30 September 2010

Long Live the Fighters

The moon has made countless laps around the Earth since I last attempted to define myself as an individual - I am intent on changing that - Sagacious Sam is back with a full metal jacket.  I am confident saying that we've collectively been through a lot during my reloading period: many things that we didn't want or foresee.  That is, however, the natural beauty of playing the game that we are forced by birth to call "life."  The American standard of living has been a fickle friend for all of us during the last year and "change," but that does not mean we should become accustomed to unpredictability in the future.  

If we want (need) to return the global definition of "America(n)" to the world's dictionary we must stand up and fight.  Not with fists nor guns nor bombs, nay, we must raise our collective voices and rally for a better tomorrow; a brighter future for the world.  If America is to once again lead the free nations of the world we must band together and obstruct the highway that the United States government has constructed:  the road  we are traveling on does not take us towards progress - neither national or global - but stagnation.  Allowing America to take a back seat is unacceptable and negates all ideology upon which our still great nation was founded.  

The two majority parties will forever be battling, that much is true, but if we look past our differences and work together towards an America that is governed from the middle - not the far left or right - the totality of the globe will prosper.  

The coming midterm elections will be savage, and the following presidential election even more so; however, history shows us that true, great civilizations are conceived via total savagery: sustained periods of incivility eventually nurture a better, more complete civilization.  America has the potential to become greater than it has ever been, and that greatness will be beneficial for all humankind.

Let us all fight not merely for the benefit of ourselves or our "party."  We must fight for each other, we must fight for America as Americans, we must fight for the future of the world, we must fight because the other option is flight.  Long live!  Long live the fighters!

Fight with me!

Talon's Out.

01 April 2010

Condolences China: Sagacious Sam 1 - People's Republic 0; another book reviewed and S.S. remains unimpressed



BOOK REVIEW
Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China
Leslie T. Chang
As a study rooted in both the lessons of history and the narration of cultural subjectivity in China, Leslie Chang’s text seems to be purposed as an open-ended performative narrative meant to bring about conclusions which will be objectively different depending on the cumulative knowledge that the reader personally has about the subject at hand: the lives of Factory Girls in China.  From my bent-at-the-waist perspective, the fact that Chang was only able to gather enough information on only two of the over 130 million migrant Factory Girls in China, is disappointing. 
Chang points out the mindboggling magnitude of her attempt at cultural narrative quickly, as if to get it off her to-do list without noticeably missing a drumbeat; “In their frilly tops and jeans and ponytails, they looked just like the millions of other young women who had come to Dongguan from somewhere else,” and after drawing in a long, purposed breath she continues; “The sight of so many girls I would never know was paralyzing—it seemed inconceivable that any single story mattered at all.”[1]  Ahem, but as a credible(?), tenured(?), journalist, didn’t you essentially, and some [I] would venture to say, purposefully smash the Ethos of your remaining 390 pages; leaving an admittedly naïve, but detail-oriented undergrad, grasping for even a tiny metaphysical twig while being hurdled—without warning—over the Cliffs of Insanity!  I read your book, but I was drawn back to your confession page[2] time and again—due to my disbelief—which made the only remaining handholds of Pathos and Logos far too difficult to hold onto.  I was literally mentally and scholastically disenchanted by your apparent resignation from the industry.  “I DON’T BELIEVE IT.”[3]
If you don’t mind my saying Narrator Chang, you seem awfully too willing to admit defeat—the arch-nemesis of your character cast consisting of two strong-willed females dueling against traditional Chinese dualists, men and management—before even firing a shot from the big guns of your three year cultural study. 
If I’m to understand that you weren’t intentioned on at least attempting to coerce the reader into pits of conclusion, what was you business plan when you decided to become a pen-wielding globe-trotter?  Making people feel sympathy for Chinese women, empathy even?  No matter what country you look at Chang, women have had a tough go of it until pretty recently... "E" for effort on that one.  
Pop-quiz hot shot: Ever since humans realized that the seasonal ebbs and flows of the Yellow and Yangtze rivers deposited mineral rich silt, which was paramount for sustained agriculture—the most recent infanticide of modern Chinese society, another motionless piece of evidence against China’s “grand plan;” why do you think there are—and will continue to be—so many young, bright-eyed women packing their bags and hoping on a one way trip into the warming glow of floodlights perched high atop factories in cities?    

Is China – the country currently viewed as the soon-to-be torch-bearer of geopolitical influence – being propelled to the forefront of industrial production due to the Chinese Communist Party’s ability to motivate the hearts and minds of its national population, which consists of more than 1 billion citizens, with popular slogans and a communal heartbeat powered by the government’s single-minded desire to deservedly take the pole-position of global influence from the vice-grip currently dominated by America and the U.N.?  

Or is there, rather, a more devious purpose underlying China’s six-decade long quest for power; something along the lines of the subjugation of the world’s lower- and middle-class citizens, very much akin to the “lives” of the “packs of girls and boys swallowed up” behind the walls and “the long avenue of factories” in “Dongguan;”[4] the birthplace of the cultural understanding that Chinese “modern history began with the handbag factory,”[5] due partly to the fact that “Chinese history museums” do not “make a single mention of Mao Zedong.”[6]

-- The factory city of "Dongguan," I wonder if that translates roughly as "The Glorious People's Attempt to Forge Walt Disney's Glorious Donkey Island," hmmmmmm 


Chang, as a dedicated journalist—she did stick with it, have to give credit where credit is due—does her part by chasing the story for a total of three years and compiling an overwhelming narrative.  For that, I will join the masses of journalistic almsgivers alluded to in the book’s four opening pages subtitled “Praise for Factory Girls” and praise her also; more power to you Mrs.? Chang[7]  Not only is Chang’s scholarship applicable to debate in the highest of academia’s spheres, she also endeavored to publish a study which allows an under-educated layman the ability to draw personal conclusions about the oftentimes overlooked subjects of the ethical and humanitarian treatment of migrant workers in the most populous country on Earth, The People’s Republic of China. 
In summation, I am impressed by the tenacity that Leslie Change has, but I feel that she was often-time reinforcing the stereotypes of China’s migrant work force as a Blue Jean Army.  If history serves me correctly, Communism has been attempted all over the globe, and each time it has made great-leaps forward, only to quickly cast the seemingly weighted die, which propels it further still, entrenching the elite in positions of infallibility, with a tendency to purge, causing the voice of the people, to once again overthrow it and set up some form or another of Western style government.  It’s happened like clockwork in nearly all of the recently established Communist countries… so shine on China, forge Tao… but I feel that you’re growth is malignant rather than benign and you will consume yourself before your appetite for world domination is whetted.  Do not pass go Mrs.(?) Chang, do not collect 200 Yuan.  Madison Fifth Ave. will continue to be just out of reach, no matter what heights China’s human pyramid reaches.  
Too Infinity [roughly 2020] and Beyond [mass migration out of your backwater society]!  Silly Mao, ruling countries is for people, not pseudo-Stalins...  
"Build Roads, Bridges, and Power Plants to Generate Funds for More Roads, Bridges, and Power Plants!"  Mediocrity leads to stagnation...


[1] Leslie T. Chang, Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China (New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2009) 24.
[2] Chang, 24.
[3] Chang, 50.
[4] Chang, 21.
[5] Chang, 31.
[6] Chang, 43.
[7] More probably Miss Chang, due to the high praise Chang scholastically strained to squeeze out of plethora of publication firms, the majority of whom are coincidentally ideologically entrenched with The New York Times, for two Chinese women on a quest to challenge cultural norms and ideals.  Could there not have been higher praise for the entire constituent body of Factory Girls in China.  Short-sighted when it comes to the “big picture” in my humble, undergraduate opinion.


Talons - once again - Out

30 March 2010

UNDER RECONSTRUCTION

I apologize for the apparent neglect, but I assure you that there is good reason.  I've been entirely too busy to allow myself time to drop everything and write, but that will change hopefully sooner rather than later.

This blog is going to be re-imagined as more of a "Hannity & Colmes" oriented blog - a dueling-blogs if you will. Where opposing opinions will be presented, which will allow for greater debate and more cohesion in the long-term.

Please have patience, as this process will undoubtedly take a month or more to initiate.  I will not allow for an idea with great potential to be launched prematurely.  When the ball does start rolling with "Sagacious Sam v. ____________," it will roll fast and hard; I hope that after reading this, you are as excited as I am about the future of this Blogspot.

Thanks,

S. Sam

22 February 2010

"Progressticide"

There are innumerable lessons to be mastered from the dissection of history; there have been tremendous accomplishments and horrendous misfortunes from which we can learn.  It is relatively easy to predict the outcome of present and future action by consulting the records of what has been or what failed to be.  My personal viewpoint on the efficacy of understanding history – in opposition of the excessively regurgitated phrase “history repeats itself” – is that human nature only goes so far: history doesn’t repeat itself per se, but rather, modern times dictate similar reactions to undefined dilemmas—things happen that mirror historic events, but for reasons inaccessible to even the most gifted of modernity’s time-travelers. 

It would be easy to assert that what I have said is nothing more than a highbrow reiteration of “history repeats itself.”  In a way, it is; permit me to redefine my terms, avoiding hyper-scholastic phrasing: hindsight is not foresight; looking back will not enable one to see forward; however, reflection upon humanities past undertakings – the pros and cons – does benefit the forecasting of a sagacious, cognitively vital individual. 

That being said, it seems appropriate to quote one of America’s most purely sagacious minds, so that my purpose may be framed.  Benjamin Franklin once said; “Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom,” when he spoke of the Constitution’s strength in guarding Virtue and Freedom—constitutive parts of the Republican Ideology—which helped establish the United States of America as a sovereign Nation.  Sagacious Ben’s predication following the previous quote was an ‘ah ha!’ moment for me; “As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.” 

Our nation’s helmsman of late, seems to have neither the power of hind- nor foresight.  His politicking feels void of lessons learned from history, doubly affecting his ability to lead America into the pole position of the future.   I have a difficult time envisioning a world championed by the Chinese Communist Party or the Russian Federation.  Critiquing the president is not my intention – although the continuous finger-pointing is really starting to make me raise a finger – I feel that the bitching is being done by more critics than necessary—similar to saying f**k in every sentence, the potential power of slander is being so diluted that it may become entirely ineffective if we don’t start focusing our efforts elsewhere. 

It is not the conductor I am worried about though, his ability to conduct even a community orchestra is at this point questionable.  I’m concerned with how he got to where he is, and how we can avoid seating another demigod borne of American Democracy.  I see Obama as the result of irrationality; the first – and hopefully last – president voted into office by a nation of citizens unwilling or unable to think rationally for themselves.  If the current education system in America continues on its path of below average result, we will not only be outsourcing American jobs, but American thinkers as well.  I desperately hope that there are student who appreciate the opportunity to be in college – like myself – using the brief period to develop rational and pragmatic skills paramount the “real” world.  I know they are out there; why must they insist on remaining thoughtless, voiceless, and nameless.  Obama’s victory was so one-sided on University campuses nationwide, in part, because there was no opposition to oppose; no voices to silence—for me, the silence was deafening.  People voted for him because other people were voting for him, they did not know why he was to be voted for; they did not give or ask for a reason.    Fortunately, I see a light at the end of the ignorance tunnel: the mind. 

Without thinkers in America – the “integrated man: a thinker who is a man of action” – society inevitably spirals downwards; the economy collapses and the irrational demigods seize power.  The mind, fueled by rational thought, is the motive power that fuels man’s existence; the only evil is the refusal to think for ones self.  What we’re currently facing is the destructive power of the state potentially overtaking the creative power of the individual. 

President Obama is an example of one of the great paradoxes of socialism: a great mind (give credit where credit is due) becoming employed in hindering the progress of the state—that my friend is “Progressticide.”  

Socialism destroys innovation: when the government influences the economy, corruption and mediocrity inevitably follow, ultimately creating an irrational system in which need matters more than production.  Our current – and previous – government’s interference in the economy and private sectors has had – and will continue to have – unanticipated effects that will require further intervention to fix. 

The more the government tries to fix the American system, the more repairs it seems to need.  America’s political structure was designed to make legislation at the federal level difficult, not easy.  

With the security of retaining full knowledge of our course – not the blind sense of being pulled into the unknown by an unknown power – do not trust, but know, that We [the American people] can take the power back; not for a political party, but for the America of the future.  The historic need for leaders who think has been great before, but the consequences of inaction have almost never before been as dire as they are today.  Raise your hand and be counted no more!  Raise your head, and count on yourself as someone who will not permit mediocrity!  Know that we will fight against great odds, and win!

“We who are not about the die…”

Talon’s Out.

11 February 2010

"This Is Sagacious Sam Speaking"

From time-to-time, when I am feeling unfounded, confused and overlapped – by no cause other than myself – I make a genuine effort of intrapersonal understanding.  There are so many things that I think, I know, I “believe;” for me, that known knowing is the exigency which entices me to rewrite myself.  I’ve recently – for the last three weeks, and at limited expense to my societal duties – allowed myself time for myself: time to think for myself, time to discuss myself, and time to read for myself.  I have written very little in that time, but I was purposed with my inaction.  The entire process of de- and reconstruction of one’s self should be, in my mind, internal, until there is no longer a metaphysical fog through which the mind’s eye must strain.  I am happy to report that today is that day. 

Where I have cognitively landed is hard to say, being that I’ve just arrived and I’m psychologically jetlagged, but I’m back, and my voice – thought it may be shaky at times – is more focused and will remain to be unapologetically assertive: Objectivist.

From this day forward, “This Is Sagacious Sam Speaking,” and we – myself and I – will be championing the “New Intellectual,” “We who are not about to die…” as Ayn Rand prophesized and philosophized in her essay For The New Intellectual.

This country is too great, not in size, but in mind, to be under the yoke of mediocrity; we, the Future Force, can be America’s re-Founding Fathers.  This will be a long fight, but I intend to win.

The Founding Fathers were America’s first intellectuals and, so far, her last.  It is their basic political line that the New Intellectuals have to continue. … The New Intellectuals must remind the world that the basic premise of the Founding Fathers was man’s right to his own life, to his own liberty, to the pursuit of his own happiness—which means: man’s right to exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself; and that the political implementations of this right is a society where men deal with one another as traders, by voluntary exchange to mutual benefit.

Who are to be the New Intellectuals?  Any man or woman who is willing to think.  All those who know that man’s life must be guided by reason, those who value their own life and are not willing to surrender it to the cult of despair in the modern jungle of cynical impotence, just as they are not willing to surrender the world to the Dark Ages and the rule of the brutes.

The need for intellectual leadership was never as great as now.  No human being who has a trace of personal worth can be willing to surrender his life without lifting a hand—or a mind—to defend it, particularly not in America, the country based on the premise of man’s self-reliance and self-esteem.  Americans have known how to erect a superlative material achievement in the midst of an untouched wilderness, against the resistance of savage tribes.  What we need today is to erect a corresponding philosophical structure, without which the material greatness cannot survive. … To support a culture, nothing less than a new philosophical foundation will do.  The present state of the world is not the proof of philosophy’s impotence, but the proof of philosophy’s power.  It is philosophy that has brought men to this state—it is only philosophy that can lead them out.

Those who could become the New Intellectuals are America’s hidden assets; their number is probably greater than anyone can estimate; they exist in every profession, even among the present intellectuals.  But they are scattered in silent helplessness throughout the country, or hidden in that underground which, in human history, has too often swallowed the best of men’s potential: subjectivity.  They are the men who have long since lost respect for the cultural standards to which they conform, but who hide their own convictions or repress their ideas or suppress their minds, each feeling that he has no chance against the other, each serving as both victim and destroyer.  The New Intellectuals will be those men who will come out into the open and have the courage to break that vicious circle.

If they glance at the state of our culture, they will see that the entire miserable show is kept up by nothing but routine and pretense, which disguise bewilderment and fear: nobody dares to take the first new step, everybody waits for his neighbor’s initiative. … The greatest need today is for men who are not strangers to reality, because they are not afraid of thought.  The New Intellectuals will be those who will take the initiative and the responsibility: they will check their own philosophical premises, identify their convictions, integrate their ideas into coherence and consistency, then offer to the country a view of existence to which the wise and honest can repair.

The New Intellectual will be the man who lives up to the exact meaning of his title: a man who is guided by his intellect—not a zombie guided by feelings, instincts, urges, wishes, whims or revelations. … He will discard its irrational confliction and contradictions, such as: mind versus body, thought versus action, reality versus desire, the practical versus the moral.  He will be an integrated man, that is: a thinker who is a man of action.

The New Intellectuals must fight for capitalism, not as a ‘practical’ issue, not as an economic issue, but, with the most righteous pride, as a moral issue.  That is what capitalism deserves, and nothing else will save it.

The New Intellectuals must assume the task of building a new culture on a new moral foundation, which, for once, will not be the culture of Attila and the Witch Doctor, but the culture of the Producer.  They will have to be radicals in the literal and reputable sense of the word: ‘radical’ means ‘fundamental.’  The representatives of intellectual orthodoxy, conventionality and status quo, the Babbitts of today, are the collectivists.  Let those who do care about the future, those willing to crusade for a perfect society, realize that the new radicals are the fighters for capitalism.

It is into the midst of this dismal gray vacuum that the New Intellectual must step—and must challenge the worshipper of doom, resignation and death, with an attitude best expressed by a paraphrase of an ancient salute: ‘We who are not about to die…'

-Ayn Rand, For The New Intellectual, 1961

Talon's Out.

01 February 2010

Righteous Justice: American Style, Straight Up

Remember the terrorist who got on a plane with a half-assed bomb built into his shoe and tried to ignite it mid-flight?

Did you know his trial is over?  Did you know he was sentenced?  As it should be, he will be locked away until he expires, or someone kills him.
 _____________________________________________________________

Ruling by Judge William Young; US District Court.  30 January, 2003, United States v. Reid).
_____________________________________________________________

Prior to sentencing, the Judge asked the defendant if he had anything to say.  

His response: After admitting his guilt to the court for the record, Reid also admitted his ‘allegiance to Osama bin Laden, to Islam, and to the religion of Allah,' defiantly stating, 'I think I  will not apologize for my actions,' and told the court 'I am  at war with your country.'

Judge Young then delivered the statement quoted below; one of the most articulate monologues on what the term “American” truly stands for; Judge Young is a true patriot:

'Mr. Richard C. Reid, hearken now to the sentence the Court imposes upon you.

On counts 1, 5 and 6 the Court sentences you to life in prison in the custody of the United States Attorney General....  On counts 2, 3, 4and 7, the Court sentences you to 20 years in prison on each count, the sentence on each count to run consecutively.  (That's 80 years.)

On count 8 the Court sentences you to the mandatory 30 years again, to be served consecutively to the 80 years just imposed.  The Court imposes upon you for each of the eight counts a fine of $250,000 that's an aggregate fine of $2 million.  The Court accepts the government's recommendation with respect to restitution and orders restitution in the amount of $298...17 to Andre Bousquet and $5,784 to American Airlines.

The Court imposes upon you an $800 special assessment. The Court imposes upon you five years supervised release simply because the law requires it. But the life sentences are real life sentences so I need go no further.

This is the sentence that is provided for by our statutes.  It is a fair and just sentence.  It is a righteous sentence.

Now, let me explain this to you.  We are not afraid of you or any of your terrorist co-conspirators, Mr. Reid.  We are Americans.  We have been through the fire before.  There is too much war talk here and I say that to everyone with the utmost respect.  Here in this court, we deal with individuals as individuals and care for individuals as individuals.  As human beings, we reach out for justice.

You are not an enemy combatant.  You are a terrorist. You are not a soldier in any war.  You are a terrorist.  To give you that reference, to call you a soldier, gives you far too much stature.  Whether the officers of government do it or your attorney does it, or if you think you are a soldier, you are not—you are a terrorist.  And we do not negotiate with terrorists.  We do not meet with terrorists.  We do not sign documents with terrorists.  We hunt them down one by one and bring them to justice.

So war talk is way out of line in this court.  You are a big fellow. But you are not that big.  You're no warrior.  I've known warriors. You are a terrorist.  A species of criminal that is guilty of multiple attempted murders.  In a very real sense, State Trooper Santiago had it right when you first were taken off that plane and into custody and you wondered where the press and the TV crews were, and he said: 'You're no big deal.'

You are no big deal.

What your able counsel and what the equally able United States attorneys have grappled with and what I have as honestly as I know how tried to grapple with, is why you did something so horrific.  What was it that led you here to this courtroom today?

I have listened respectfully to what you have to say. And I ask you to search your heart and ask yourself what sort of unfathomable hate led you to do what you are guilty and admit you are guilty of doing?  And, I have an answer for you.  It may not satisfy you, but as I search this entire record, it comes as close to understanding as I know.

It seems to me you hate the one thing that to us is most precious.  You hate our freedom; our individual freedom.  Our individual freedom to live as we choose; to come and go as we choose; to believe or not believe as we individually choose.  Here, in this society, the very wind carries freedom.  It carries it everywhere from sea to shining sea.  It is because we prize individual freedom so much that you are here in this beautiful courtroom, so that everyone can see, truly see, that justice is administered fairly, individually, and discretely.  It is for freedom's sake that your lawyers are striving so vigorously on your behalf, have filed appeals, will go on in their representation of you before other judges.

We Americans are all about freedom.  Because we all know that the way we treat you, Mr. Reid, is the measure of our own liberties.  Make no mistake though.  It is yet true that we will bear any burden; pay any price, to preserve our freedoms.  Look around this courtroom.  Mark it well.  The world is not going to long remember what you or I say here.....  The day after tomorrow, it will be forgotten, but this, however, will long endure.

Here in this courtroom and courtrooms all across America, the American people will gather to see that justice, individual justice, justice, not war, individual justice is in fact being done.  The very President of the United States through his officers will have to come into courtrooms and lay out evidence on which specific matters can be judged and juries of citizens will gather to sit and judge that evidence democratically,  to mold and shape and refine our sense of  justice.

See that flag; Mr. Reid?  That's the flag of the United States of America.  That flag will fly there long after this is all forgotten. That flag stands for freedom.  And it always will.

Mr. Custody Officer.  Stand him down.’


Talon's Out

27 January 2010

Let's Breathe Life Back Into America

The future is created through the combination of our collective remembrance and our vision of prosperity.  We are a nation founded on greatness.  Previous generations of Americans fought tooth and nail to ensure our national stability and strength.  We, the children of this great nation, the mothers and fathers, the brothers and sisters, embodied by the hallowed red, white and blue, must today, reconstitute the national wherewithal that William Tyler Page carved into the marble pillars of American greatness in 1917. 

A creed is a system, a doctrine, an oath, an article of faith, as well as a summarization of one’s overarching ideological beliefs.  Individuals who stand by “the American Creed” base their identity on its core values; more importantly, our creed codifies individuals within our country as members of a nation of people who identify themselves—despite trivial differences and minutiae—as Americans; something greater than the individual self.  If you live in the United States of America, and you identify yourself as an American, it will be impossible to avoid shivers and goose bumps while reading “the American Creed;” those uncontrollable sensations that remind you of your morality and mortality.  Breathe it in my American Brothers and Sisters; let your hearts beat to the drum of inspiration nationalism:

“I believe in the United States of America, as a government of the people, by the people, for the people;
whose just powers are derived from the consent of the governed; a democracy in a republic;
a sovereign Nation of many sovereign States; a perfect union, one and inseparable;
established upon those principles of freedom, equality, justice, and humanity
for which American patriots sacrificed their lives and fortunes.

I therefore believe it is my duty to my country to love it, to support its Constitution,
to obey its laws, to respect its flag, and to defend it against all enemies.”

In merely one hundred words – a feat in itself – Page powerfully summarized both the American political tradition and the responsibilities of every citizen to his or her government.  The American Creed uses passages and phrases from America’s Declaration of Independence, the Preamble to the Constitution, Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, and Daniel Webster’s reply to Robert Y. Hayne in the Senate in 1830.  When Page was asked about what he had written, he said that “It is the summary of the fundamental principles of the American political faith as set forth in its greatest documents, its worthiest traditions, and its greatest leaders.”

Try this one on again too; it goes hand-in-hand with “the American Creed” (it’s more powerful if read aloud): 

“I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands,
one Nation, under God, indivisible, with Liberty, and Justice, for all.”

Do you pledge?  I do.

The red blood thrust from the heart allows the body to grow strong, but over time it loses its constitution, its force which allows life; a change is made from red to blue.  We too, for a time, became blue.  The blood that enters the heart is blue, that much is true, but to keep the body fed, the blood—without fail—again becomes red. 

Within the Creed’s ideology lies salvation: it allows us to once again become a nation of Americans, without the party ties that are slowly tearing us apart.  “The American Creed” is the heartbeat that nourishes our national body with the power to grow; stronger than we have ever been.  It is “the American Creed” that will strengthen the pulse of our nation; it is the heart muscle of our national body.  All that we need to do is look to it for direction, for the future purpose of America.

What has happened to us, in contrast with previous patriotic generations; why don’t Americans believe in the future of America today?  Why are we standing idly by while the once experimental form of government known as Democracy is, in front of our eyes, being slowly subjugated by the catastrophic politics of yesteryear?

By calling on you to introspectively examine yourself, I’ve also challenged myself.  I challenge what we have allowed ourselves to accept in modernity: mediocrity.  I challenge you to chisel “the American Creed” into your personal constitution, and challenge those around you to do so as well.  We need the Creed, we need to believe in the strength of ourselves and others, we need to believe in the future of America, we need to believe in what we are: Americans united as Americans.    

If I’ve challenged your beliefs, then I’ve done what I can.  Now it is up to you.  If you love our great country, and you were rocked by reading “The American Creed” and “The Pledge of Allegiance,” join me.  Your purpose is there, your perspective, you live in it.   

Together, we can breathe life back into America.


Talon's Out

19 January 2010

"Obamaberry Blue": Progressive Failure

I’ve never bet on a horse race; too risky a venture for my increasingly malnourished bank accounts.  In fact, I’ve never been able to trust myself enough to gamble; with money that is.  I do however stake my reputation – one of the few things I truly own – more often than I like to admit.  The beauty of socially constructed, metaphysical phenomena synonymous personal effects like my ‘reputation,’ is that they’re ideas that are assigned worth – a commonly held opinion of one’s character – rather than tangible treasures easily attained or squandered.  I can lose face for a time, when I mistakenly stake my notoriety against stacked odds, but it is only for a time.

Renown is renewable.  It doesn’t typically take much for an everyday guy like me to redeem his recognition; that fact, is due mostly to the societal responsibilities inherent my particular station in life – or lack-there-of.  There aren’t many consequences for my actions, when the ‘big picture’ is the lens.  The ‘big picture’ is a puzzle, which by fickle virtue will remain forever unfinished.  There is no static snapshot on the box top to refer to when befuddled.

Here’s a big picture to puzzle: saddled atop the political “Iron Horse” of America’s thoroughbred racing heritage is a man who recently became its below-the-waist-bowing jockey.  He wagered more than his reputation to get the job; he had the audacity to ante America’s reputation.  Insulting at the very least: America’s thus far superior status is the cumulative result of over two-hundred back-breaking years of growth, progress and hundreds upon thousands of men and women who willingly sacrificed themselves for an idea – a Republican Ideology that was meant to stick – a flavor that was meant to last, not to be reconstructed by an “Iron Horse” that believes “American Government 2.0: the Socialist version” is an upgrade. 

As someone who typically enjoys the pursuit more than the result – anticipation more sacred than attainment – I appreciate studying the ways in which events develop.  There are a set of pieces to even the most trivial of daily puzzles.  The emotional satisfaction following the beginning, middle and completion of any puzzle is very much like – in my mind – the ritual of chewing a piece gum: when you buy a package of gum you know what flavor you’re in for (anticipation;) when you begin to chew, you are rewarded with the burst of flavor, confirming your expectations (beginning;) like most things in life though, the tremendous flavor starts at its zenith, declining into routine, unexciting normality (middle;) the only logical option is to begin anew – a fresh stick the only remedy for the boring, bland wad mashed between your molars (completion).  It could be said that the act of chewing gum is a “progressive failure” – an idea rooted in oxymoronic hypocrisy that is beginning to make more and more sense as we collectively watch events unfold. 

We chew gum daily, without thinking about it, even though we know the endgame is inevitably lacking.  That seemingly worthless act is very similar to how we vote for presidents every four years, even though we know that the majority of what the president-elect has promised is, not for lack of a better term, bullshit.  However, the possible “refresh” allowed by our political system every four years is also one of its best selling points. 

Today’s Republican victory in the Massachusetts Senate race was like placing another piece in the puzzle that Republicans, Conservatives, Moderates, and Independents (increasingly more Liberals and Democrats,) have been trying to put together since November ’08 – more appropriately – it was the piece that completed the border for the puzzle of 2012. 

In retrospect, connecting all the dots from last years events has not proved too daunting a task; like a “connect the dots” on a placemats at Denny’s.  The once undecipherable message hidden amongst the matrix of dots is all too clear now.  When all 365 dots are connected, they appear to spell out the same thing that Obama’s once elated masses have been saying under their breath with elevating concern and disbelief: “WTF.” 

I’ll tell you WTF – America has spoken, Americans have spoken, the people are back and the authentic way of American politics won’t be far behind.  The “victor” will be Republicans or Democrats in 2010, and the same in 2012, but one thing is for certain, the true winner will be America and every single American; for that is what we truly are.  If this preemptive Republican shrug is to be taken as a sign of things to come, there will not even be one shred of Socialist programs left by 2012.  Hopefully this will all seem like some kind of sick joke.

The anticipation and initial flavor rush of “Obamaberry Blue” was so tantalizing it enchanted a nation.  The nation’s jaw is becoming too sore to ignore.  The packaging was misleading; America is allergic to the socialist ingredients that were hidden by eloquent rhetoric.  This national blunder needs to be documented and studied so that even the most magnificent of wordsmiths won’t again be able to package and push a poisonous product on the American political consumer.  Luckily, gum can be spit-out. 

If we don’t spit this gum out by 2012, America risks socialist blood poisoning. 

Starting today, I’m boycotting blue gum.

Talon's Out