Inspiration From Out Of The Blue

 

Don't Quit by John Greenleaf Whittier

When things go wrong as they sometimes will, When the road you're trudging seems all up hill, When the funds are low and the debts are high And you want to smile, but you have to sigh, When care is pressing you down a bit, Rest if you must, but don't you quit. Life is strange with its twists and turns As every one of us sometimes learns And many a failure comes about When he might have won had he stuck it out; Don't give up though the pace seems slow— You may succeed with another blow. Success is failure turned inside out— The silver tint of the clouds of doubt, And you never can tell just how close you are, It may be near when it seems so far; So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit— It's when things seem worst that you must not quit. This poem is in the public domain.

A Return To A Youthful Perspective.

 As a young man, I believed strongly that all government was force and fraud for the betterment of the forceful and the fraudulent. Over time I modified my perspective. 9/11 was a turning point. Yes, the FBI might be murderous thugs but we need them to protect us from Al Qaeda. 

I came around to believe that American institutions were worth preserving, the American experiment was a noble undertaking, and that free elections were a safeguard against tyranny. I embraced the premise of winning hearts and minds, ultimately so that the hearts and minds voted in a sane and sensible, and rational manner.

George Bush II was the first president I helped elect. This would be a year before 9/11 so maybe my cynicism was softening anyway. I had this ridiculous idea that Bush, being the first MBA president, would appreciate the merits of fiscal responsibility and he would sing the virtues of a sound currency. Prior to that I usually boycotted elections, believing the two-party system was a sham and that unelected bureaucrats held all the real power anyway. Voting would signify my seal of approval for a bogus system.

In 2020 we witnessed the hijacking of a presidential election to say nothing of down-ballot robbery. It was fraud on a scale and a scope we thought impossible. We would also learn that many of these practices had gone on for years, if not decades. But this time, evil was caught red-handed. 

For each action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. That might be a law of physics but it is not a law of politics. From all indications, law enforcement aided and abetted the criminals and the GOP would reveal that they had more in common with the Dems than with their base. To date, there has been no opposite reaction.

Maybe my youthful cynicism was an accurate perspective after all. It is all force and fraud all the time. The FBI is crooked. DOJ is crooked. Big city law enforcement is crooked. The media are crooked. Big tech is crooked....the list goes on and on.

The one institution that still had integrity was the military. Or so they said. But they are standing down. Every US war in my life has been a philosophical playground. Vietnam may or may not have been a noble cause but was in the US's best interest? The first Gulf  War was well-intentioned and went swimmingly for the Coalition and the Saudis picked up the tab but it wasn't as if the US was directly attacked. The Afghanistan War might have started out as a rational undertaking but twenty years later, why are we there?

The US was attacked by foreign and domestic terrorists in November 2020. This came on the heels of the COVID-19 pandemic, sometimes referred to as the China Virus. If ever there was a need for military action, it would be in 2021. Nothing has happened. Begs the question: why do we fund a military? If they don't defend us now, will they ever defend us? Are the military's loyalties to the American people? Are they as crooked as the FBI?

 If elections are so easily stolen, why bother with politics? Why bother with hearts and minds, rational discourse, reason, and rhetoric?  A red wave in 2022? Sure and the Dems win anyway. A new political party? Sure and the Dems win no matter what. All hail Mark Zuckerberg. 

Maybe I should be glad I started from a position of extreme cynicism. This is familiar territory.  The more things change, the more they stay the same.