Recently the state of Arizona passed immigration law which, gasp, allows local law enforcement officer to enforce immigration law. This of course has aroused the typical liberal angst against the largely conservative state. Epitaphs of racism, accusations that this will lead to racial profiling, etc. all have been leveled at this state. Frankly I'm happy Arizona has the good sense to pass such a measure and I shake my head that something so simple drives so many otherwise fine people to hate their neighbor and call them a racist. It's more par for the course though and I was content to let it pass, but a recent incident has caused me to decide to comment fully on it.
Yesterday after logging into facebook to see what my friends and family are up to back home I came across a posting by a cousin of my girlfriend, random thought, why do we make people we barely know friends on facebook? Anyway, her views trend to the left and I generally ignore it but saw this posted by her "WTF. Arizona immigration law?" It had quite a few responses and my curiosity made me check out the idiocy I knew laid inside. Sure enough there were the typical responses equating Arizona's laws to fascism. In fact in 12 responses all i saw as gestapo/nazi this and fascist that. So, being the nice guy I am I responded "yeah, a country that enforces it's laws, crazy concept." Along with another note taking a shot at such liberal use of a term like "fascist" by people who apparently had little to no knowledge on what it actually means. This morning I saw that my GF's cousin, well didn't appreciate it too much and asked me to refrain from posting my political views on "her wall." To be more exact it was keep my views on my wall and she will do the same. First signs of leftist tolerance i see. I also saw one of her friends gave the always delightful response to the tune of "if you don't agree with our group think, that STFU." No differing views allowed here. Another sign of that leftist tolerant attitude we hear so much about.
In the end of course I will respect her wishes as I would expect her to respect mine and I only baited the STFU guy a little, it's the most fun i can have right now. Really, this got me thinking though, what is the big deal about this? Is there perhaps something in this law that I have overlooked that would and should cause such protestations? There could be and so in the hopes of becoming better informed I looked it up and shockingly, it was exactly what I heard it could be. Basically it says that a cop my have "reasonable suspicion" that the person he is speaking with is an illegal immigrant. After having that the officer may than request that the suspect provide documentation proving he is a legal resident or immigrant in our nation. That is it folks.
Now if your looking for the outrageous part in all this, it is in the term "reasonable." That's right, reasonable is an unreasonable term that will inevitably allow those mean police officers to target Hispanic immigrants in this country. President Zero even expressed some concern about this by notice that this law would allow an immigrant to be here for generations and suddenly be stopped by those men no doubt wearing jackboots and have to answer their unreasonable inquiries. Oh the horror.
In the end folks, the law does little but assist the federal government in their enforcement of immigration laws. Other than that the State of Arizona will remain as serene as it always has been.
-Zach
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Thursday, April 22, 2010
Heros and the way we honor and remember them
Recently I received an e-mail from one of my friends. The e-mail was one of those chain e-mails that usually have some sort of story that is designed to be compelling and to cause the e-mail reader to forward it to many contacts. Normally I am always suspicious of these e-mails simply because whatever message they are selling is usually false, but sounds plausible enough to the casual reader that they will simply forward it without thinking.
The e-mail in question concerned the supposed recent passing of Capt. Ed Freeman (USAF retired) who was awarded the medal of honor for his actions in Vietnam. The e-mail gave a vivid description of the battlefield, of certain death for many young American men, and how many of them lived to come home because of Capt. Freeman medevacing over 70 wounded men, ignoring heavy machine gunfire while flying an unarmed helo. He would even keep flying after sustaining 4 bullet wounds to the leg and arms. Truly his actions were those that embody what we as a country expect in a MOH awardee and selfless acts of heroism like his are what inspire so many who have served this nation before. At the end of this e-mail it takes a few pot shots at the American media complaining about coverage given to Tiger Woods and Michael Jackson while this man died and received so little coverage. That alone should have and to some degree did set off a red flag about this e-mail to me, but being a bit lazy and thinking of the man's heroism I decided to forward it than check the validity.
Of course as soon as I typed in Capt. Freeman's name I found out that he did not pass away recently, but actually passed in August of 2008. I also found that one of the first links to come up was to snopes.com, a website that specializes in debunking these kinds of e-mails. Sure enough I found that while Freeman was a real man and his actions were not embellished in his e-mail, the rest had been circulating for some time with the original version coming out some six months after the man had passed. Frankly reading the snopes report on this e-mail had an effect of really pissing me off. This man was a hero and his actions were of such courage that I can not imagine what it was that kept him flying into that hell, but six months after he died some douchebag who apparently wanted to run his fucking pathetic mealy mouth about the American media used this hero's death for a very selfish purpose. The sad thing is the originator of such an e-mail probably considers himself patriotic and a "real American." At the end of the chain e-mail it stated "shame on you American media for not covering this man's death." Frankly I'm more inclined to want to find the originator of this e-mail so that i can knock his ass out for doing this. Not that I'm a fan of the American media, but like any seller of a product they are catering to what the public wants. If they are reporting on Jackson or Woods it's because Americans are dumb and pathetic enough to value that more. So in the end it should be shame on the American public for not having their priorities straight.
Back to the original point though. folks, this is not the way to honor those who have served, and this sure as shit is no way to honor a man like Capt. Freeman. Too many men have sacrificed their youth, their lives, their sanity, and their health so that we can as a nation continue to live our lives the way our founders intended. Almost everyone of them has served selflessly and given this sacrifice for their own reasons. For them the most that they would want is for their actions to be remembered and for it to serve to inspire those who serve today. To remember such a sacrifice and remember the valor that lives in the heart of those that serve is the best way to honor these men. It serves no purpose and no honor to these men to cheapen their work by using it for something as trivial as politics and the national media.
The only good thing about this e-mail is that the vast majority who have been exposed to it and forwarded it likely did so for the same reasons I did, they were amazed by the Captains actions and forwarded it without waiting to think about it. Their focus was in the right place and that was on furthering the story of the man's actions and in that sense the e-mail was a good thing. In the future though, lets honor these men and leave the politics out of it.
-Zach
The e-mail in question concerned the supposed recent passing of Capt. Ed Freeman (USAF retired) who was awarded the medal of honor for his actions in Vietnam. The e-mail gave a vivid description of the battlefield, of certain death for many young American men, and how many of them lived to come home because of Capt. Freeman medevacing over 70 wounded men, ignoring heavy machine gunfire while flying an unarmed helo. He would even keep flying after sustaining 4 bullet wounds to the leg and arms. Truly his actions were those that embody what we as a country expect in a MOH awardee and selfless acts of heroism like his are what inspire so many who have served this nation before. At the end of this e-mail it takes a few pot shots at the American media complaining about coverage given to Tiger Woods and Michael Jackson while this man died and received so little coverage. That alone should have and to some degree did set off a red flag about this e-mail to me, but being a bit lazy and thinking of the man's heroism I decided to forward it than check the validity.
Of course as soon as I typed in Capt. Freeman's name I found out that he did not pass away recently, but actually passed in August of 2008. I also found that one of the first links to come up was to snopes.com, a website that specializes in debunking these kinds of e-mails. Sure enough I found that while Freeman was a real man and his actions were not embellished in his e-mail, the rest had been circulating for some time with the original version coming out some six months after the man had passed. Frankly reading the snopes report on this e-mail had an effect of really pissing me off. This man was a hero and his actions were of such courage that I can not imagine what it was that kept him flying into that hell, but six months after he died some douchebag who apparently wanted to run his fucking pathetic mealy mouth about the American media used this hero's death for a very selfish purpose. The sad thing is the originator of such an e-mail probably considers himself patriotic and a "real American." At the end of the chain e-mail it stated "shame on you American media for not covering this man's death." Frankly I'm more inclined to want to find the originator of this e-mail so that i can knock his ass out for doing this. Not that I'm a fan of the American media, but like any seller of a product they are catering to what the public wants. If they are reporting on Jackson or Woods it's because Americans are dumb and pathetic enough to value that more. So in the end it should be shame on the American public for not having their priorities straight.
Back to the original point though. folks, this is not the way to honor those who have served, and this sure as shit is no way to honor a man like Capt. Freeman. Too many men have sacrificed their youth, their lives, their sanity, and their health so that we can as a nation continue to live our lives the way our founders intended. Almost everyone of them has served selflessly and given this sacrifice for their own reasons. For them the most that they would want is for their actions to be remembered and for it to serve to inspire those who serve today. To remember such a sacrifice and remember the valor that lives in the heart of those that serve is the best way to honor these men. It serves no purpose and no honor to these men to cheapen their work by using it for something as trivial as politics and the national media.
The only good thing about this e-mail is that the vast majority who have been exposed to it and forwarded it likely did so for the same reasons I did, they were amazed by the Captains actions and forwarded it without waiting to think about it. Their focus was in the right place and that was on furthering the story of the man's actions and in that sense the e-mail was a good thing. In the future though, lets honor these men and leave the politics out of it.
-Zach
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
only a liberal deals in absolutes
Todays tittle brought to you by the good folks of Star Wars. I hope they don't mind me borrowing one of there lines.
Anyway, it's been awhile so now is the time to post some random musings of which you may or maynot gain some intelletual stimulization or consitpation from.
As we all know, President zero and the rest of the brain squad recently forced through healthcare despite the clear "no" that the public had sent them for months. In dealing with arguing the finer points on what to do with the healthcare system most conservatives got reaquainted with an old truth about liberals, and that is that if you do not agree ver batum with exactly their line of thought, than you are evil, ignorant, apathetic, a blight on humanity, or some combination of the four. For example, If you did not vote for President Obama and if you did not support his nomination of Sonia Sotomayor for the supreme court than despite the soundness of your reasoning, you probably just a racist to some liberals.
With the healthcare debate the tactic seems to have been by most knee jerk libs to claim that if you oppose the healthcare bill than you do not care about the uninsured and that you do not care about "people who will die in the streets." Often times when prodded to state how the healthcare bill will make this better you usually get some rambling, mostly incoherrant bit about holding insurance companies responsible and forcing them to not deny coverage. When pointed out that this will not lessen the rates and actually may raise it as companies seek to make up the added cost for doing business you usually get a shrug or a non response. If you suggest that people who are happy with their current coverage offered by their business will now lose it as those same business's seek to adjust to a government that taxes them more and so they move to a bare minimum option that the government ok's you again get a shrug of indifference from the compassionate leftists.
In january Obama in his hopes to gain support for the healthcare bill and to marginalize Republican opposition invited them to a open press conference in which both parties could offer ideas on reform. After zero's stunt backfired and Republicans gained more support, rather than seek to adopt the changes that Republicans called for or to scratch the plan all together and start fresh as the country and the Republicans stated would be the best option, zero pushed ahead because gosh darn it, he knows better than your just a dummy who doesn't get it.
In the coming election zero has dared Republicans to "go for it" in campaigning for the november elections on a repeal healthcare ticket. Clearly the plan here will be to charge that once again that Republicans want to take away "your healthcare" and let people die in the streets. Frankly, this thing needs to be taken down and quickly because if it's allowed years to take root and feaster there will be enough of a class of Americans dependent on this corrupt system that they will buy into it the same way they buy into the "republicans want to take your social security, abortions rights, minority rights" away.
In the end this is the liberal way. They deal in absolutes and there will be no room for discussion while they are still a majority in the house.
-P.S. A note to those that want to run Dem rep Bart Stupak through the mud for his compromise on healthcare i say lighten up. The man is a Dem who held up healthcare for about a month and his steadfast determination will keep federal funds from going to support abortions. The man was placed in an awkward position where lesser politicians would yield to party pressure and instead gave us one positive in this bill so lets show some class and not make this man a target as the tea party for whatever reason appears to want to do.
-Zach
Anyway, it's been awhile so now is the time to post some random musings of which you may or maynot gain some intelletual stimulization or consitpation from.
As we all know, President zero and the rest of the brain squad recently forced through healthcare despite the clear "no" that the public had sent them for months. In dealing with arguing the finer points on what to do with the healthcare system most conservatives got reaquainted with an old truth about liberals, and that is that if you do not agree ver batum with exactly their line of thought, than you are evil, ignorant, apathetic, a blight on humanity, or some combination of the four. For example, If you did not vote for President Obama and if you did not support his nomination of Sonia Sotomayor for the supreme court than despite the soundness of your reasoning, you probably just a racist to some liberals.
With the healthcare debate the tactic seems to have been by most knee jerk libs to claim that if you oppose the healthcare bill than you do not care about the uninsured and that you do not care about "people who will die in the streets." Often times when prodded to state how the healthcare bill will make this better you usually get some rambling, mostly incoherrant bit about holding insurance companies responsible and forcing them to not deny coverage. When pointed out that this will not lessen the rates and actually may raise it as companies seek to make up the added cost for doing business you usually get a shrug or a non response. If you suggest that people who are happy with their current coverage offered by their business will now lose it as those same business's seek to adjust to a government that taxes them more and so they move to a bare minimum option that the government ok's you again get a shrug of indifference from the compassionate leftists.
In january Obama in his hopes to gain support for the healthcare bill and to marginalize Republican opposition invited them to a open press conference in which both parties could offer ideas on reform. After zero's stunt backfired and Republicans gained more support, rather than seek to adopt the changes that Republicans called for or to scratch the plan all together and start fresh as the country and the Republicans stated would be the best option, zero pushed ahead because gosh darn it, he knows better than your just a dummy who doesn't get it.
In the coming election zero has dared Republicans to "go for it" in campaigning for the november elections on a repeal healthcare ticket. Clearly the plan here will be to charge that once again that Republicans want to take away "your healthcare" and let people die in the streets. Frankly, this thing needs to be taken down and quickly because if it's allowed years to take root and feaster there will be enough of a class of Americans dependent on this corrupt system that they will buy into it the same way they buy into the "republicans want to take your social security, abortions rights, minority rights" away.
In the end this is the liberal way. They deal in absolutes and there will be no room for discussion while they are still a majority in the house.
-P.S. A note to those that want to run Dem rep Bart Stupak through the mud for his compromise on healthcare i say lighten up. The man is a Dem who held up healthcare for about a month and his steadfast determination will keep federal funds from going to support abortions. The man was placed in an awkward position where lesser politicians would yield to party pressure and instead gave us one positive in this bill so lets show some class and not make this man a target as the tea party for whatever reason appears to want to do.
-Zach
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