidents (Democrats), kept sprinkling more and more socialism into our system. It reached a crescendo in the 1960's when Lyndon Johnson promulgated the Great Society. It destroyed the families and started the decay of our education system. We then went from the haves and have nots, to the makers and the takers.

What we are seeing in the week since George Floyd died, is some of what Khrushchev said coming true. A small percentage of our population, is trying to destroy the greater good - the majority of us. This small percentage, who call themselves anarchists, socialists, progressives, heathens, atheists, hedonists, and so forth - are everything the rest of us are not. They hate that some of us have things we earned by working for them. Not fair - not a bit. So, they want what we have. And they will take anything and everything they can, in any way they can.

Sound familiar? Sound like this past week? How about last night, when the almost 200 year old church most all Presidents have prayed in - was torched. How about when the Third Precinct Police Headquarters in Minneapolis was taken over and burned to the ground? Or, how about last night, when every high end shop in the Soho district of NYC was looted and trashed? Or what is happening in California? All of this done, by that small percentage of malcontents, who although small in numbers, seem to keep outnumbering the police.

Last night our Sheriff put out a Citizen's Alert. Seems the malcontents have put the word out they might be coming after the burbs. Be alert, be safe. Is this going to be our new norm? Sleeping with a loaded shotgun, just in case some long haired kid in a black mask breaks into your house? Just to take your stuff - the stuff in the minds of the malcontents you are not entitled too? WTH?

One of the things a nation does to perpetuate itself, is to protect its "seed corn". Our "seed corn" being our youth. We might have to learn to get along without some of our seed corn in the very near future. Some of our "seed corn" has crossed the Rubicon. Gone too far. Become "bad seeds" instead of "seed corn".

It pains me to say this, because they are Americans, but if these "bad seeds" are only intent on destroying this great country, they can't be part of our society. Where would they go? After the President declares them a "Terrorist Group", many will end up in a place like Gitmo. Or worse.

We are now reaping what we have sown. The seeds of socialism, we planted in the 1960's, are now bearing bad fruit. How this will end, I don't know. But if we are not careful, our society will be "buried" as Khrushchev warned. And the great American Experiment will be over.