Death to Traitors!!!!

Death to Traitors!!!!

Many of you may be aware that I am a history buff (or nut, depending upon your viewpoint) and am finishing up my Masters in history at Sam Houston State. The other day I posted a long blog on how I felt about many of the current conditions taking place in this country. I received a number of very positive responses, so I thought I would press my luck and delve a little deeper into one issue which is on a lot of our minds.

In 1775, all the colonists (not slaves) of this country were British citizens. Subject to the authority of King George III.

If you went against his authority or against the British government, you could very well be deemed a ‘traitor’.

Do you know what the punishment was for being a traitor to the English Crown was at that time?

Death.

But not just an easy type of death. No, you were first hung by the neck until you were almost dead. Then you were laid on a bench or table (in public, I might add) and you were ‘drawn and quartered’. Your stomach was opened and your intestines ripped out and sometimes set on fire while you are still alive. Then to top it off, your arms and legs were tied to 4 horses and then the horses were whipped, which effectively tore your arms and legs off your body.

By this time, you would, of course, be dead.

Women were only burned at the stake for treason. Bags of gunpowder were often tied around their necks so that they would explode and kill the person instantly rather than suffer the flames.

So, isn’t this information uplifting?

Well, in July of 1776, 56 men signed what we call the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia, which was the equivalent of affixing their signatures to their own death warrants.

These were not soldiers, Army Rangers, Navy Seals or paid mercenaries.

These were lawyers, shop keepers, merchants, printers and ordinary people, who had had enough of King George and his oppressive policies.

England was the greatest country in the world at this time, with the largest navy and armed forces.

They had colonies scattered throughout the world. Hence the saying of ‘The sun never sets upon the British Empire’.

England needed colonies to sustain itself. It is an island with few natural resources and they needed the colonies for timber, tobacco and other profitable exports. They also considered that if the colonies were allowed to rebel against them then others would follow.  

In the hot building known as ‘Independence Hall’ that July, the windows were kept closed to prevent British spies from overhearing of the forth coming plans for independence.

All of these men could have been arrested and executed for their signatures on that one piece of paper.

Well, we all know the story and the outcome of the war, don’t we?

Against all odds, George Washington was able to defeat the mighty British army and its navy and gain our independence.

I suggest you read the kind of obstacles which had to be overcome in order for this to occur.

All of this leads me to the point I am trying to make.

We have learned a lot since 1776, and we still have a lot more to learn, don’t we?

But, we must learn as a nation…..not as a divided entity fighting for different objectives.

We will never solve any of our major problems, unless we agree to work together as Americans, not as individuals. As one of those 56 men so aptly said… ‘United we stand, divided we fall.’

We owe allegiance to our country, and to our flag and to our national anthem.

If it had not been for the courage of those 56 men in Independence Hall in 1776, we would not have a national flag or a national anthem.

If it had not been for the many thousands of men and women who have given their lives and their health (even today) in the belief that America is worth fighting and yes, dying for….then that flag and that anthem would not be there.

You want to protest? I don’t blame you. So do I. But where and when is where you and I may disagree. A sporting event is a form of entertainment that I pay for, it is not the place for you to demonstrate your political viewpoints and spit in the face of all of those I have described above.

For those taking a knee in our football games, look at the back of your helmets.

There is an American flag stuck back there.

If you are so upset with our flag, my flag…then let me suggest this to you.

Rip that sucker off and in place of it, stick the flag of any nation in the world, any nation in the entire world that will pay you the kind of money your receive for a GAME, and let you voice your opinions freely and openly as you are allowed to do in this county.

All because of the guts, courage and fortitude of 56 men in a hot building 241 years ago.

Can’t think of any country whose flag you could stick back there in place of our American flag?

Funny, neither can I.

A Call to Arms

A Call to Arms….

A couple of days ago, on a Facebook post made by a friend of mine, some lady somewhere was discussing the upcoming Supreme Court debate over the baker who refused to bake a wedding cake for a same sex couple. Needless to say, I weighed in and was denounced almost immediately for my ‘narrow’ views which must mean I hate Jews, Blacks and Gay people. In short, I am a ‘racist’ and probably a ‘sexist’ as well.

Well, I am a 75 year old white male, Christian, heterosexual, who served in the Army and was a cop at one time. I hunt, fish and eat meat and yes, I wear cotton shorts and tee shirts. I feel sure my identity will probably make someone, somewhere mad.

Look, I don’t care if you are a Jew, Muslim, Black, Brown, Gay, Trans, or what ….just leave me alone. Do not attack me . I’ll listen to you, if you will also listen to me…just because we don’t agree, doesn’t mean we can’t get along with other. Ask anyone who has been married for a long time about this. OK?

If I had a bakery and someone wanted me to make a cake that went against my beliefs, then I would suggest you find another bakery.  There are plenty out there. I don’t go to a Jewish deli and get mad because I can’t get a ham sandwich any more than I would go to a Mosque and wear my shoes throughout the building. If I was a single man, I would not expect to find a new female date at a gay club. This is called respect for others. I respect them, please respect me. I don’t cram my beliefs down your throat, please do the same for me.

I do not care if you want to be in love with a chicken and want to be married, God bless you. Just don’t presume to think I think that cuddling with a Rhode Island Red would be all that great. More power to you, if that makes you happy. It doesn’t work for me.

If I want to say ‘Merry Christmas’ during December, then let me. I won’t stop you from celebrating whatever holidays you choose. If I want to pray before a ball game, then let me. You can as well, we need all the prayers we can get. If I want to stand and sing during the National Anthem, you better believe I will do so. If you want to sit it out or refuse to stand, then don’t get mad at me because I don’t choose to come to your event.

Currently we have this big thing going on about Hobby Lobby using cotton plants in their fall store displays. Come on, folks when will we stop? It’s a plant, not a symbol. You and I are not that different, you have probably been called names you don’t like…well, so have I. When it happens to me, I consider the source. If I open the door for some woman (or anyone for that matter) in my building, it doesn’t mean I think they are incapable of opening the door, they are probably in better shape than I am, it just means I am trying to help. Don’t look for fault and slights in every word, phrase and action….you will waste your entire life being angry over stuff that does not matter.

Are we divided in this country? Sure, we are, but yelling at each other and setting fires to property or destroying stores where they are needed is not the answer to our problems.

Have we made big mistakes in history? Of course we have, slavery was wrong, but it happened. The Holocaust was wrong but it happened. Who killed more during the Crusades or the Spanish Inquisitions? Who knows? We cannot do anything about past behavior, but we can sure do something about future behavior. Mankind has been dealing misery out to other humans since time began. Let’s face it, we (you and me) are not perfect, we make mistakes. We marry the wrong people, get the wrong jobs, invest poorly, get drunk, hurt people’s feelings, talk when we should be quiet and remain silent when we should speak up.

If I have ever done anything to hurt anyone reading this, please accept my heartfelt apology, I would not intentionally do so. I confess to being a mortal man who says and does things that may cause offense. I only ask that you allow me to explain what I meant and allow me to understand why you feel the way you do without us becoming combative. I find it hard to talk rationally to anyone who is beating me over the head with a club.

You can eat all the vegetables you want….good for you…..but let me eat what I want to..ok? You can protest all you want as well…good for you. Just don’t burn down my neighbors business that they worked hard for so many years.

You can rally and speak out against every form of social injustice that you can think of, it’s ok with me. But then let me come to a rally on your campus to hear someone from my side of the table who wants to speak and may have a different point of view that yours.

I did NOT like President Obama, but he was the President of our country and I respected his elected position. I never once suggested that he be assassinated or get killed, why can’t the current President get the same amount of respect? You can always vote him out of office in 3 years.

Am I a person who has experienced white privilege, I would have to say that I am.

Growing up in the segregated South in the 50’s and 60’s gave us opportunities that others did not have. We cannot undo the wrongs of the past, but we can fix and improve the future.

How? By working with people, talking to people and most of all helping people.

Not just people like ourselves, but people who need help, encouragement and the one thing that keeps all of us pressing forward….that is HOPE.

The human condition is not perfect, all of us…have done things we are either ashamed of or that we regret. What we can do is to be tolerant of others and listen to those voices we hear crying out and then we get up off the couch, turn off the television and our cell phones, unplug the computer and go out into the world and try to make an impact on one person at a time.

Taking a selfie at a rally is not the same as collecting school supplies for needy kids or making lunches for the homeless in our cities, is it? You must ( I must) do more than just talk about helping, we must put feet to our words if we want to see any change in our country and our relationships with each other.

God Bless all of you….

Jesus for Everywhere….and everything....

. Last week, the California legislature refused to honor John Wayne because Mr. Wayne had made some derogatory remarks about some racial groups fifty years ago. “Off with his head…” That ninny, how could he have been that crass, that uncaring, that racist, that sexist, that insensitive, that foolish, that dumb…oh wait …let’s see he’s a human …right? So, we are going to condemn any and all for anything they may have said during their entire lives, is that the picture? Have we lost our collective minds or what? We can’t talk about God, Christmas, or just about any other thing without some group getting their panties in a wad and wanting to protest and tear down a building or set fire to a neighborhood or some tax payer funded police cars. Very smart….brilliant. I venture to say that all of us, I mean everyone of us has used some expression in the past or present that could be offensive to someone, somewhere, no matter how innocent we may have used it in our conversations. Hillary Clinton was talking about her husband the other day and said… ‘Sometimes he (Bill) went off the reservation.” An apparent reference or slur to American (Native) Indians, I suppose. Is the correct term Native Americans or can you use the word Indian any longer? I am so confused. I am surprised that the NBA, NFL, and MLB haven’t banned ticket (wait for it) scalpers from operating around their arenas since that word is, of course, verboten as well…Is verboten ok to say? So, here’s my proposal…if we take offense to poor old John Wayne giving out his OPINION which is his right as an American, then we need to avoid any references to George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and a host of others since they made remarks over two hundred years ago that I am sure are offensive to someone, somewhere. This morning, the paper reports that folks in Egypt are protesting over the violence in the old ‘Tom and Jerry’ cartoons…. It seems their behavior is unacceptable and promotes violence. I can’t help but think that this bodes ill for Wiley Coyote. Stock in the Acme Explosives Corporation will surely drop. As far as I can tell the only person that cannot be credited with any violence or wrongdoing, (unless you want to focus strictly on the money changers in the temple scene) is Jesus Christ. Let’s rename all of the buildings which represent failed and flawed humanity for any reason with HIS name and use Him as our benchmark for our future role model. Take those guys off the mountainside at Mt. Rushmore and replace with four images of Christ. Let’s eliminate violence from all television, movies, newspapers, internet, books, plays…well just about anything you can consider. If we write anything about anyone, you can bet it will be offensive to someone for some reason or another. Make a play or movie without any minorities involved….you will be criticized for not having enough minorities. Make the same play with the majority of the cast minority; then you get criticized for stereotyping minorities. Jesus for everything…my answer to the insanity that surrounds us.

Do The Right Thing

. After I graduated from police school in 1964, I was assigned to work in the patrol division while I was on probation. I asked one of the old hands for some words of wisdom that I should always remember. He told me in no uncertain terms…. “Never put yourself in any kind of a position where you could not or would not be comfortable with arresting someone is you had to do so..” In other words… ‘Do the right thing.’ Don’t take an offering of any kind, even a hamburger or some favor from anyone for any reason if it could jeopardize your ability to put someone in jail or file charges against them if it was necessary. I am watching as are most of you, the ongoing debacle with the Republican National Committee over the upcoming presidential nomination convention. As you know, the front runner in this race Donald Trump got beat out from any delegates from Colorado since the voters themselves did not vote for any delegates, the party choose who the delegates were to be. The chairman of the Republican Party was trying to spin the matter by saying the practice was allowed under the rules for that particular state. Try telling that to the millions who felt they were cheated out of the nomination process. Another spokesman made the comment that … “We (the RNC) pick the nominee, not the people.” Perhaps the rules do allow for this kind of action, but like most of you I thought we all got to participate in the nominating as well as the general election process. Apparently not. Apparently we, the lowly taxpayers, are not to be trusted with the power of the vote. Why we might actually choose and elect someone outside of the reining power base. Heaven forbid. So I suppose our votes are just really a sham so that we feel good and think we are actually helping to choose our national leadership….but not really, just let them vote and throw away the results since they are too stupid to know what is good for them. We do know, we have experience in running the country, The problems you see each day? Like the runaway deficient… ineffective foreign relations…poor defense results? We inherited those from the previous administration. Who inherited them from the one before them and so on and so on. No, we take zero responsibility for our actions, you see it isn’t about you…it’s about us. We don’t care to do the right thing….we are not interested in your problems, we have our own. Such as how to get our ill-gotten gains into safe offshore accounts now that Panama and Switzerland are no longer safe places for my cash stash. I know and I suspect you do as well know when we are doing something that just isn’t right. It comes from that small voice we have inside of us called a conscience. It disturbs me to believe that electing people to politics requires the suspension of your conscience. I don’t see much evidence of it otherwise.

The Parties Over.....

The Parties Over……. Years ago, I was sitting in a green room with a lady who was married to a US Congressman…In the few minutes we sat waiting to go on the program, I asked her what her husband was going to do now that he was no longer in congress. She looked me square in the eye and said without hesitation…. “Why, he is going to be President of the United States.” This was years (maybe 15) before he actually ran and was elected. I went home that night and told my wife what this crazy old lady (or so I thought) had told me…but sure enough he did get elected. How could she actually believe this so far in advance? I have always grown up with the theory and belief that anyone, anyone at all could eventually become the president of our nation if they tried hard enough to gain the votes necessary to propel him or her into that office. So, what happened to that idea? The idea that we, the people actually got to choose the people we want to represent our interests in governing our country. It is obvious by what is going on now that you and I have no influence upon the outcome of what goes on in our national political arena. Ask the millions of people in Colorado who just lost their right to vote in a presidential primary because the Republican Party does not agree with or like the current frontrunner….Donald Trump. Why have elections in the first place since the outcome is going to be decided by a group of insiders who want the status quo to remain the same? What effect can my one vote have when it (along with millions of others) is being tossed aside and disregarded because the establishment leadership wants to maintain their control on the reins of authority and to hell with what we the people want? What do we know about government and what is in our best interests, anyway? We are just the hardworking men and women who don’t lie, cheat and steal from the governmental coffers and pay our taxes year after year while the fat cats travel first class, stay in 5 star resorts and commit fraud and theft for billions of dollars with little retribution ever extracted. “Oh, you stole 25 million from the XYZ Agency fund? Shame on you….there is a black mark by your name and you get probation for 5 years….don’t do it again.” Hardly a day goes by, that we don’t read or hear about these situations, is there? No, the Republican Party has taken a stand and made their intentions very public. We, the people don’t matter to those in power. Our beliefs are not welcome. Our opinions are not wanted. Go home…let the big boys handle these important matters. You just report to your jobs at the salt mines of America and send us your tax monies. Keep your head down and don’t ask questions. We really don’t need to hear from you at all. In fact we would prefer not to hear from you for any reason. We may wave at you as we are passing on our way to some exotic destination for a week or so in which we discuss the granting of a billion or so bucks (to some of our friends) for the research study on the mating habits of cockroaches. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams…..those names ring a bell? King George III didn’t listen to the people in the colonies either, did he?

'THEY' Exist

“They” Exist!!!!!!!! How many times have you heard someone say …. ‘They’ did it.’ or ‘they’ said’? We have often questioned ourselves with the puzzling question of just who in the heck is this ‘they’ anyway? Where do ‘they’ live? What do ‘they’ do for a living? What do ‘they’ look like? Well, folks… here is a newsflash for you. THEY….are the establishment politicians living amongst us and supposedly looking out for us in Washington, D.C. But are THEY really? That is the question. Former governor Mike Huckabee was on the news this morning stating the obvious, this is not a good year to be thought of as a member of the ‘they’ group. He goes on to state that we are in the middle of a political revolution. I could not agree more. The people we have elected have set themselves up as an elite group without any concern for those of us in the trenches slugging it out in the muck and grime of our daily lives. We are not in the ‘in’ crowd that ‘they’ belong to. We do not get to fly first class or dine in expensive Georgetown restaurants at the expense of the taxpayers. Huckabee pointed out that the 6 richest counties in the nation are those next to our nation’s capital. He states that real estate is booming with houses selling for more than their asking prices. Not happening in my neighborhood…how about yours? Just as the frog gets slowly boiled in a gradually heating pot of water, so have the average America taxpayers. We did it to ourselves; we never questioned or paid much attention to what ‘they’ were doing for far too many years. Now the water is boiling and some of us are jumping out and escaping, much to the chagrin of those in public offices. Every day, some politician gets his hand caught in the national cookie jar and generally skates with a limp promise of… “It won’t happen again…” Why did it happen in the first place? Is it any wonder that people are fed up with self-serving professional politicians who have been sucking on the governmental teat for so long they cannot see how far removed they are from those of us struggling to pay rent, food and taxes? I suppose when you live in an Ivory Tower far above the maddening masses it is hard to identify with us average old Americans. The political establishment is in a flee or fight mode at this time, it appears they are absolutely astonished that those of us still able to fight would eventually get tired of their behavior and start to push back. How dare we? How dare we question their authority or their actions? How dare we ask about their insider deals or insider trading? How could we dare question their relationships with lobbyists and governmental contractors? How dare we question their voting records on matters that mean a lot to us and that concern our daily lives, but not theirs? Don’t we know who THEY are? Yes, yes we do.

The Elephant in the Room

Nearly every day so far this year….. I have gotten into a discussion about the danger of Donald Trump…the success of Donald Trump or what will happen to this country if the Donald gets (or doesn’t get) elected. Is Trump abusive, abrasive, egotistical, brash, rude and just downright nasty sometimes? The answer is….yes, he is. So why is he resonating so well with so many voters in spite of his very visible shortcomings? Simple…. He is voicing what so many of us have wanted someone to say for so long. We are tired of the same old tired lies that have come out of the mouths of the folks we elect year after year. We have established and enabled an entire industry of professional politicians. Once they get there....they stay there. They never leave. Kind of like checking into The Hotel California. No sane politician wants to discuss immigration, social security, military build-up and the worst of them all…the out of control deficit. These are political suicide. Also …what kind of a nut funds his own campaign….without using millions freely given by large corporations or labor unions out of the goodness of their own hearts just for the sake of love of the United States? Seems to me we are in a sort of voter revolution….we are wanting to vote for anyone, no matter who it is….just so he or she is not a member of the elite establishment now residing in our nation’s capital. We have had our fill of these folks….good bye. We, the American public have to pay taxes….follow the rules, live within our budget…not so with the people in the political industry. And that is exactly what it is, an industry. Lawyers, lawmakers, governmental contractors, lobbyists, consultants, special interest groups, political action committees, labor unions, associations of everything you can think of under the sun, non-profit organizations, foreign government personnel, just to name a few, there are many more. These people’s lives and fortunes rely upon relationships and partnerships that have been forged and created for years, perhaps centuries with each other. You think after all these years, these people want to give up all they have invested both their time and money into creating only to lose it to some guy with a big mouth and weird hair? They are scared of Mr. Trump. Donald Trump is a threat to the status quo. He is not playing by the rules. He is an outsider. He could mess everything up. He isn’t being funded by those who have controlled the congress, as well as the office of the president for God know how many years? He isn’t making his moves based on the decisions of a few select individuals in some smoke filled hotel room. How many elections have been decided in those rooms in the past? Will he win? Who knows? Has he gotten the people in this country talking? You bet. Will it have any effect on the future? We will have to wait and see. But one thing is for sure…. We all know there is something big in the room with us …. Don’t we? Peary Perry