Cliven Bundy and the Negroes

Thank you Mr. Bundy; until your comments on the “Negro” surfaced I was not sure of what I would be posting today. Thanks to you I am now clear on that question.  So, in case you have been buried somewhere in a hole; or just had your head in the sand lately; here’s some background.

Cliven Bundy is the Nevada rancher who has been grazing his cattle on your land for 20 years, or more, and doesn’t think he owes you any money for. He was repeatedly warned about this practice and ignored several warnings which were given concerning our government seizing his cattle as payment. When the bill came due and our government sent marshals to do that, he met them with armed resistance. After a brief stand-off, our troops decided not to kill him and his supporters and left. Mr. Bundy has been crowing ever since.

I use the pro-nouns “our” and “we” in describing the government because that is exactly who the government represents; you and me. Mr. Bundy and his friends are so busy casting things in terms of “us” and “them” that I felt the need to remind everyone who “we” really are.

We are the government; though at the present time we may not all be happy with our representation; either at the local or federal level. The fact remains though, that when Mr. Bundy picks Uncle Sam’s pocket he is really stealing from you and me, since there is no Uncle Sam; just a treasury with “our” money in it.

So, why all the surprise that this guy is a racist who supports the idea of slavery; search me? Here are his remarks. If you like this guy, more power to you; just don’t steal any more of our money. The next time I’m rooting for the Federal Marshalls.  I have highlighted the double negatives of this highly educated man. It's the same old crap - just in a different hat. You can't make this stuff up...

“I want to tell you one more thing I know about the Negro,” he said. Mr. Bundy recalled driving past a public-housing project in North Las Vegas, “and in front of that government house the door was usually open and the older people and the kids — and there is always at least a half a dozen people sitting on the porch — they didn’t have nothing to do. They didn’t have nothing for their kids to do. They didn’t have nothing for their young girls to do.

“And because they were basically on government subsidy, so now what do they do?” he asked. “They abort their young children; they put their young men in jail, because they never learned how to pick cotton. And I’ve often wondered, are they better off as slaves, picking cotton and having a family life and doing things, or are they better off under government subsidy? They didn’t get no more freedom. They got less freedom.”

Strange Days Indeed

These are strange days indeed. A passenger on a West Jet flight left the above note on a napkin for pilot, who has 17 years of flight experience. Obviously the writer knew that this was an insensitive; at best; thing to do. They even admit to the political incorrectness, which doesn't bother me at all. It’s the stupidity of the note, and the writer, which annoys me more.

We are all entitled to opinions. That goes without saying; but when you leave anonymous notes you are no longer expressing your opinion. You have crossed the line into intimidation. If someone wants to disagree with someone else, that is perfectly acceptable. You simply wait to engage them in conversation or correspondence where you both can address the issue at hand.

Of course when dealing with the pilot of an airliner there are certain rules which may keep you from engaging the pilot directly, but you can leave a note with your contact information with the steward/stewardess to give to the pilot.

That is, if you don’t have a problem with the gender of your steward/stewardess. Let’s face it, the guy who wrote this note is not going to be happy with a male steward. And I feel sorry for him. Everywhere he goes he is surrounded by women in jobs he doesn't feel comfortable with them holding.

It must be so sad to exist in a world where everywhere you turn you find yourself in disagreement with half of everyone you see. And, if you have a daughter it must be twice as painful. She may have ambition and want to do something which you feel should be open only to men. Will you stop her?

Here is the reply which the Captain sent via her Facebook account;

To @David in 12E on my flight #463 from Calgary to Victoria today. It was my pleasure flying you safely to your destination. Thank you for the note you discreetly left me on your seat. You made sure to ask the flight attendants before we left if I had enough hours to be the Captain so safety is important to you, too. I have heard many comments from people throughout my 17 year career as a pilot. Most of them positive. Your note is, without a doubt, the funniest. It was a joke, right? RIGHT?? I thought, not. You were more than welcome to deplane when you heard I was a “fair lady.” You have that right. Funny, we all, us humans, have the same rights in this great free country of ours. Now, back to my most important role, being a mother.

Rev. Charles Worley - For the Love of Christ

The Reverend Charles Worley, Pastor of Providence Road Baptist Church in Maiden, North Carolina; which is about 40 miles from my house; has caused quite a stir with his call for concentration camps for homosexuals. If you haven’t heard this story yet, you should. It is a direct refutation of the attitude that “it can’t happen here.” The reaction of the 300, or so, members of Providence Baptist Church is proof positive that it can. If you haven’t seen the video just listen for the “Amens” as the Reverend calls for a 150 mile long fence, with Lesbians on one side and “the queers and homosexuals in another; and have that fence electrified so they can’t get out…… Feed ‘em , and you know what? In a few years they’ll die. Do you know why? They can’t reproduce.” Ah, good Reverend, were it only that simple.

You see, the Reverend’s plan would not work as he thinks. It would become necessary for the camps to remain in continual operation to kill off any newborns from the heterosexual population who might later identify as homosexual. Apparently this would be just fine with the Reverend and his congregation, all of whom; I would assume; are anti-abortion. I have to wonder what would happen the first time that one of the congregant’s children showed signs of homosexuality. I suppose that then it would be okay to kill your own child; years after that child has been born. So, by this logic, abortion of an un-born fetus would still be wrong, but killing your own kid later would be acceptable.  Can you even believe that we are having this conversation in 2012?  You better believe it, because we are.

I am reminded of the scene in one of my favorite films, “Judgment at Nuremberg”, when the German defense attorney reads the following words concerning sterilization of the incompetent; “It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind... Three generations of imbeciles are enough.”

Chilling as these words are, they were spoken by Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes in his decision of Buck v. Bell in 1927. That case concerned itself with one young woman who was sterilized by the state against her will. That these words were flung back in our own faces during the Nuremberg Trials by the German defense attorney was almost comical. Not only had we pre-dated the Nazi’s with our embrace of the sterilization program  of which they stood accused, we actually re-started the program here in North Carolina the year following the Nuremberg trials, in 1948! That program was not discontinued here until 1964, and the state of North Carolina is just now making financial reparations to surviving victims of that cruel injustice.

So don’t say it "can’t happen here". It can; and will; unless we all stand up and loudly denounce the bigots who seek to divide us. Right now, the rumblings of the past are only 40 miles from my door.

Religious Tolerance - A Bygone Virtue

Why is it that otherwise sensible and intelligent people often check these two admirable qualities at the door, so to speak, whenever it comes to religion? What is so threatening about someone else’s beliefs that they would deliberatlely deface and debase the beliefs of another?

In Charlotte the talk has been about ways to retort to “God Bless You” when someone cares enough to say it after you sneeze. I always thought “Thank You” was appropriate but lately it seems to be in vogue to retort with something like “I don’t believe in that crap.” I figure if you are asking God to bless me it can’t hurt and is probably a way of saying I care or I love you. So what’s the big deal?

Of course the religious crowd has it’s own faults- let’s see- book bannings and burnings, torture, shunning etc are all excesses of a fringe element of the religious crowd- but I reject the premise that to deface or disrespect another’s beliefs will solve the problem.

The left is continually bashing religion in the name of smiting the over zealous and their belief in a Higher Power. The result is not pretty. With all the supposed intelligence and sensitivity they claim to posess, they tear down what they don’t believe in- and for what end? To stifle freedom of thought? Isn’t that what they themselves complain about as the bane of organized religion? I just don’t get it.

Rejecting religion out of hand and ridiculing others for their beliefs is as sane as the Christians who believe that they posess the only “Stairway to Heaven.” And let's not forget Hitler, who debased a particular religion in a vain attempt to commit genocide of a whole race!

In the final analysis both sides are wrong and do nothing to contribute to Global Harmony. After all, if we each shove back against every perceived threat to our own sensibilities then all we have left is a throng of non humanity, left with little consideration for others.

No one forces you to read a Bible- and no one should try to marganilze you for reading one. The key to the whole global condition is mutual respect. Without that, we are lost.