Things to Remember Before Writing Seniors Off

The typical U.S. household headed by a person age 65 or older has a net worth 47 times greater than a household headed by someone under 35, according to an analysis of census data currently released.

They like to refer to us as senior citizens, old fogies, geezers, and in some cases dinosaurs. Some of us are "Baby Boomers" getting ready to retire. Others have been retired for some time. We walk a little slower these days and our eyes and hearing are not what they once were. We worked hard, raised our children, worshiped our God and have grown old together. Yes, we are the ones some refer to as being over the hill, and that is probably true. But before writing us off completely, there are a few things that need to be taken into consideration.

In school we studied English, history, math, and science, which enabled us to lead America into the technological age. Most of us remember what outhouses were, many of us with firsthand experience. We   remember the days of telephone party-lines, 25 cent gasoline, and milk and ice being delivered to our homes. For those of you who don't know what an   icebox is, today they are electric and referred to as refrigerators. A few even remember when cars were started with a crank. Yes, we lived those days.

We are probably considered old fashioned and out-dated by many. But there are a few things you need to remember before completely writing us off. We won World War II, fought in Korea and Viet Nam. We can quote The Pledge of Allegiance, and know where to place our hand while doing so. We wore the uniform of our country with pride and lost many friends on   the battlefield. We didn't fight for the Socialist States of America; we   fought for the "Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave." We wore different uniforms but carried the same flag.

We know the words to the “Star   Spangled Banner,” “America,” and “America the Beautiful” by heart, and you may even see some tears running down our cheeks as we sing. We have lived what many of you have only read in history books and we feel no obligation to apologize to anyone for America.

Yes, we are old and slow these days but rest assured, we have   at least one good fight left in us. We have loved this country, fought for it, and died for it, and now we are going to save it. It is our country and   nobody is going to take it away from us. We took oaths to defend America   against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that is an oath we plan to   keep. There are those who want to destroy this land we love but, like our founders, there is no way we are going to remain silent.

It was mostly the young people of this nation who elected Obama and the Democratic Congress. You fell for the "Hope and Change" which in reality was nothing but "Hype and Lies." You youngsters have tasted socialism and seen evil face to   face, and have found you don't like it after all. You make a lot of noise, but most are all too interested in their careers or "Climbing the Social   Ladder" to be involved in such mundane things as patriotism and voting. Many   of those who fell for the "Great Lie" in 2008 are now having buyer's remorse. With all the education we gave you, you didn't have sense enough to   see through the lies and instead drank the 'Kool-Aid.'  Now you're paying   the price and complaining about it; no jobs, lost mortgages, higher taxes, and less freedom. This is what you voted for and this is what you got. We entrusted you with the Torch of Liberty, and you traded it for a paycheck and a fancy house.

Well, don't worry youngsters, the Grey-Haired Brigade is here, and in 2016 we are going to take back our nation. We may drive a little slower than you would like, but we get where we're going, and in 2016 we're   going to the polls by the millions.

This land does not belong to the man in the White House nor to the likes of Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Eric Holder.  It belongs to "We the People," and "We the People" plan to reclaim our land and our freedom. We hope this time you will do a better job of preserving it and passing it   along to our grandchildren. So the next time you have the chance to say the   Pledge of Allegiance, stand up, put your hand over your heart, honor our country, and thank God for the old geezers of the "Gray-Haired Brigade."

Footnote:  This is spot on.  I am another one of those Baby Boomers signing on. I encourage the readers to circulate this to other Baby Boomers and yes, even generation Y‘s you may be in contact with.

Does it Not Violate Natural Law

Does not the freedom to kill innocents violates all norms of civilized society? Does it not violate the natural law? Before governments existed was it condoned in the state of nature? Does this freedom to kill innocents not violate the 13th and 14th Amendments? Yet, the Supreme Court and numerous Congresses have refused to interfere with it. Is it not a grave and profound evil? Is it not legalized murder? It all comes down to one great question. Is the fetus in the womb a person? Since the fetus has human parents and all the needed human genome to develop, of course the fetus is a person.

A simple one-line statute could have been enacted when Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush were in the White House and Republicans and a hand full of anti-abortion Democrats controlled the Congress. They could have ended the slaughter by legislatively defining the fetus in the womb to be a person. They did not. Are the self-proclaimed anti-abortion folks in Congress sincere, or do they march under the anti-abortion banner just to win votes?

Their failure to attempt to define the fetus in the womb as a person seriously, and the Supreme Court’s unprecedented dance around the requirement of due process and the prohibition of slavery has resulted in up to 60 million abortions in 43 years. That’s an abortion every minute. Abortion is today one of the most frequent medical procedures performed in America; and the Democrats have become its champion.

They, and their few Republican allies, have become the champions of totalitarianism as well. The removal of legal personhood from human progeny in order to destroy the offspring is only the work of tyrants. How long can a society last that violates universal norms and kills its babies in the name of “sexual freedom?”

Whose personhood will the government define away next? I contend one has to look no further than the affirmed and the elderly.

Bon Apitite GOP

It appears to me that the Republican establishment, having created Donald Trump, is now going to be eaten by him. That could be good news for everybody – at least everybody who lives outside the Washington, D.C., fishbowl.

My years of life, both here and abroad have taught me that opposition is required, regardless of which ideological persuasion is in power at the moment. All of us become too sure of our own ideas given the passage of time. The last principled opposition to the left’s agenda was Ronald Reagan. Oh, by the way, they were venomous toward him, too.

Well, back to the Republican arm of DC Democrat politics. What did they think they were there for? If we had wanted the left’s agenda to succeed, we would have voted for Democrats. Why did they think it would turn out well, lying to us about who you were? On the campaign trail you pledged to stop Obama’s corruption of the Constitution, if only you were given a majority in both houses of Congress. You were. You didn’t. You ran and surrendered your majority. Way too many of you are pitiful, Machiavellian and nauseating. You care nothing for America. Worse than that, you fought against the principled voices of new members who did understand why they had been elected, and who attempted to hinder Obama’s agenda. You installed as speaker, a political elitist to help assure there would be little to no opposition to the Democratic agenda. When reminded of your power of the purse, did you not promptly negotiate it away in return for … nothing? If memory serves me right, you did this twice. But by far, your worst capitulation came on immigration. Congress makes the laws; the president executes them. Do you see anything about executive orders in the Constitution? I wonder why that is?

At a time when people worldwide are being blown up, hacked to death, machine-gunned and beheaded by the religion of peace, you sought to admit more Islamic refugees into America. To accommodate the cries for safety by Americans, you traded essential liberty for more government power over everyone. Banks, big-government, big-business and Wall Street all seem to have recovered from the most recent economic down turn. Main Street America doesn’t know what a recovery looks like. Rural areas are the leading indicator, spiraling down into the next depression. And America's senior citizens, forget them.

So, of course it makes perfect sense to admit more refugees, put them on government assistance, train them for jobs so they can compete with Americans already here. How else are multi-billion dollar corporations to become multi-trillion dollar corporations that can contribute to your next re-election campaign? As an added benefit, you would make sure our vote never counted again. As one commentator said “you created the desperation that gave Donald Trump birth. Your dinner invitation is on its way.” May I add, might you and yours be the main course.

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If Only The GOP Establishment...

Who among the candidates has been the most steadfast supporter of limited government, strong national defense, traditional values, and the establishment knows he’s not going to put up with any of their nonsense. Who is the candidate that is most committed to conservative principles across the board, a person of character who embraces in the highest regard, the Constitution and America, as founded, who acutely understands the destruction President Obama has wrought, and who we can rely on to fulfill his promise to do everything in his power, if elected, to reverse this disastrous course and restore us on a path to recovery. If only the GOP establishment would quit hyperventilating over a certain person’s conservative ideological oratory and get behind him they could do more than anything else to advance the cause they profess to believe in.

Woe to Those Who Call Evil Good and Good Evil...

The progressive left under Obama is bringing about much more than just expanding government, redistributing wealth and desensitizing our culture of Christianity. With its madcap salutation of carnal anarchy, its overwhelming culture of political correctness and its lack of understanding of the fundamental sacredness of human life, it is also, whether intentionally or not, promoting extensive dependency, decadence, family breakdown, criminality, depravity, hopelessness, poverty and addiction. 

One only has to survey this emergent chaos in American society to expose both the utopian revolutionaries and their remarkable methods that have turned America's most valued ideals literally upside down – to the point that lunacy is applauded and normalcy demonized. 

In essence, what is happening in America under the leadership of the progressive left is the modern-day manifestation of the timeless biblical truth found in Isaiah 5:20: "Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter." But unlike the doleful occupant of the White House, there is room for real hope and real change that will fundamentally repair what the progressive left has essentially transformed.

Granted, in this day and age of political corruption, ever increasing government intrusiveness, racial unrest and acts of terrorism it is easy to give up hope. Well, I refuse to do so. In other words, one could say, if there's no hope then what do I do? I go off, I drop out, I live for myself, for my family, and I try to live a good life. No; too many people have answered the call, and bled and died to help this country and to help the innocent in distant lands. I believe there is still a majority, slight as it may be, of the country that has not had their mind poisoned by entitlement promises of a utopian life that only the government can provide. Which half of the country maintains majority influence over the whole, may determine whether we have any future at all.

The Time Ahead is the Past Played Over

In many ways the time ahead is nothing more than the past played over again in a new key. The notes look new and sound out of the ordinary. Is it not delightful to usher in the first quarter of a new year and all the hope that it holds? As the calendar scrolls through the new year’s first quarter, traces of another story already under way from a previous year begin to surface. Relationship issues, perhaps. Financial difficulties. Lies coming to light. Personal security concerns. Employment problems. It’s not that this new story wasn’t there all along; it’s just that those of us in the midst of our own story didn’t notice it. Writers sometimes call these the threads of a larger story. These threads unfold alongside of or even inside the story promised in the book’s title. Is not history really just a series of novellas or short stories that includes all of us as characters? We’ve each got our role to play in the story – the story we know about and the ones we don’t. It may turn out that we know nothing about a story in which we actually play a very important role. Such was the case with the generation that fought in both World Wars. They didn’t know they were part of that story until it surfaced and they found themselves on the battlefields of Europe and in the case of WW II, also the Pacific.

Let us examine the Millennial or generation Y story. I contend it is similar tale for the Millennials.  I selected them because they followed both the baby Boomer Generation, of which I am one and Generation X. They see in front of them the story of their own generation as it unfolds before them. Yet their story is surrounded by and interwoven with the stories of previous generations and those yet to come. Generation Y grew up in an electronics-filled and increasingly online and socially-networked world. They are the generation that has received the most marketing attention. Having been raised under the pitch "follow your dreams" and being told they were special, they tend to be confident. While largely a positive trait, Y Generation's self-confidence has been argued to spill over into the spheres of entitlement and narcissism.  They are often seen as slightly more optimistic about the future of America than other generations -- despite the fact that they are the first generation since the Silent Generation that is expected to be less economically successful than their parents. One might even label Generation Y as the Sacrificial Generation. If so, why?

The tyranny of the past and the future affects us all. The decisions of past generations still exert their pull on the Millennials – the national decision, for instance, to force everyone to go to college by shifting manufacturing jobs overseas, where they could be done, at least for a time, cheaper. Not everyone wanted to go to college. Not everyone was suited to go to college. But by the Generation Y's time on stage the decent-paying alternative of manufacturing jobs was no longer an option. How did that happen? This thread in our national story was never discussed. It was not voted on by Congress. No president ever signed it into law. The Supreme Court never considered its constitutionality. But it happened, and it impacted everyone.

Sometimes threads from the future emerge within the current generation’s story as well. Every generation since the 1960s has had their research and development priorities altered by specific event(s). Are there storylines still to emerge within the Generation Y story? To the thoughtful reader clues are beginning to surface. The singularity. Human genomic alteration. Artificial intelligence. Machine designed mechanisms (Androids) replacing workers. All-pervading surveillance by those in power designed to “keep us all safe.” Yet that surveillance subtly controls our thoughts, which in turn controls our actions. The digital world has a memory that never forgets. A record of our thoughts and actions can be stored … forever. Will it one day be used against us by a more “enlightened” generation yet to come? Are there no national debates on these deeper threads in the Generation Y story? Nevertheless, these threads continue forward, interlinking themselves into our future. Then they will be the story of the Millennial or Y Generation … those coming after, and those after them.

The most ancient and secreted thread bound into humanity’s novel, which encompasses us all, remains unseen, yet is woven through all the generations. It is the supernatural conflict between the Creator and the creation. God. Man. The angelic realm, the created universe, humanity’s fall from oneness with God, and God’s extraordinary efforts to set the relationship aright once again. The threads are all in place; the stories within the story moving forward as one. The Y generation will see the end of that story unfold before their eyes. Few will understand that the story of humanity, like all books or stories has a beginning and an end, an Alpha and Omega. Yet the clues are everywhere around us for those with ears to hear and eyes to see.

 

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Charting a New Course Requires Recognition and Determination

At times I find it difficult to identify with a majority of DC conservatives. Why, you may wonder, because today’s GOP conservative tends to resist change. But their recent legislative action does not offer much of an alternative to the direction in which we are moving. The current logjam or tug of war between conservatives (republicans) and progressives (democrats) can only affect the pace, not the direction, and I personally am not content with simply helping to apply the brake. Neither can you. We must demand immediate change. We as citizen conservatives who insist on change—in the direction we’re going and the kind of government that leads us—must be knowledgeable buyers. Feeling may affect us, but in this 2016 election year, sitting down with pencil, paper or I-PAD, and a smidgen of reason, is beneficial.

In this space of a blog post, it would be impossible to address every issue confronting us—abortion, the economy, national defense, Islamic terrorism, immigration, taxation, Second Amendment rights, healthcare, Russian political maneuvering, and what government does and does not underwrite just to name a few—but let’s zero in on two, Islamic Terrorism and Immigration.

First, America must defeat Muslim extremism, whatever the form. Any religious tangent or ideology that seeks to subjugate everyone else is little different than the blight of smallpox, leprosy or the plague, and must be eradicated unsympathetically. We want firm, forceful leadership without committing thousands of new ground/combat troops except as an absolute last resort. We insist that Iran stand down and back up the threat with cyber, air, and fiscal warfare, and that goes for any other Middle Eastern miscreant intent on disrupting peace. All the while, we will maintain and protect our association with Israel and make no apologies about it. No longer will we engineer regime change anywhere unless doing so would eliminate a substantial threat to the US homeland and its citizens. Middle Eastern nations have to keep their own peace (probably a pipe dream not a reality).

Second issue I will address is immigration. The world is still the world and many peoples envy and loathe us. National self-interest is nothing to feel guilty about. Is it too much for America and all who live in it, to want our northern and southern borders sealed and protected, electronically or otherwise, and desire safe and protected coasts, rail, and shipping? We are not the EU Open Borders society and hopefully never will be. All immigrants, refugees or otherwise, must be thoroughly vetted, if possible, and if necessary, isolated until we know their true intentions. They must want to become Americans—as we define ourselves. Do they add to our culture, labor force, and way of life—or not? Those deemed unfit within reasonable limits, will not be welcome. No matter their origin or presence in the US, all immigrants must be registered with local, state, and federal authorities. Non-registrants, criminals, and those abusing social and financial support systems will be deported. Illegals will have to find a path to legitimacy or face penalties. In the end, vast numbers of immigrants will be permitted residency as they earn membership in our American family.

I realize the readers of this post may have differing views, some differ slightly, some substantially, but most sensible Americans I know and speak to believe that we must take a hard look at federal government functions, agencies, and responsibilities, first defunding all inappropriate initiatives and finally, reducing its footprint substantially within one presidential term. Mutual respect matters because together, we will choose the Republican nominee, and if done well, we will be choosing the next President of the United States, someone who can reverse mediocre leadership’s slide toward global oblivion, and retake our place as world pace master of an economic and political powerhouse. What we need is to re-make the face of government, and make the pursuit of happiness more than a dream for Middle America. Determining to win in November is the first step in plotting a new course of history.

There is But One Mediator Between God and Man and its not Mohammed

Retired Pastor James McConnell is waiting to see if his next sermon will be given from a prison pulpit. His crime? The 79-year-old pastor, speaking at the church he founded in Belfast, Ireland, preached a sermon on 1 Timothy 2:5: “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.” Pastor McConnell says he wrote that sermon to protest “… the terrible injustice done to a young Muslim woman named Miriam Ibrahim who was converted to Christianity and for marrying a Christian man. Miriam Ibrahim was pregnant and was to receive eighty lashes and possibly martyrdom.” McConnell stated in part of his sermon, “Islam’s notions about God, about humanity, about salvation are vastly different from the teaching of the Holy Scriptures. Islam is heathen. Islam is satanic. Islam is a doctrine spawned in hell.” As has become in other parts of the world, it could very well befall us in America. Speaking ill of Islam may be deemed hate speech and punishable by fine and imprisonment and in some cases forfeiture of one’s life. Is not Islam’s ideas about God, humanity and salvation dissimilar from that of Christianity?

But increasingly, speaking out against Islam from a biblical position is coming into conflict with hate-speech legislation in many Western nations, to include America. The U.N. Human Rights Council has even adopted a resolution that "defamation of religion ... leads to violations of human rights" and stated that "... freedom of expression ... should be exercised with responsibility and may therefore be subject to limitations" expressly deploring "the use of the print, audio-visual and electronic media, including the Internet ... to incite ... xenophobia or related intolerance and discrimination toward Islam. ..."  How about prejudice and intolerance toward Christianity?

Have You Wondered as I, Why...

Have you wondered as I, why our DC representatives are introducing mindless policies? What have these programs actually accomplished? Have they not introduced militancy, fanaticism, terrorism, higher taxes, constitutional infringements, wide spread corruption, distrust, ramped-up racism, deficient national defense capabilities, greater entitlement mindset, higher federal deficits and more? Is it any wonder why the American people are left wondering why they keep voting yet feel like they don’t have representation? It is my hope and prayer that 2016 will usher in a "new wave" political mindset to represent the best interests for America and her citizens and not what is in the best interests of the career DC PC Politician.

What goes Through His Mysterious Muddled Mind

Admittedly, I cannot even imagine the thought process by which Obama cogitates. What was going through his head when he surrounded himself with some of the families of victims of recent gun violence like the one in San Bernardino, California? I have tried but failed to get into Obama’s often mysterious muddled mind to analyze the “Why” in his decision making rationale. It is a process that evades reason.  Well, Ben Crystal can and did. I will share enough of Crystal’s thoughts, satirical as they may be, to shed light on the president’s recent mind numbing gun control address to the nation.

“Last year, 12,421,517 Americans were killed by guns. More than 75 percent of them were adorable little babies with puppies and rainbows. Forty-eight percent were plucky single mothers who work 13 different jobs nine days a week in order to provide for their 11 kids. The other 64 percent were cops. Since I’m pushing gun control, I’m going to mention the latter group, even though my Black Lives Matter friends say all those pigs are racist demons…

Thanks to big, gaping loopholes, it’s too easy to get a gun; 93.4% of all guns used in gun crimes were purchased through loopholes. If an American child can’t open a bottle of aspirin, then there’s no way he should be allowed to go online and buy an auto-fire-o-matic AR-19 that fires 75,000 rounds per nanosecond through its “tactical muzzle breaker” without having to at least get permission from his mommy. And did you know that a convicted serial killer can escape from prison and pick up a free machine gun at the nearest gun show (186 percent of all gun crime is caused by gun shows)? Besides, that many white people in one place is already a bad scene; adding guns to the mix just makes it more likely that no one will be raped, robbed or assaulted…Guns have a magical power that turns ordinary, law-abiding Americans into fire-breathing, gun-toting lunatics. What else could possibly explain that the overwhelming majority of gun crimes happen in such otherwise peaceful utopias like East St. Louis, Detroit and my hometown of Chicago? Of the 30 most violent cities in America, 29 are run by Democrats. Obviously, it must be guns causing all that ugliness and not, say, decades of failed entitlement programs and nanny state-induced malingering…

But every time I ask them to help me help you, stupid Congress brings up the “2nd Amendment” rule. I reread my copy of “Rules for Radicals” and couldn’t find it anywhere. Those guys are total jerks. I mean, what is this "Constitution" thing, anyway...

I can’t help but think what a great idea it was to put an onion in my pocket; these tears are gonna kill with the focus groups! And I’m proud to announce a series of executive orders, which I constitutionally can’t issue, which violate the separation of powers, which violate privacy and due process, and which would have done precisely nothing to prevent the incidents I'm shamelessly exploiting...

And then there are those NRA people. Everyone knows that the NRA is a front for the KKK. Just because none of the crimes I'm pretending to care about today was committed by an NRA member doesn't mean the NRA isn't to blame. And so what if the NRA members are the only people who actually sponsor and teach real firearms safety, as opposed to spreading ignorance and fear? Most of them aren't even democrats, unlike the people who actually commit most crimes...and it will become harder for parents to bequeath their hunting rifles to their kids." 

Nothing like a puzzle to set one’s mind ablaze. Have a great weekend.

Another Expression of Lawlessness Via Executive Fiat

Whatever he wants, regardless of what the Constitution, Congress, the Courts, or the public has to say about it, he will get. His lawlessness knows no bounds, for he is the law. Or so he thinks, therefore he is. His pen is mightier than the scales of justice, thus his actions express lawlessness.

Using his medium of choice, President Obama this week announced with flowing tears a number of “Executive Actions” aimed at restricting gun sales and ownership in the United States. President justified his autarchic policy proclamations on a need to bypass an “ineffectual” Congress. To some extent I reluctantly agree that our Congress is largely ineffectual and fails in its role as a legislative branch of government. But then I digress.

Obama’s teary-eyed efforts to rally supporters to his gun-control agenda every time a publicized mass-shooting occurs, has become “something of broken a record.” While the latest proposals more appropriately subterfuges appear on the surface to be largely benign, we had best take them seriously. Caution is sometimes the better part of valor. With this in mind, let us remember the old adage and proceed with vigilance, “the devil is in the details”; there is a relevant consequence to said aphorism – “it’s often not what’s on the lines that count; it’s what’s between the lines that matters most.”

Finally The Truth of the Matter

At last, the truth about our President and his Agenda are starting to trickle through the protective wall built around him by the liberal media. By Matt Patterson (Columnist - Opinion Writer)

“Years from now, historians may regard the 2008 election of Barack Obama as an inscrutable phenomenon, the result of a baffling breed of mass hysteria akin perhaps to the witch craze of the Middle Ages. How, they will wonder, did a man so devoid of professional accomplishment beguile so many into thinking he could manage the world's largest economy, direct the world's most powerful military, execute the world's most consequential job?  Imagine a future historian examining Obama's pre-presidential life: ushered into and through the Ivy League, despite unremarkable grades and test scores along the way; a cushy non-job as a “community organizer;" a brief career as a state legislator devoid of legislative achievement (and in fact nearly devoid of his attention, less often did he vote "present"); and finally an unaccomplished single term in the United States Senate, the entirety of which was devoted to his presidential ambitions.

He left no academic legacy in academia, authored no signature legislation as a legislator. And then there is the matter of his troubling associations: the white-hating, America-loathing preacher who for decades served as Obama's "spiritual mentor;" a real-life, actual terrorist who served as Obama's colleague and political sponsor. It is easy to imagine a future historian looking at it all and asking: how on Earth was such a man elected president? There is no evidence that he ever attended or worked for any university or that he ever sat for the Illinois bar.  We have no documentation for any of his claims. He may well be the greatest hoax in history.

Not content to wait for history, the incomparable Norman Podhoretz addressed the question recently in the Wall Street Journal: To be sure, no white candidate who had close associations with an outspoken hater of America like Jeremiah Wright and an unrepentant terrorist like Bill Ayers, would have lasted a single day. But because Mr. Obama was black, and therefore entitled in the eyes of liberalDom to have hung out with protesters against various American injustices, even if they were 'a bit' extreme, he was given a pass. Let that sink in: Obama was given a pass - held to a lower standard because of the color of his skin.

Podhoretz continues: And in any case, what did such ancient history matter when he was also so articulate and elegant and (as he himself had said) "non-threatening," all of which gave him a fighting chance to become the first black president and thereby to lay the curse of racism to rest? Podhoretz puts his finger, I think, on the animating pulse of the Obama phenomenon - affirmative action. Not in the legal sense, of course. But certainly in the motivating sentiment behind all affirmative action laws and regulations, which are designed primarily to make white people, and especially white liberals, feel good about themselves.

 Unfortunately, minorities often suffer so that whites can pat themselves on the back. Liberals routinely admit minorities to schools for which they are not qualified, yet take no responsibility for the inevitable poor performance and high drop-out rates which follow. Liberals don't care if these minority students fail; liberals aren't around to witness the emotional devastation and deflated self-esteem resulting from the racist policy that is affirmative action. Yes, racist. Holding someone to a separate standard merely because of the color of his skin - that's affirmative action in a nutshell, and if that isn't racism, then nothing is.

And that is what America did to Obama. True, Obama himself was never troubled by his lack of achievements, but why would he be? As many have noted, Obama was told he was good enough for Columbia despite undistinguished grades at Occidental; he was told he was good enough for the US Senate despite a mediocre record in Illinois; he was told he was good enough to be president despite no record at all in the Senate. All his life, every step of the way, Obama was told he was good enough for the next step, in spite of ample evidence to the contrary. What could this breed if not the sort of empty narcissism on display every time Obama speaks? In 2008, many who agreed that he lacked executive qualifications nonetheless raved about Obama's oratory skills, intellect, and cool character. Those people - conservatives included - ought now to be deeply embarrassed. The man thinks and speaks in the hoariest of clichés, and that's when he has his teleprompters in front of him; when the prompter is absent he can barely think or speak at all. Not one original idea has ever issued from his mouth - it's all warmed-over Marxism of the kind that has failed over and over again for 100 years. (An example is his 2012 campaign speeches which are almost word for word his 2008 speeches)? And what about his character? Obama is constantly blaming anything and everything else for his troubles. Bush did it; it was bad luck; I inherited this mess. Remember, he wanted the job, campaigned for the task. It is embarrassing to see a president so willing to advertise his own powerless-ness, so comfortable with his own incompetence. (The other day he actually came out and said no one could have done anything to get our economy and country back on track). But really, what were we to expect? The man has never been responsible for anything, so how do we expect him to act responsibly?

In short: our president is a small-minded man, with neither the temperament nor the intellect to handle his job. When you understand that, and only when you understand that, will the current erosion of liberty and prosperity make sense. It could not have gone otherwise with such an impostor in the Oval Office.”

Some say the commentary is a hoax. Following some rudimentary research, I was able to validate the veracity of the commentary and its authorship. From what information I was able to gather from source material, reference this particular piece, Mr. Patterson is “not a columnist” but an “occasional contributor of opinion pieces” for various publications to include Newsweek, Washington Post, San Francisco Examiner and others. Though, I am of the notion that both Newsweek and the Washington Post have coined the phrase “occasional contributor of opinion pieces” to distance themselves from the stated commentary. I submit Matt Patterson hit the proverbial nail on the head in his analysis or evaluation of Obama’s ascension to the presidency (very step of the way). Obama was told he was good enough for the next step, and the next step and the next step in spite of ample evidence to the contrary. How's this for a concluding opinion piece?

Humanity be Aware; Read, Weep and be Informed.

Who are the knights of ISIS — savages, brutes, thugs, beasts. For my readers, especially liberal friends and females, one of the specialties of the Islamic State involves a sophisticated and organized sex trade industry. Several news outlets have reported on the terrors these women suffer, which include repeated rape and brutalization. Some victims range in age of ten and younger. And they call themselves religious followers of Allah who perpetuate such reprehensible acts.

From what I have gathered from various media reports, the ISIS male followers actually pray before and after raping the women, claiming that the Quran gives them the right to do so, as it pleases their god. Is it not fortunate that the one true God of the Bible is not the god of Islam? This being the case, we need to pray  for Christians, Yazidis, moderate Muslims, and all those across the Middle East and North Africa who are persecuted and suffering at the hands of ISIS and other radical Islamic groups.

The unbelievable crimes committed against these women are despicable and show without a doubt whom these radicals are actually worshipping… and as Franklin Graham once said, "it’s not the God of the Bible."