Patriotism

The Failure of the Dream

Mark Noonan35 Comments

Race: its a little bit of a contentious issue, huh?

This is mostly because of all the lying. Lying is really bad, by the way. Makes it very hard to get anything done. On the other hand, if you’re trying to steal money and power in a democratic system, lies are the way to go. They work very well. What happened with race in America after 1965 is that once the victory was won – and the Civil Rights Act won it decisively – the people who had invested in fighting against racism were faced with the stark and very frightening necessity of getting a job.

Unless, that is, they could find a way to milk it.

Which they did – and starting in 1966, what we got were people asserting stoutly that the nation which had fought a bloody civil war to end slavery and which had just enacted sweeping legal assurances of equality under law was still this evil nation which was so damned racist that they’d…dammit, I know they just passed a law assuring equality for blacks but that’s not important. What’s important is some yahoo in Alabama still flying the rebel flag! See!!!! Still racist! And the Civil Rights Act wasn’t a magic wand making everything perfect all at once! Racism!!!!

What the Civil Rights leaders found is that you could still play the game – and obtain a great deal of power and money – if you pretended that it was forever the day after Bull Connor took the firehose to the marchers. And the example was taken up by others – anyone non-white, non-male, non-Christian, non-straight could hop on that bandwagon. And, so, they did. Just a huge churn of unfounded accusations against the most tolerant and equitable society in human history…and all to grab a bit of unearned money and power. And all latched onto by Marxists to tear down what they hated most: America.

King’s dream was of a place where people would be judged by the content of their character. A noble dream. A very American statement, too. Not for us to place people by birth into their position. Not for us to bow down to money or raw power. Who did the right thing? Who did the hard work? That is who Americans wish to honor. But now, thanks to those who came after King, that dream has become a nightmare of everyone being judged by their skin color, their sexual orientation, their gender…with the privileged elite asserting a right to rule based on the credentials they awarded themselves. This is a very long way from the content of our character.

It is, for lack of a better word, disgusting. It fills me with loathing to see on Martin Luther King day the sort of people who wear his skin-suit and pretend to be his successors while rejecting everything he stood for. I want them punished – for, after all, stealing a dream must be the worst crime. To take what was beautiful and use it to cover a nauseating gang of race-baiters, hustlers and con artists is about the most vile thing a person can do. I do still have King’s dream in my heart. I pray that we will one day live it. But I know we can’t while we allow those who betrayed the dream to have power and position in our society.

Let’s Go Brandon!

Mark Noonan18 Comments

“Let’s Go Brandon” is spreading not just all around the United States, but all around the world. In case you’ve been under a rock, that phrase is cover for “f*** Joe Biden”. It got started when an MSMer was interviewing a race car driver named Brandon and in the background you can hear the crowd chanting “f*** Joe Biden” and the MSMer tried to cover it up by saying their were cheering for Brandon.

The chants – in both forms – are getting ever more common in public venues. All entirely spontaneous. I’m nearly 57 years old: I’ve never seen anything like this. Sure, Presidents have become unpopular and have been booed at events…but I’ve never seen a President nine months in getting spontaneously booed when he’s not even present. Meanwhile, the man he supposedly defeated less than a year previously is able to draw huge crowds of adoring supporters. We are in entirely uncharted political waters here.

The polls are also bad for Biden, but we’ve all learned never to put too much stock in them. Still, they are bad. A couple of them very bad, though the MSM, true to form, has also generated a few which are somewhat favorable to Pudding Brain. They had to, lest the poll aggregators show his overall support dropping towards 40%.

Here’s the deal, as Pudding Brain would say when he can concentrate on the teleprompter long enough: the fact that he’s this catastrophically unpopular while his opponent gets crowds any politician would envy just tells you the truth: Biden did not get 81 million votes in 2020. People do turn on people they vote for, but slowly. This is because people, by and large, are unwilling to admit error. If 81 million voted for him less than 12 months ago, you can be sure that he’d still have a level of support…more than sufficient to ensure against random crowds cursing his name.

It has gotten so bad that the GOP’s sure-loss in Virginia next month is in question. To be sure, they’ve already announced that the Dem stronghold of Fairfax county will report late so they can know how many ballots they need to insert…but the fact that they have to do that and bring in the big guns shows that all is not well for the Democrats right now. Things are bad; Joe didn’t have support to begin with…and people are getting into the mindset of punishment.

And, honestly, what is there to be happy about? We’re still suffering mask mandates and lockdowns of various severity. Prices are through the roof. Store shelves are getting empty. The border is out of control. China is testing advanced weaponry while the US military is concentrating on race and gender issues. It as all gone wrong: we’re in the most stunning “I Told You So” in history.

Still a long time between now and the end of this mess, but I think that we now do have the wind at our back.

The End of American Faith

Mark Noonan42 Comments

I believed, my friends. When I joined the Navy in 1983, my faith in America was boundless. And it stayed! I believed that the generals and admirals were good. I believed that most people in law enforcement and intel were good people. I swallowed the whole thing hook, line and sinker.

But I don’t believe any longer.

Back in 2011, I wrote this article arguing that if the Afghan government wouldn’t get on the side of civilization, it was time to abandon it. I was right! But, not nearly as right as I should have been.

We’re all rather stunned at the speed of the Taliban victory. We’ve seen the videos of Taliban with captured America equipment. But less remarked on is that the Taliban was able to mount this offensive this quickly…and then you see the Taliban clean, well fed…not like they’ve been hiding for 20 years in caves under intense pressure from a powerful enemy ready to strike hard at a moments notice. And then you ask: just what the heck were we doing there? Did we even fight them? Those videos we’ve seen of bombing attacks and claims of high value targets being killed…was any of that true? I just don’t know – and I can’t ask the government or MSM because they are all known liars.

And then you take a further step back from it…and place yourself in the boots of a battalion commander who wants to get his combat duty ticket punched but who also doesn’t want to wind up charged with a war crime it things get dicey out there and the troops kill the wrong guy, or even kill the right guy but on video which looks like (or can be made to look like) the shooting wasn’t justified. Given this, perhaps you just go through the motions? If an easy and clear targets serves itself up for you, fine: but getting down and dirty in it which might lead to a career ending mistake? Give it a pass.

And the senior officers probably won’t look too closely at it – they know the game, too. They played it years before and got through it with a star on their shoulder and now look forward to a post-military career as a lobbyist or TV talking head. Maybe even get a book deal out of it…with their picture on the cover in a uniform with more decorations on it than Patton and MacArthur combined had. Hold the pose: that stern look of command (the photographer will get the lighting right for that), eyes off into the distance. The viewer mentally hearing the Star Spangled Banner. Life is good! Don’t think about those guys who got nearly burned to death by an IED…

After really pondering it, I’ve come to the conclusion that it has all been utter sh**. Pardon the language but sometimes an old swabbie has to say it like it is. They never fought to win. Not the officers. Not the civilian leadership. None of them. They just wanted to be seen to be doing something which could be put up in public as brave…as they merely worked the system for advancement. The only person who cared about the troops, as such, was Trump…and you’ll notice that the senior officers, violating their oath (and they will stand before God one day to answer for that: mark my words), undermined him at every turn. He risked the game: the game of never win, get advancement, get rich.

I looked at the pictures of my father and grandfather yesterday – grandpa in his WWI Army uniform and dad in his WWII Marine uniform and I wondered what they would think about it? And then further wondered what they would do about it? Have we all become such cowards? I do think that dad and grandpa would have started shooting by now. People are dead. Thousands of them. Ours and theirs. And for what? So that defense contractors can make money and four star cowards can get rich? Admiral Byng was shot pour encourager les autres simply because he wasn’t aggressive enough against the enemy. What should be done with generals who weren’t aggressive at all? And the politicians who set it up that way?

How did we get to this? How cowardly did we have to be to allow this to happen? Was the bribe of a big screen TV and a Super Bowl enough? Sadly, it was. Using fake money the Ruling Class allowed us to purchase amazing luxuries to keep us distracted while they sold us out. Look in the mirror, folks, to find who is responsible for this.

But, now we know. We can’t go back: the lies have been exposed. We know. We can’t be fooled anymore. Now it turns about and becomes the responsibility of very specific people who are trying to keep this con going. And we, in our turn, must hold them accountable. They must be punished for what they have done. We have been betrayed by the very people we placed our faith in. Time will tell if these traitors get their proper wages.

Defending America’s Truth

Mark Noonan86 Comments

The problem we have, as a nation, is that we allow lies and truth to co-exist. I’ve said before, many times, that if you add even the slightest bit of a lie to something, then the whole thing becomes a lie. And, do keep in mind: “you add”. In other words, you have to deliberately do something…it isn’t a mistake. It isn’t a misunderstanding. You, a liar, decide to maliciously insert a lie. That’s how you turn something true into a lie. And we’ve allowed malicious liars to insert a whole host of lies into our truth.

And what is our truth? Our American truth?

“…all men are created equal…”

That is the foundation of us all, as a people. Trump pointed it out in his Mt Rushmore speech and I’m ever more convinced that he’s actually a deep student of history…he’s hit the exact right point too many times for it to be an accident.

That is also a dogma, as I’ve also pointed out before. It is a dogma as incapable of proof as the dogma of the Trinity. And, like the Trinity, it appears false on the face of it: one thing can’t be three and if you just look at people you can tell they aren’t equal. But, it is still the truth – the Trinity is one thing and three and people are created equal. It is crucial that we adhere to it – that we, per Jefferson, consider it a self-evident truth. Because if we don’t, then we aren’t created equal and our position in society becomes whatever we can get away with…or whatever an oppressor can get away with doing to us. If we aren’t equal, then we are mere beasts vying for power.

The most important thing about this truth of ours is that it means, as soon as adopted, that the nation is incapable of being unequal. That is, whatever is unequal is living on borrowed time the minute you say, “all men are created equal.” Whatever inherited inequalities you have at the moment and any that you try to create later are doomed because they’ll run up on the rocks of “all men are created equal.”. People being Fallen, they will naturally try to defend wrong things which advantage them, or create new wrongs which will advantage them: but as long as the dogma is, “all men are created equal”, then such efforts are ultimately doomed…simply by pointing out, “all men are created equal”.

This is why the United States has never been a racist nation. We didn’t assert that “all white men are created equal”. We said “all men are created equal.” And, yes, some people later on, confronted with our truth against their holding people as slaves, did try to cook up a notion that “all men” didn’t mean “all men.” But, it didn’t work, did it? Whether it was luck or wisdom or the very hand of God which moved Jefferson’s pen, that slaveholding man wrote the words which guaranteed that his slaves would one day be free. And he knew it, too.

Those who are asserting that America is a racist nation are lying. They are saying that men who crafted a government which didn’t even mention race were creating a racist nation. They take as their evidence that the men who founded our nation held slaves and in were in many ways not in favor of things we take for granted in 2020. But everything we take for granted in 2020 was covered by their words, “all men are created equal.” If you are a black man living free: thank the Founders. If you are a married gay man: thank the Founders. If you are a Bolshevik at liberty to spread your sedition: thank the Founders. Because they wrote ” all men are created equal”, you are free and living your life as you wish.

This is an amazingly dangerous time in our history: because of the liars. The Left trying to destroy our founding. They are claiming it was wrong and it must be corrected. But pay close attention: what must be destroyed is “all men are created equal.” Oh, like all Leftists they’ll claim the words…but if you look at what they do, it is clear they are against the truth. They want special set-asides for favored people. Special rights and privileges for various groups based upon their claims to past oppression. The Left’s all men are created equal comes out as “all men are created equal, except whites and Christians and heterosexuals” and whatever else they might want to add in there in an ever-changing system of spoilsmanship.

And it is a natural bent in humanity, after all: the desire to be on top. The desire to be thought of as holding special knowledge which justifies ruling. As we are all prone to sin, so are we all prone to the sin of thinking ourselves better than others. And just as heresy in Christianity is fought by strict adherence to Christian dogma, so we must crush political heresy by an unflinching defense of the truth, “all men are created equal.”. And we can’t retreat an iota, just as the old Church father’s couldn’t back in the past. Let one small part of “all men are created equal” be destroyed and the whole thing goes. No matter how noble you think the justification is, no one can have any special privileges under law: it must apply equally to everyone, or we’re doomed.

If we are to survive as a free nation, we have to reassert the self-evident truths stated in our founding document. Anything that contradicts what is in there simply cannot be allowed to become the law of the land. Anything currently in our laws which contradict the founding also have to go. And like the stern battlers for Christian truth in the past, we will have to become stern battlers for American truth today. We are not fighting over trivia like tax rates here: we are fighting over whether or not the nation founded on July 4th, 1776 shall continue to be. This is not a time to worry about offending people: if they are offended by the Founders, then they are trying to destroy the nation. Will we let them? Out of an abundance of politeness and unwillingness to fight, will we allow liars to erase “all men are created equal”?

I hope not.

Happy 4th of July!

Mark Noonan2 Comments

In Congress, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness…

The Left Attacks

Mark Noonan41 Comments

There is no love on the Left – that is something which must be kept in mind. It is why they are so angry and so merciless. Anyone with love in their heart simply wouldn’t torch a building or beat a random person near to death. As to why they have hardened their hearts so much: I don’t honestly know. Probably a lot of factors; anger and resentment over this or that perceived or real slight in their lives. The fact that they are alive, free and healthy is proof positive that they haven’t had anything really bad happen to them…but whatever did happen to them has turned them against normal human feelings.

It would be an interesting study to see how many of these rioters were people who had been unjustly arrested and sent to jail. There are such. Far too many, actually: the police are often wrong and prosecutors often venal in their desire to puff up their conviction rate. But what you mostly see from those finally freed from an unjust sentence is gratitude and mercy. Perhaps there are a couple such people among the rioters, but I’ll bet it is few and far between. What we’re seeing is a temper tantrum from people who feel that they should be top of the heap but lack the skill and grit to work for it…seconded by a mass of utter fools who are in it to grab what they can while the grabbing is good.

Trump is right to designate Antifa a terrorist organization – because they are using terror to advance their political cause. They aren’t seeking votes or donations or petitioning government for redress of grievances. They are engaging in an obscene outbreak of violence in an attempt to intimidate us into letting them impose their will on the country. The public backers of Antifa claim there is no organization involved, but as such public backers are of the Left, we already know they are egregious liars. The fact is that this is being coordinated: there is a mind or a group of minds behind this. Money and communications are being used; orders are being issued; tactics refined and implemented (I’ve seen videos where upper class white youths are painting anarchist symbols on otherwise undamaged buildings…they are signalling to the crowd that the cops aren’t watching/acting and so, go for it; it is a very clever bit of street fighting tactic. The white kids then take off). The FBI should be looking to find those giving the orders and arrest them: and one of the charges must be civil rights violations. I want the perpetrators of this to be sitting in jail knowing they have been convicted of violating the rights of American citizens.

None of us can know how this comes out – the heirs of Lenin are face to face with the heirs of Washington. One side or the other will prevail.

9/11 at 18

Mark Noonan50 Comments

Hard to believe it has been that long. People are becoming adults in our nation who have no memory of it. But, if they join the Army we will send them to fight in Afghanistan! And then accuse them of being war criminals.

I can no longer get weepy about 9/11 – it has been burned out of me. I used to feel anger about it, but now I know if it hadn’t been that, it would have been something else. Bin Laden picked his target well – he must have been an avid reader of the American MSM. No nation that allows the garbage it puts out is in a healthy state. We managed to whack bin Laden – something he knew was a risk – but at the end of the day, we’ve done nothing against the ideology he supported and we are even more riven by faction and self-hatred than we were on 9/10/2001.

I pray for the souls of the departed, and that our nation is cured of it’s errors, and becomes, once again, a nation which can respond to an attack like 9/11.

In Congress, July 4th, 1776

Mark Noonan12 Comments

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness…

…We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

Can the USA Stay Together?

Mark Noonan19 Comments

The knitting (yes, knitting) website Ravelry has banned all pro-Trump content. They did this, so they said, to be inclusive of “all”. I noted to them on their Twitter account that “all” has a meaning and they should look it up. I haven’t received a response. But, that aside, we should really think about what they are doing here: they are saying that being pro-Trump (you know, like most of us who come here are, to one degree or another) is inherently evil.

I’m a middle aged man of no particular importance. Just a regular guy, as it were. I’ve got my stack of sins, just like everyone else but I also at least try to do the right thing, as most people do. I’m not evil. That is, I don’t desire evil to happen – I don’t seek it out; I don’t enjoy it; I don’t wish for anyone to suffer evil in their lives. But what of people who wish to silence me because I voted for a particular person for President? Are they good? Or, more to the point, do they and I have the same idea of what “good” is?

That is the really decisive thing in a country, after all. In general, most things, most of the time, have to be agreed to by nearly everyone. If you and I have opposite understandings of what “up” and “down” are, we’re going to find it hard to cooperate in any real sense. We’ll keep having fundamental conflicts with each other as we each try to get the other to do the exact opposite of what is desired. Eventually, we either have to give up and go our separate ways, or one of us must surrender his definition of what “up” and “down” are to the other person. As Our Lord said – and Lincoln reiterated – a house divided against itself cannot stand. It must cease to be divided, or it must fall.

Until just recently, I held firmly to the opinion that it was really no business of mine, at all, what other people believed. But now I realize something: tolerance can only go so far. We tolerated the bizarre ideology of the leftists because we felt ourselves safe – after all, it was ridiculous what they believed and no rational nation would ever allow themselves to be ruled by such lunacy. But the left is no longer a fringe of lunatics we can laugh at. They control the media, the large corporations, the education establishment, the bureaucracy and a large portion of the judiciary. The very craziest leftwing nutjob we laughed at 25 years ago is now in a position to enforce insanity upon us; and they are doing so. We are now forced to watch what we say, lest an unguarded word puts our job at risk. We are forced to fight tooth and nail just to secure the right to be left alone – and even when we win, the left just keeps coming right back at us, never accepting any defeat as anything more than a temporary setback.

And it isn’t that we and the left want the same things. We might both say we want “justice” but what they mean by the word and what we mean is entirely different – so different that it is like trying to say “black” and “white” are the same thing. To us, justice means people get what they are due…to them, justice means anyone they hate gets punished. Facts and logic mean nothing to the left – but they mean something to us. And we also know that we can’t have anything without rigid adherence to facts and logic. But the left views it differently – they do think they can, by a sort of incantation, make the world fit their mental image, rather than taking the world as it is. And just how do we get along? How do we find a way to march down the road together when we want to be on the road while the left is insisting that that the cliff is the road and we should walk over it?

In the end, I don’t want us to stay together if it is to be like this – in theory, I want the entire territory of the United States to be intact and for all of us to be patriotic citizens of the same country. In reality, though, it can’t be that way. At least, not right now. And maybe not ever. I can’t live in a nation where it is implied I am evil because of whom I voted for…or that I’m evil because of the skin color I was born with, or that I’m evil because of the religion I adhere to, or that the emblems of my nation must all be torn down. You get the picture. I can’t live with people who don’t see the world largely as I do. And I don’t think anyone else can, either. It might be mere inertia that is keeping us going right now – but I fear that this is a fading quality and a crisis is coming.

It is being provoked by the left – and I honestly don’t think they’re smart enough to understand fully what they are doing – and it could lead to a civil war…wherein either they’d kill all of us or we’d kill all of them. In either case, the nation would cease to be divided against itself. It would become all one thing. I’d prefer what some are calling a national divorce…where we just nearly divvy up the national debt on a per-capita basis and everyone votes, State by State (I prefer county by county, actually) which nation they want to belong to. Each resulting nation would become a nation of people who largely agree – and that is how it has to be, if a nation is to exist, at all.

In Congress, July 4th, 1776

Mark Noonan9 Comments

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness…

…We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.