The Fire that Burned Baltimore into the Big Leagues

It’s hard to imagine a more unusual set of circumstances which propelled Baltimore’s arrival into the pinnacle of professional sports. For fifty-two years, the city was relegated into minor league status when the major league Orioles pulled up roots and became the New York Highlanders, and ultimately, the Yankees. When the Federal League disbanded, International League Orioles owner Jack Dunn moved his team into Terrapin Park, located at 29th and Greenmount, and renamed it Oriole Park. It was a wooden edifice, seating 11,000, and the bleachers were repeatedly treated with creosote to ward off deterioration and decay.

Then on the evening of Independence Day, 1944, the place caught fire and was burned to the ground. The Orioles went on a 12-game road tour while Municipal Stadium, an earthen football stadium located on 33rd Street, was readied for baseball. Because of its immense size, the old stadium, which had previously been used almost exclusively for football, was able to draw unusually large crowds for minor league baseball games. That same year, the Orioles made it to the Little World Series and vied with the Louisville Colonels for the International League title.

At the same time this series was drawing in excess of 52,000 in Baltimore, the major league cross-town series, between the Cardinals and the Browns, was drawing a paltry 31,000 at Sportsman Park in St. Louis. People across the country took note, and began talking about the potential in what was, at that time, the eighth largest city in America.

Yet, it was football that made the first splash onto the scene when the All-American Football Conference awarded the defunct Miami Seahawks franchise to Baltimore. A fan contest to rename the team saw three submissions suggesting the name “Colts”. Because of an essay touting the Colts name and its tie to Pimlico and the Preakness, Charles Evans Hughs of Middle River, Maryland won first prize- a lifetime pass to Baltimore Colts games.

Meanwhile, a sports editor at the Baltimore Sun, one Roger Pippen, began to urge the city to re-build Municipal Stadium in order to attract major league baseball. Facing a lot of criticism, even from the editors of his own paper, Pippen went on a one-man crusade to spur interest in the project. In 1949, he succeeded and over the next two years, Municipal Stadium was gradually transformed into Memorial Stadium, which could accommodate both sports equally well.

At first, the new stadium was a concrete, single-deck facility seating 31,000. When it became known that St, Louis Browns owner Bill Veeck was interested in selling his team, the city decided to add an upper deck increasing the capacity to 49,000 seats- large enough for big league baseball. Attorney Clarence Miles assembled a group of investors, and the St. Louis Browns became the Baltimore Orioles in 1954. Ironically, another Browns franchise would relocate to Baltimore forty-two years later, and return Baltimore to the NFL twelve years after their beloved Colts had departed for Indianapolis.

Since the early fifties, Baltimore’s professional teams have been sometimes hot, and sometimes cold, but always of great interest, regardless of their standings. Yet, were it not for the fire of 1944, and the impetus that provided, they might not have been teams at all. From the ashes of 1944, Baltimore rose to a prominent place in both sports boasting world championships in 1958, 1959, 1966, 1970, 1983 and 2000.

(author’s note- the Baltimore Ravens won their second Super Bowl following the 2012 Season,  six years after this was originally published in the Baltimore Sun)

-Drew Nickell, 14 March 2007

© 2007, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

A Declaration of Personal Rights

February 26, 2015- In the City of Virginia Beach within the Commonwealth of Virginia

When in the course of history, the growing encroachment on Constitutionally-protected Freedoms causes one to avow his Rights, under a growing and pervasive threat to such Rights, I do hereby proffer the following notice to the Government of the United States, and to the Commonwealth of Virginia, in which I was born and continue to reside.

I hold these truths to be self-evident, that I am an American Citizen, endowed by my Creator with certain inalienable Rights and that amongst these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness, as well as those Rights specifically enumerated in the Constitution of the United States. I further avow that these Rights may not and will not be abridged without due process of law by any entity within, or outside, the Government.

I will not surrender specifically the Rights that are enumerated in the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution. Amongst these are the right to Free Speech, Assembly, Publication of my opinions in any venue, and on any subject, as well as the right to Worship my Creator, in my own Way, and that the expression of such cannot and will not be abridged by any individual, entity or Governing body, on the basis of what such entities deem to be politically, socially, academically and/or morally incorrect. I further avow that it is my right to keep and bear arms as specifically enumerated in the Second Amendment, if I should so choose.

I hereby lay claim to these Rights which I will not surrender under any circumstance, other than my own demise. Signed and sealed on this twenty-sixth day of February in the year of Our Lord, Two Thousand and Fifteen.

-Drew Nickell (seal)

© 2015, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Wars, and Rumors of Wars

I believe it t was Aeschylus (525 BC – 456 BC), the Greek tragic dramatist, who once wrote that “In war, truth is the first casualty”, and all of us must consider this purview with regards to what is taking place in the world, today.

I am going to say something that is not popular, not politically correct, and would certainly not be uttered by President Obama, nor by his predecessors, Bush (both) Clinton, and not even Reagan, nor by any leader in Europe or elsewhere.. Nevertheless, I am going to say it because it needs to be said… whether or not we want to own up to it…and that is that we are at war with radical Islam…there, I have said it and I will say it, again…we are at war with radical Islam.

Why?

Simple- Radical Islam is at war with us. They know it, they say it, and we don’t… which places us at a tremendous disadvantage. No war can ever be won unless the enemy can be identified and called by its name. History has borne this out. For instance, in the World Wars, we were at war with Imperial, and then, Nazi Germany, which is not to say that we were at war with Germans, per se, but rather with their rulers- a slight and delicate distinction, perhaps, but altogether meaningful and substantial. We identified the enemy and we defeated the enemy twice, in a span of thirty years. So to be clear, we are not at war with Muslims, we are at war with radical Islam, and this distinction must be made clear, lest the point of this missive be missed.

In southeast Asia, in the hills of Asia minor, in the Middle East, and in Northern Africa, radical Islam is waging war against the west, and by “the west”, I mean the United States, western Europe and, of course, Israel. Just as this war is being waged in Iraq, Iran, Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Malaysia and all over the Muslim world, it is also being waged in Europe, including Great Britain, and here, even in the United States. The problem is that the western concepts of sensitivity, inclusion and political correctness will not allow us to own up to this very fact- but it is a fact.

When Nidal Hassan launched his murderous rampage at Ft Hood, Texas, does anyone with half a brain in his head want to say that this was merely a case of workplace violence, as the Obama administration would have us believe, rather than an attack by a radical Islamist in the name of jihad? Does anyone think that the bombing at the Boston marathon last year was anything other than an attack by radical Islamist brothers for the purpose of waging jihad? Just how many of these acts, not to mention the 9/11 attacks, will it take for we in the west to realize just who the enemy is, be willing to call the enemy by its real name, and wage war against it.

Please forgive me for saying so but “terrorism” is nothing more than a generic euphemism orchestrated to hide the real truth- and that truth is that we are at war with radical Islam…not Muslims, nor even with the silent, so called, “moderate Muslims” who refuse to condemn the radical counterparts within their same religion…but we are at war with radical Islam, and we will lose that war unless we as a society, grow up, say what needs to be said, without regards to sensitivity, inclusion, or political correctness, and wage this war with the righteous determination- bent on victory that is so necessary in what is most certainly not a rumor of war, but of a real war, itself. If we fail to do so, we are finished, period.

-Drew Nickell, 13 June 2014

© 2014, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Inadmissibility of the Left

Disclaimer- Some of my very best friends are liberals. I don’t know why this is the case, given the fact that I am pretty conservative in my own political beliefs. Perhaps, in the end, I just feel sorry for these otherwise deplorable Democrat dolts (talk about alliteration) because, at the end of the day, they are usually proved to be wrong but never, EVER admit to having been proven wrong. You just gotta love such stupendous stubborn stupidity (okay, enough of the alliteration) when, in the face of facts which eventually bear out, they just can’t admit they had it all wrong. Cases in point:

• “Ronald Reagan is just an ‘amiable dunce’, a ‘reckless cowboy’ who will get us into nuclear war with the Soviets.” As it turns out, Reagan was an erudite reader, who actually studied up on the issues, made the right decisions, despite advice to the contrary from his own cabinet, and his policies brought about the end of the Soviet Union without having fired a single shot.
• “By 2013, the polar icecaps will have completely melted causing a catastrophic rise in the sea levels which will obliterate coastal cities in the United States…” Al Gore’s blathering, once taken so seriously, have been completely debunked, and that “Man-made Global Warming” is nothing more than a farce, not supported by scientific data, but a farce that made him quite wealthy, nevertheless.
• “George Bush is an idiot who thinks that if Obama pulls the troops out of Iraq too soon, that a force more dangerous than Al Quada will take over large parts of Iraq and cause death and destruction on a scale not yet seen”   ummm … ISIS anyone?
• “There are no Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq- it’s just a lie made up by that dunce, George Bush, and his evil counterpart, Dick Cheney, as a lame attempt to justify an illegal War in Iraq.”    Well, as a New York Times article published just this morning, by one C.J. Chivers, has pointed out there were WMDs in Iraq- lots of them, and they even caused injury to our soldiers there…. Here is an excerpt from that article:

“From 2004 to 2011, American and American-trained Iraqi troops  repeatedly encountered, and on at least six occasions were wounded by,  chemical weapons remaining from years earlier in Saddam Hussein’s rule. In all, American troops secretly reported finding roughly 5,000 chemical warheads, shells or aviation bombs, according to interviews with dozens of  participants, Iraqi and American officials, and heavily redacted intelligence  documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act”

And then, there’s this…

• “Our experts here at the CDC and across our government agree that the chances of an Ebola outbreak here in the United States are extremely low. We’ve been taking the necessary precautions, including working with countries in West Africa to increase screening at airports so that someone with the virus doesn’t get on a plane for the United States,” -President Barack Obama, 13 Sept 2014.    As it turns out, someone with the virus got on a plane to the United States and, so far two of the health workers tending to him in Dallas have become infected with the virus…in short, it’s here…In essence, the Inadmissibility of the Left is a nothing more than a play on self-righteous indignation- one whose asinine arrogance is only exceeded by the President they elected twice, whose very own asinine arrogance has now brought a disease into the United States for the first time since its first outbreak in 1976.

In a word- dangerous men, given power, beget dangerous results to those who empower them…and those of us who saw through the lies of liberalism must now suffer along with the fools who refused to see otherwise.

Sooooo… do you think all of these liberals will ever admit that they had it wrong about Reagan? Wrong about Bush and Cheney? Wrong about WMDs? Wrong about pulling out of Iraq too early? Wrong about the wisdom of Obama easing travel restrictions on flights from Western African nations where Ebola has become pandemic?…Don’t hold your breath….At this very moment, these same liberals are now blaming Bush for the Ebola virus coming to the United States.

.-Drew Nickell, 15 October 2014

© 2014, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The  Coming Pandemic

Pandemic- (n) an epidemic occurring on a scale which crosses international boundaries, usually affecting a large number of people. (source “Dictionary of Epidemiology” Oxford University Press, p. 179. Copyright 2012)

It is often said that what we don’t know can be deadly, and while humanity is always under the threat of extinction, be it from an unthinkable nuclear war, the strike of a large meteor on the surface of the earth, a gamma ray burst, or the eruption of a caldera which would result in a years-long blockage of sunlight, it is the microscopic world of viruses that pose the biggest threat to humanity.

Pandemics are nothing new. In 430 BC, a pandemic of Typhoid Fever wiped out 25% of Athens. Smallpox took the lives of as many as ten million during two outbreaks in the second and third centuries AD. Beginning in 541 AD, and lasting until 750 AD, the first pandemic of Bubonic Plague wiped out 25% of the known world population, and resulted in a 50% decline of the population in Europe. More infamously, it was the second wave of Bubonic Plague that killed 75 million people, beginning in the fourteenth century. Known as the Black Death, as much as third of the world’s population was completely wiped out during a six-year period, 1348-54 AD, and repeated waves of this plague continued to eviscerate as much as 50% of the European populace, up until the Great Fire of London in 1666 which virtually eradicated the disease in that city. Another wave of the Bubonic Plague hit China in 1855, spread to India, and killed an additional 10 million. Bubonic Plague even hit San Francisco, in the six years leading up to that city’s devastating earthquake in 1906, killing many thousands.

Smallpox, brought by Spanish conquistadores in the 1500s, virtually wiped out the native populations of Central America in the decades that followed- the same smallpox that killed off 90% of the Native Americans in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in the mid-1600s. Recurrences of smallpox, along with influenza and measles, ravaged the Plains Indian tribes in the mid-to-late 1800s, and killed millions around the world, as well.

More recently, the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918-1919, infected 500 million people across the world in a brief eighteen-month period, and killed some 50 million during a six-month period during the height of its devastation- more than were killed in the First World War that was just ending when this pandemic began.

Respective outbreaks of Asian flu in the late 1950s, and Hong Kong flu in the late 1960s, killed three million people worldwide, including over 100,000 in the United States, alone.

Today, one third of the entire world’s population has been infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis- that’s two and a half billion people around the world. Five to ten percent of these people will progress to having active tuberculosis- that’s anywhere from one to two million people developing a disease which has a mortality rate in excess of 20%.

And then, there is Ebola. This excerpt from a CDC report dated 29 July 2014:

“Ebola hemorrhagic fever (Ebola HF) is one of numerous Viral Hemorrhagic Fevers. It is a severe, often fatal disease in humans and nonhuman primates (such as monkeys, gorillas, and chimpanzees). Ebola HF is caused by infection with a virus of the family Filoviridae, genus Ebola virus. When infection occurs, symptoms usually begin abruptly. The first Ebola virus species was discovered in 1976 in what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo near the Ebola River. Since then, outbreaks have appeared sporadically. The natural reservoir host of Ebola viruses remains unknown. However, on the basis of available evidence and the nature of similar viruses, researchers believe that the virus is zoonotic (animal-borne) with bats being the most likely reservoir. Four of the five subtypes occur in an animal host native to Africa”

The bad news is that Ebola hemorrhagic fever has an 80% mortality rate, and up to 100 health care workers who went to West Africa as part of a humanitarian effort to control the disease have become infected themselves, DESPITE the protective precautions these professionals have taken to prevent contracting the disease. Two of these professionals, Americans working for the Samaritan’s Purse, are now en route to the United States, destined for Emory University’s Center for Disease Control (CDC) is a decision that boggles the mind, when one considers the illnesses that are coming into this country by illegal aliens on our southern borders, 600 of whom have been placed in isolation for being infected with Tuberculosis.

Whether these latest developments are due to gross incompetence, intentional disregard for public safety, or some kind of ulterior and nefarious intent, by the Obama administration, is yet to be known- but this much we do know…the introduction of Ebola Hemorrhagic Fever onto American soil is something we should all be attuned to and, combined with the health crises erupting from Obama’s decision to relax the deportation of illegal aliens who are carrying virulent diseases, is something that should not be tolerated, regardless of one’s political inclinations, moral philosophies or humanitarian concerns. To do otherwise, and abide in this onslaught, is morally repugnant, intellectually degenerate, and pandemically suicidal.

-Drew Nickell, 2 August 2014

© 2014, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Coming Constitutional Crisis

Created September 17, 1787 and ratified June 21, 1788, the Constitution of the United States, on which representative democracy is based, has long stood the test of time. It replaced the 1777 Articles of Confederation, which proved unworkable as the result of Shay’s Rebellion in Massachusetts, the preceding year. Born of this crisis in the early years of our republic, it has been the foundation of what it means to be an American, and is the oldest constitution in the entire world still in use- an attest to its brilliance in forming a government of, by and for the people. Following the first ten amendments, known as the Bill of Rights, created September 25, 1789 and ratified December 15, 1791, it has been amended an additional seventeen times- amendments which have also proved, with the exception of the 18^th Amendment, to be lasting.

Since its inception, there have been a few occasions in which there occurred a constitutional crisis. Most notable was the constitutional crisis of 1861, where eleven states seceded from the Union, to form the Confederate States of America. This secession brought about the deadliest war in the history of the United States, as well as the Western Hemisphere, as civil wars throughout the world very often do prove to be so deadly. Another constitutional crisis erupted in 1937, when President Franklin Roosevelt attempted to pack the Supreme Court, which unanimously struck down FDR’s National Recovery Act, two years prior. Yet another constitutional crisis in 1974 brought about the resignation of President Nixon, following the Watergate scandal. Since then, the Constitution has been occasionally tested, most notably in 1998, when President Clinton obstructed justice and perjured himself in Clinton vs Jones that previous year, which resulted in the second impeachment of a President in US history.

This week, on the 25^th of June, Speaker of the House John Boehner announced that he is introducing legislation to allow the House of Representatives to sue President Obama for his refusal to execute our laws, for exceeding his constitutional authority in the use of his executive actions, and for his continuous attempts to bypass Congress. This confrontation has been slowly percolating since prior to Obama’s re-election and has, in the wake of the border crisis and many other brewing scandals, begun to boil over into a crisis within our federal government. Already, the Supreme Court has unanimously ruled against the president twice, in his attempt to make recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board without consent of the Senate, and in his attempt to have the National Security Agency monitor the cellular telephones of American citizens without due process.

Now it will ultimately be left to the courts to rule as to whether Speaker Boehner, at the behest of Congress, has legal standing to proceed with this lawsuit- perhaps and potentially the most important litigation in the history of our republic. If Boehner is successful, then the constitutional balance of powers, outlined in the Constitution’s first three articles, will remain intact. If Boehner fails in his attempt to curtail Obama’s overreach, then this delicate balance of power on which our nation has survived, will forever be lost and this president will have destroyed representative government as we know it. Under such a contingency, future presidents would become de facto dictators, and the legislative branch of government will be emasculated to the extent of outright impotence, rendering the United States Constitution irrelevant, thus completing the hidden agenda of Barack Obama and his nefarious allies.

-Drew Nickell, 27 June 2014

© 2014, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Super Bowl XLIX

Super Bowl Sunday 2015 fast approaches and the New England Patriots will soon be facing the reigning world champion Seattle Seahawks, in a quest to wrest the Vince Lombardi Trophy from the grasp of its current owners. Despite all of the back and forth about deflated footballs and the like, my guess is that Seattle will retain their title. Granted, I personally have no stake in this particular matchup…I’ll care about the big game, itself, when Baltimore returns to it… ‘til then, it’s just another football game, as far as I am concerned.

Having thus opined about this year’s Super Bowl, I continue to marvel at the spectacle the Super Bowl has become, of late. For anyone who knows me, that should be no surprise…after all, I am older than all of the players, and most all of the coaches who will be participating in this year’s contest, and even eight years older than the game, itself. I do have memories of what came to be known as the Super Bowl, from its very beginning when it was known as the AFL-NFL Championship Game.

In the first such contest, the NFL’s Green Bay Packers faced off against the AFL’s Kansas City Chiefs at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, which was only two-thirds filled at kickoff- amazing, considering that the tickets to that game were $ 6.00 (that’s six bucks, folks), not to mention the fact that it was the only Super Bowl to be simultaneously broadcast by two networks, CBS and NBC. The halftime show consisted of a traditional college football bands from the University of Arizona and Grambling State University, along with jazz trumpeter Al Hirt. There were no special commercials aired for the Super Bowl back then…just the normal ads one might see for any run-of-the-mill football game, mostly for beer and cigarettes…yes, cigarettes. Miller High Life (“The Champagne of Beers”) squared off against the Marlboro Man (“Filter, Flavor, Pack or Box”) for viewer interest during the minutes between football plays.

Two years later, in what was to be the first so-called Super Bowl, a husky ten-year-old in suburban Richmond, Virginia was crying his eyes out when the Joe Namath-led New York Jets pulled off the greatest upset in the annals of sports and defeated the heavily-favored, Earl Morrall-led, Baltimore Colts. Coached by Don Shula, who stubbornly refused to play all-time-great Johnny Unitas until the fourth quarter, when the Colts were down 16-0, it was to become second darkest day in that young lad’s life as a football fan. Given more time, Unitas would easily have beaten the Jets, but it was not to be on that particular Sunday afternoon.

Two years later, that same husky ten-year old (now twelve) became the happiest kid in America, when Jim O’Brien kicked a field goal with five seconds remaining, to lift the Baltimore Colts over the Dallas Cowboys in Super Bowl V, which was the first time the newly minted AFC squared off against the newly-minted NFC, following the great merger of 1970. It was ironic that the first NFL team to lose a Super Bowl would become the first AFC team to win a Super Bowl, but that was the irony that was the Baltimore Colts. The darkest day in his life as a football fan, would follow thirteen years later when, on March 29, 1984, the Robert Irsay-owned Baltimore Colts snuck out of town in the middle of the night and thus became forever, in the mind of this fan, the Indiana-no-place Counterfeit-Colts.

In the decades that followed, the Super Bowl became a bacchanalia of excess, with “nip-slips”, “wardrobe malfunctions”, and even a platform for the sitting President, to take advantage of vast viewerships and drone on and on about something that has long since been forgotten. The pre-game show, which had been fifteen minutes, back in the day, now comprises five hours, yet the game itself is no better now than it was back then, and actually worse given all of the rules changes that have summarily ruined what was a great game in the 1960s.

That statement even holds true when the Baltimore Ravens won their pair of Super Bowls in 2001 and 2013…but, alas, I digress…

It’s Super Bowl Sunday, after all and the time for talking about it will end, soon enough…that is, until next year…Go Ravens !!!

-Drew Nickell, 20 January 2015

© 2015, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The State of the (dis-) Union

The Constitution of the United States, in Article II, Sec 3, requires that the President of the United States, from time to time, provide to Congress a report on the state of our union. This requirement has, over the decades, become an annual address outlining the president’s recommendation on his own legislative agenda, more so than a report on the actual state of our union, as it were. On rare occasions, the president has elected not to provide such a report, and the vaguely referenced requirement in our Constitution provides for this leeway.

In the past, most notably when presidents have faced defeat (typically following the mid-term congressional elections), they have reached out to the opposing party and proposed consensus-building initiatives for the greater good of the country. For example, when President Clinton suffered such a defeat in the mid-term election of 1994, he used the State of the Union address to reach across the aisle to engage the Newt Gingrich-led Republicans, and the result was fruitful in providing for needed welfare reform and, thanks to a change in the accounting procedures which moved some of the country’s financial obligations “off the books”, a so-called balanced budget, as well. These two initiatives proved better for the country at large, and business responded favorably.

In essence, Bill Clinton decided that it was better for the country for him to work with the opposition, than it was for him to stick with his partisan base and continue to try to ram through ideologically-driven initiatives, such as “Hillary-care” which would have divided the country and promoted even more legislative inaction.

This past autumn Barack Obama suffered, far and away, the worst electoral mid-term defeat of any president since the 1930’s. Nine senate seats changed hands and the House Republicans picked up an additional forty-seven seats, giving the GOP the largest share of House seats since the Great Depression. Not that “His Arrogance” was bothered in the least, as he inferred that the election results were nothing more than a reflection of poor voter turnout- which, reminded us of someone who throws the blanket over their head when they flatulate in bed. Tonight he will deliver his state of the union speech and, rather than putting the country ahead of his own lofty ego, he is going ahead with plans to further drive a divisive and toxic wedge into our country’s electorate, by once again driving home the dubious point that the rich need to do their “fair share”, and pay even more in taxes than they already pay. That is not exactly a legislative initiative that seeks to spur economic growth, according to any economist with half a brain, aside from Paul Krugman who, it would seem, only has half a brain. Some people, like Obama and Krugman, will never get it- the “it” being that communism doesn’t work, socialism doesn’t work, and taxing the rich doesn’t work, either. Again, Obama couldn’t care less. Should the country go down the tubes, he’d still be more than satisfied in the scent of his own flatulence, so why in the sand hill would he want to reach across to Republicans at this point in his presidency, and accomplish something good for the country?

He’ll swagger his pen and insist upon continuing to act as though he were some kind of monarch, and run down a list of executive orders that he intends to issue- Congress be damned. The useful idiots in the major media will continue to jump over each other in voicing ejaculatory praise for his lofty vision- a vision designed to further marginalize what was once a truly an exceptional nation, because his presidency has proved to be nothing more than an expression of his determination to make the United States of America no better than any other nation in the world. In other words, his stratagem is this: “if you cannot lift up the rest of the world through the example of your own leadership, than the best thing to do is lower the United States to the level of the rest of the world, ensuring international equality”. In a world view where equality trumps excellence, nothing improves and, by definition, everything deteriorates, instead. That will prove to be the legacy of Barack Obama.

When all of us are dead and gone, historians will surely say of him “He brought us down to make us equal”… that’s some legacy, indeed. God help us.

-Drew Nickell, 20 January 2015

© 2015, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

St. Patrick’s Day

Our late father, who would be celebrating his 101^st birthday on May 16^th, was half Irish, one fourth Scottish and one fourth German, even though he always thought of himself as Irish. Given the fact that our mother was 100% Italian, I suppose that given such a “mongrel” background, as it were, that would make us one fourth Irish, so it is with this horrid cocktail of Jameson Irish Whiskey, Glen Levitt Scotch Whiskey, German lager and Italian Red Chianti, we should go ahead and offer a hearty and happy St. Patrick’s Day to one and all, whether you are a-sportin’ the Catholic green or the Protestant orange on this, the 17^th of March.

Dad always loved St. Patrick’s Day, and so did Mom. Both would be wearin’ the green all over- we think they might have even painted their faces green, if they had had the chance. On whatever night the date might fall, we would be assured of dining on corned beef, cabbage and even a sip of green beer, just for luck. It was one of those harmless frivolities that marked the passage of time. Given enough of liquid encouragement, Dad would even be emboldened enough to belt out his rendition of “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling”, in his soft Irish tenor voice- even though, invariably, he’d be sure to botch the lyric, as he did with any song he ever attempted to sing- such were the makings of family traditions, as it were.

I remember his telling of a tradition in Baltimore that, before he was a lad, there was a rather odd application of justice in that city. With so many Irishmen getting drunk on St. Patrick’s Day, and a finite number of jail cells in which to place them, those arrested would be marched down to City Hall, forced to lower their trousers, and they would have their backsides painted Kelly green and forced to stand until the paint dried. The thought was that the poor lads’ wives would summarily exact a much harsher punishment on their husbands, having come home with green posteriors, attesting to their imbibing during Lent, than the city ever could.

So, when we became of age and began to go out and celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, on our own, we would always get the same kindly warning from our Dad, “Don’t go getting your fanny painted, tonight,” which meant “don’t over-do it”.

So to all our friends on this, St. Patrick’s Day, 2015, may we say “Happy St. Patrick’s Day to all, and don’t go getting your ass painted.”

-Drew Nickell. 17 March 2015

© 2015, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Sesquicentennial

The ninth of April 1865 was a seasonably cool, yet mostly sunny Palm Sunday and, for the first time in four years, guns were silent and cannons stilled. The armies’ movements were halted, and all was quiet in the tiny hamlet of Appomattox, Virginia. Accompanied by his personal secretary, his orderly and another cavalry soldier bearing a white flag of truce, General Robert E. Lee, commanding officer of the Army of Northern Virginia rode his white horse, “Traveler” slowly toward a recently-relocated house owned by Wilbur McLean. The house which, ironically, once stood near Manassas, Virginia, when the War Between the States had begun four years earlier, was offered by its owner as a meeting place for Union General Ulysses Grant to receive General Lee, in order to discuss the terms of surrender of the armies under Lee’s command.

Lee really had no choice but to approach Grant that Sunday morning. His armies-starved, ill-equipped, decimated and vastly outnumbered, were virtually surrounded by the armies under Grant’s command- better equipped, fed, uniformed and vastly superior in numbers. The day before, saw the last skirmishes between the two sides and, facing certain annihilation, Robert E. Lee was quoted as saying, “There’s nothing now left for me to do, but go and speak with General Grant”.

Dressed in his finest uniform, General Lee climbed the steps of McLean’s house and entered the parlor, along with his personal secretary, and the two generals began reminiscing about their shared service during the Mexican War, twenty years before. Lee, the one-time stellar lieutenant under General Winfield Scott, was well known during the Mexican War, while Grant was virtually unknown at that time. Grant remembered Lee quite well from that conflict, but Lee regrettably did not remember Grant, at all.

After some awkward moments, the two generals stumbled into the conversations that would effectively end the American Civil War. Magnanimous in victory, Grant offered his vanquished foe generous terms in the proposed surrender. Confederate officers would be allowed to retain their side-arms, provided they sign an oath to never again take up arms against the North. Any man who claimed to own a horse, would be allowed to retain the horse so that they could “plow their little farms” for spring planting, to which Lee responded, “that will have great effect” upon the morale of his decimated soldiers. All of the Confederate army would be “paroled until exchanged” which, effectively meant that they could return the states that they called home, present themselves at their respective courthouses, sign a loyalty oath to the United States, and return to their families, in due course.

Amongst these tattered remnants was our great, great grandfather, Private Edward James Nickell, a man in his late thirties who had black hair and stood all of five feet, seven inches. His father, Andrew, had been a captain serving his country in the War of 1812, and his grandfather, Thomas, had fought in the French and Indian Wars, under British General Braddock, then at the Battle of Point Pleasant under Colonel Andrew Lewis in Dunmore’s War, and finally, under General Washington in the American Revolutionary War. His grandson, and our great, great grandfather, Edward, spent much of the Civil War, stationed at a railroad depot in nearby Lynchburg, Virginia, and performed courier services on horseback, far away from his remote homestead, located in Monroe County, in what was to become West Virginia. He would return to Charleston, sign his loyalty oath, return whence he come, and live for the next thirty-six years on the small farm near Pickaway, where he died in 1901.

Something else happened in Appomattox on that particular morning, though nobody present would realize it until many years later. Prior to this war, far and away America’s costliest (civil wars tend to be the bloodiest), the United States were referred to in the plural (i.e. “they”), placing emphasis on the states which comprised the union. Following the war, the United States would be referred to in the singular (i.e. “it”), placing emphasis on the union, itself. This lays credence to the fact that the Civil War was primarily fought to settle a constitutional crisis and ultimately determine whether any state, or group of states, could secede from the union.  It wasn’t until January of 1863, when Abraham Lincoln signed the “Emancipation Proclamation” that the war took on the secondary cause of freeing the slaves in the Confederate states (the border states of Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri, which had not seceded, were exempted from this emancipation order).

My great, great grandfather, whose family was dirt poor, and owned no slaves, threw his lot in with the Confederacy because he felt more loyalty to his home state (then, Virginia) than he did towards the nation of which it was a part- just as most of his fellow soldiers had done. Following Lee’s surrender, he went home to live his life as an American, beaten in war yet not defeated in spirit, which should be the important lesson of that which took place 150 years ago when two generals sat down and settled a conflict- one which politicians, left to their own devices, could not settle, and one which took the lives of some 600,000 men.

Historical revisionism, left to the wiles of contemporary political correctness, has done a remarkable job in re-defining both the cause and the meaning of America’s Civil War, and in demonizing the confederacy and those who fought for the South (someone once said that history is written by the victors, after all). Yet, in the stillness of Appomattox, the truth remains that it was there where a divided nation became one nation- an inclusive, forgiving and united nation, where all could claim to be American, at long last. Lee knew it when, returning to his army, told his men to “go home and be good citizens”. Grant knew it, and dissuaded his army from exacting revenge and engaging in raucous celebrations of victory. It’s just too bad that, 150 years later, people today tend not to realize what all of this means- really means, in the grand scheme of things.

-Drew Nickell, 8 April 2015

© 2015, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Redistribution

First, a parable:

Once upon a time, there was a father who gave his son an allowance of $1.00 a week. The father told his son that he would have to “live within his means”. Over time the son ran up debts that averaged $2.00 per week. So the son went to the father and said, “Dad, if you increase my allowance to $2.00 per week, I promise I will live within my means.” So the father increased his allowance to $2.00 per week. After a while, the son ran up debts to an average of $4.00 per week. So the son went to his father and said, “Dad, if you will only increase my allowance to $4.00 per week, I promise that I will live within my means.” So the father increased the allowance to $4.00 per week. Sure enough, the son ran up debts that amounted to $8.00 per week. So the son said to his dad, “Dad, if you can just give me an increase to $8.00 per week, I promise that this time, I will cut my spending and live within my means.” Predictably, this cycle continued…$8.00, $16.00, $32.00, $64.00, $128.00, etc., etc. etc.  Then one day, the son came home and saw a “FOR SALE” sign in front of the family home. When he asked his dad why the house was for sale, the father told him that he could no longer afford to pay the mortgage on the house, because there wasn’t enough money left after giving his son an allowance and the debts that the son had continued to run up would have to be paid. The son said to his dad, “All this time, I thought you had enough money, and now you have to sell the house? …Well gee, Dad, can I still get my allowance after you sell the house?”

This story, which I wrote in 2012, is an illustration of largesse on the part of our government and its propensity to throw billions of dollars to fix a problem that, in the end, is not going to be fixed by throwing more and more money at it. Since the inception of redistribution in the United States, going back to LBJ’s Great Society programs and even FDR’s New Deal, there has been an effort to redistribute private wealth for the “public good”, in other words taking from the “haves” and giving to the “have-nots”. What was once a noble effort on the part of our society to provide for those who are truly in need, has grown to the point of multi-generational dependency, growing ever larger to the extent that we have arrived at a place where upwards of fifty millions of our citizens are receiving EBT benefits, while forty-five percent of our population is receiving some form of assistance from our government- all in the name of compassion, yet altogether unsustainable, in any way imaginable, as these numbers continue to grow.

To even mention these facts to anyone brings on the predictable accusations of insensitivity and selfishness as though the national wealth is something that should be shared equally, without any regard to the source of this wealth. There are those, largely Obama supporters and their liberal allies, who advocate such wholesale redistribution, and it is no wonder.

As far back as 2001, Barack Obama was advocating legislative action to make mandatory, the wholesale redistribution of wealth, in a radio discussion (“Odyssey” Chicago Public Radio, 18 Jan 2001) he was having with two law professors while he was an Illinois state senator- citing specifically the failure of the civil rights movement to include legislative requirements that would mandate wholesale redistribution of private wealth to the less fortunate. Ladies and gentlemen- this is nothing less than radical socialism, and this point-of-view has now found discretionary power in our nation’s highest office.

There is an inherent, tangible problem with this philosophy. If we took 100% of all of the assets of the wealthy in this country, and distributed all of this wealth to the poor in this country, the net result would be a poverty level of 100% which, to some, seems “fair”, but to anyone who can look past the end of their nose is the recipe for national failure, and the basis of our own destruction. It was Margaret Thatcher who epitomized this reality when she said, “The problem with socialism is that, eventually, you run out of other people’s money.”

Add this to the problem of illegal immigrants flooding an all-too-porous border, who have been assured by this administration that they and their children will be cared for, and now we see an intent on the part of this administration to completely and intentionally wreck our economy, and subsequently introduce the concept of the “collective” into the American system as a replacement for free enterprise- and this, ladies and gentlemen, is called…Communism.

Going back to his formative years, most all of Obama’s mentors were card-carrying communists and they did a splendid job of indoctrinating their protégé on the doctrine of communism, sealing the philosophy that he has endeared ever since. His promise to “fundamentally transform the United States of America” on Election Night, 2008 is now well under way, as evidenced by the dramatic rise in public assistance that has taken place since he was inaugurated in January, 2009.

Those who have opposed him politically have faced substantial and punitive repercussions, most notably on the part of the IRS, but this fundamental transformation has not stopped there. We now live in a country where, thanks to his administration and their priorities, our government provides better health care to Guantanamo detainees, than they do our own service veterans. The poor, the imprisoned, and indigent illegals who enter this country, also are provided better health care, than those who served our country, fought our wars, and sacrificed themselves so that we may enjoy freedom.

To even mention these things is to bring on charges of racism, insensitivity, callousness and the predictable labels of “Right Wing Nut Job” all because, in their efforts to indoctrinate the minions who support them, the political left has committed wholesale larceny of the language, itself, aided and abetted by a complicit media who failed in their duties to expose the hidden agenda of Barack Hussein Obama, and now we are all having to suffer the consequences of their failure to do so.

At the end of this week, we observe Independence Day, which is supposed to be an observance of the very thing that always made this country the greatest on earth- namely, Independence. Yet, in increasing dependency on the part of millions, we are unwittingly undoing this spirit of independence, and unknowingly playing into the designs of those who would tear us asunder. If we as a nation fail to awake and see what is taking place before our very eyes, America will cease to exist, and on that day all of us will come to suffer and rue the day that Obama and his acolytes came into power.

-Drew Nickell, 1 July 2014

© 2014, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Ray Rice

First, I offer a disclaimer. I am a lifelong Baltimore football fan- a fan of the Baltimore Colts from the time I was old enough to recognize a football, through the 1983 season (their last in Baltimore), a fan of Baltimore’s CFL Stallions in 1994-95, and a diehard fan of the Ravens since 1996. My loyalty to Baltimore football knows no bounds, as anyone who knows me, can readily attest. In the autumn of each year, my blood turns purple and remains that way until the Ravens have played their final game of every season, and my mood on Mondays is almost solely dependent on how the Ravens have fared the Sunday before.

As a diehard Baltimore fan, I want to share my thoughts of the video showing Ray Rice punching his then-fiancé (they have since married) in an Atlantic City elevator, as well as the NFL’s response to his specific offense, and their policy of treating similar offenses, going forward. In a word, I am as disgusted with Ray Rice, personally, as I am with the management of the Baltimore Ravens and the National Football League, in general.

There is nothing new about male athletes treating women badly. All of us have memories of scholastic and collegiate “jocks” pressing their advantage with female co-eds, and the comparative lack of consequences vetted towards these miscreants. Every year we read about allegations of sexual and physical assaults perpetrated by athletes of every sport against women at all levels of athletic competition, and it seems that the more noteworthy the athletic prowess of the perpetrator, the more notorious the offense, and the more feckless the consequence.

Not that I would ever be able to dream of being a billionaire owner of a National Football League franchise, but I can tell you this without equivocation. Were I Steven Bisciotti, owner of the Baltimore Ravens, I would have summarily fired Ray Rice when the first video appeared showing him dragging his fiancé out of the elevator- regardless of whether the team went on to win another Super Bowl or finished the ensuing season 0-16, and I would have done so faster than the team mascot can utter a “caw-caw”. Were I Roger Goodell, the Commissioner of the National Football League, I would have put in a policy which banned for life any player, coach or member of team management who perpetrated such an offense the FIRST time is occurred. Were I John Harbaugh, the coach of the Ravens, I would have refused to allow Rice to take part in any practice or play in any game, even if it meant my job being lost, as a result.

Until such time as we cease and desist, from molly-coddling these overpaid ego-maniacs that play a child’s game for salaries that have well passed the point of being ludicrous, we will continue to see, year after year, similar occurrences as we have too often become too far accustomed to seeing. Until, at the scholastic levels, we see a wholesale change in the way high school athletes are allowed to cheat on exams, take advantage of their female classmates, and display violent and disruptive behavior, without punishment, there will never be the re-introduction of good sportsmanship and character-building that athletic competition once instilled, and professional sports will ultimately suffer under the weight of its own excess, as a result of not taking a more strenuous stance on the behavior of athletes- on the field, in the locker rooms, in the off-season, and in their very own homes, as well.

In the meantime, Go Ravens !

-Drew Nickell, 8 September 2014

© 2014, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Political Poison

How badly has Barack Obama, along with help from Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and Debbie Wasserman-Schultz poisoned their Democrat Party? ….This badly…

Since the election of 2008, the Democrats have lost (and the Republicans have won) a net 13 seats in the United States Senate- that’s a 23% drop for the Democrats.

Since the same election in 2008, the Democrats have lost (and the Republicans have won) a net 72 seats in the House of Representatives- that’s a 28% drop for the Democrats.

Since the same election in 2008, the Democrats have lost (and the Republicans have won) a net 7 Gubernatorial Elections- that’s a 24% drop for the Democrats.

Much has been made about the toxicity of Barack Obama’s intention to bypass the legislature, and evoke yet another Executive Order, thereby granting millions of illegal aliens amnesty for having entered the United States, illegally.  Well, considering that the President of the United States is sworn to uphold the laws of the United States, and to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, such a move on his part would indeed be toxic, to say the least, and quite possibly, in violation of the Constitution of the United States, in practical terms.

Not that he cares… Single-handedly, he has destroyed our credibility overseas, completely erased any semblance of a mandate he received in 2008, weakened the United States’ position all over the world, alienated our allies and emboldened our enemies to an extent not seen in the history of the United States. Not bad for a community organizer whose birth certificate is somewhat questionable, whose collegiate records remain sealed, and whose citizenship is not entirely established…not completely, that is.    With the help of resident dingbats, like Nancy Pelosi, Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Harry Reid, he has also destroyed his own political party- and that is saying something, considering that the Republicans are not exactly well loved in this country.

In short, Barack Hussein Obama is poison- toxic to his country, toxic to our allies, toxic to the world’s stability (if there ever was such a thing) and toxic even unto his own political party.      So the question is “Does he give a rat’s hindquarters?”

Not in the very least… and that is the real problem we face, today.

-Drew Nickell, 13 November 2014

© 2014, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Political Correctness

Last year, I posted to Facebook a tongue-in-cheek letter to the President, written to mock the all-too-pervasive speech codes that are the illegitimate, albeit predictable progeny of political correctness. Before we delve into the issue of political correctness and how it is destroying the freedom of expression in this country, here is that letter…

An open letter to the President of the United States

Dear Mr. President,

I am writing to you today (nothing against yesterday or tomorrow) to express my concern ( I am not unpatriotic) about the direction (not a geographical reference) our country (nothing against cities) is headed. To be clear (not meant to plagiarize your favorite phrase), and in the interests of full disclosure (not exposing myself indecently), I did not vote for you (I’m sorry) in either of the last two presidential elections (please do not audit me). I am a 54-year old (nothing against young people) straight (nothing against gays) white (not a racist) male (not a sexist) who usually votes Republican (not a right-wing extremist nor a fascist) and one who believes in monogamy (nothing against polygamists or players).

My father (nothing against fatherless children) served his country (he was not a war-monger) as a Corpsman (not a Corpse-man, but a Corpsman –pronounced korman) in the Navy (nothing against the other branches of service, or those who chose not to serve) in World War II. He has passed away (nothing against the living) a few years ago, but at the time of his passing, was worried about the future (nothing against the past or present) of our country (he was not an extremist, either). He worked (nothing against those who don’t) all of his life, just as my mother did (nothing against stay-at-home moms) and wanted only to pursue the American (nothing against other countries) dream.

Like my parents (nothing against orphans), I too have worked (nothing against those who haven’t) all of my life, and am afforded (nothing against those who aren’t) health insurance (nothing against Obamacare- oops, I meant to say the Affordable Healthcare Act- sorry!) by my employer (please don’t audit them, either) and every once in a while, (nothing against those who do so more, or less, frequently) like to fly (please don’t put me on a no-fly list) to see other places (nothing against persons or things) but find that it’s getting harder to do so (nothing against those that don’t) because of rising taxes (not anti-government) and, therefore, less (nothing against more) take home pay. I drive a car (please forgive my carbon footprint) have air-conditioning (ditto carbon footprint) and just want to continue to live freely (nothing against those who don’t) and independently (not a militia member) in the greatest (nothing against those who don’t think so) country (nothing against other countries) on earth (nothing against other planets). I read the newspapers (please don’t hack my phone, internet, or communications) I watch Fox News (not a co-conspirator) as well as other news outlets (just to be fair) and hope that my children (nothing against my elders) and grandchildren (nothing against grandparents) will continue enjoy the blessings (nothing against non-believers) of liberty (nothing against the imprisoned) and be able to worship (nothing against those who don’t) God (nothing against other names, beliefs or lack thereof) as they deem fit.

So please (nothing against you if you’re not pleased) take my (nothing against other’s) letter (nothing against tweets) into consideration when performing (nothing against not performing) the duties of the office (nothing against those without an office) to which you were elected (nothing against your operatives who weren’t) and I promise to continue to be a good (nothing against bad) citizen (nothing against aliens, legal or otherwise, un-documented workers, and visiting diplomats).

Very truly (nothing against the untruly) yours (nothing against mine, his, hers, theirs, ours),

Drew Nickell

Seriously speaking, the inherent problem with political correctness is the all-too-intended effect of creating speech codes- which are nothing more than the attempt of the political left to silence, ostracize and alienate the political right. Criticize the president’s policies, and one is labeled a racist. Focus attention on the problems at our southern border, and one is called anti-Hispanic. Question public funding of abortion, and one is accused of sexism- same holds true for those who might object to “free” birth control. Any attempt to identify or quantify the source of terrorism around the world carries with it the moniker of Islamophobia. Advocacy of traditional marriage brings on charges of homophobia. Question measures to reign in carbon emissions here in the United States, or dubious “scientific” claims of man-made global warning, and one is identified with a “flat earth” mentality. Being a Christian and admitting to it brings on multiple labels of intolerance, ignorance and living in a fantasy world. ANYTHING in support of Israel and one is automatically a Zionist occupier of the “peaceful” Palestinian territory. Question any use of EBT cards and the expansion of Medicaid, and one is callous, insensitive to the needy or greedy for not wanting to share the wealth. Comparatively trivial, perhaps, even though I am a Baltimore Ravens fan, and not a Washington Redskins fan, I feel their pain because now dedicated Redskins fans are ignobly identified as anti-Native American. And the list goes on, ad nauseam…

Ironically, this destruction of dissent originated in the halls of academia- the one-time center of intellectual pursuit and erstwhile venue of the exchange of ideas. Coincidentally and concurrently, the “blame America first” ideology began in these institutions of higher learning during the early days of the 20^th century, and took root in the 1970’s following the Viet Nam war. Its ignominious influence spread to the newsrooms and editorial boards of publishing concerns ranging from book publishers to newspapers, in the decades that followed. Now, it has crept in to all manners and means of public discourse- just ask any student with conservative leanings, on just about any college campus in the United States, and they will tell you that even their grades are adversely affected if they so much as even question the liberal dogma being spewed by their professors. In essence, if they want to pass the course they keep their opinions to themselves and end up being forced to feed into the egotistical monster behind the lectern, whose purpose is not to educate, but rather to indoctrinate. Ask yourself this question- “Why is it that former domestic terrorists, such as a Bill Ayers or a Bernadine Dohrn, are given tenured faculty positions at the very same universities which would never allow Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to give a commencement speech?” The answer, sadly, is self-evident.

These efforts to silence the opposition to liberal orthodoxy are nothing new. We saw it in Soviet Russia, until the Gorbachev era. We saw it in Nazi Germany (remember that National Socialism grew from the German Labor Party and is, actually a leftist ideology, not what the liberal left would have us otherwise believe). We saw it during the Cultural Revolution in Communist China- and the result? …. hundreds of millions dead during the 20^th century.

Even the very term “liberal” has been so corrupted. What was once considered to be advocacy for inclusion and the exchange of ideas has now been denigrated to mean the proselytizing of radical ideology and the forced quarantine of political conservatism.

In their attempt to silence opposition, such measures unwittingly fuel the fires of discontent, here at home, and wherever free men and women who cherish the concept of liberty and freedom may live. Squash a person’s freedom of expression today, and such expression will surely take on a less-than-civil means of communication, tomorrow, and then things can get ugly, very quickly, given the right impetus. Ladies and gentlemen, therein lays the true danger of political correctness and why we must demand that all be heard- on campus, in the newsrooms, and in the halls of Washington and beyond. Failure to do so will just as surely lead to the extinction of individual liberty, as we know it, and send the entire world into an abysmal return to the Dark Ages, to whence we come.

• Drew Nickell, 8 July 2014

© 2014, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Pearl Harbor

“…what’s past is prologue…”– William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, Act 2, Scene I

Seventy-three years ago, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt addressed a Joint Session of Congress. What follows is an excerpt of that address…

“Yesterday, December 7th, 1941 — a date which will live in infamy — the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked, by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan. The United States was at peace with that nation and, at the solicitation of Japan, was still in conversation with its government and its emperor looking toward the maintenance of peace in the Pacific. Indeed, one hour after Japanese air squadrons had commenced bombing in the American island of Oahu, the Japanese ambassador to the United States and his colleague delivered to our Secretary of State a formal reply to a recent American message. And while this reply stated that it seemed useless to continue the existing diplomatic negotiations, it contained no threat or hint of war or of armed attack. It will be recorded that the distance of Hawaii from Japan makes it obvious that the attack was deliberately planned many days or even weeks ago. During the intervening time, the Japanese government has deliberately sought to deceive the United States by false statements and expressions of hope for continued peace… Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory, and our interests are in grave danger. With confidence in our armed forces, with the unbounding determination of our people, we will gain the inevitable triumph — so help us God. I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December 7th, 1941, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese empire.”

–President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Address to Joint Session of Congress, 8 December 1941

In the course of history there are occurrences which, despite the seemingly isolated context of their respective contemporary settings, nevertheless have ramifications which last for decades. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was just such an occurrence. It set into motion a chain of events that united the American people to support a war effort like no other- before or since, introduced nuclear warfare, led to the ultimate destruction of totalitarianism in both Europe and the Pacific, ushered in a decades-long Cold War, and established the United States as a world superpower, just to name a few.

Sadly, however, the passage of time has eroded and faded into oblivion the central lesson of Pearl Harbor- that isolationism and living in denial of a real world can leave a nation and a people open to attack, and ultimately result in profound and lasting changes to their way of life- think September 11^th, 2001, whose own central lesson has begun to fade, especially with the young people who have now grown to the age of electoral suffrage.

We did not seek war with Japan (nor Germany, nor Italy), nor did we seek war with radical Islam. Yet both were thrust upon us, in one form or another, because of our naiveté and because we fell into a false sense of isolation, one that insidiously told us “those problems are over there- we need to stay out”- a recipe for ultimate disaster and vastly increased carnage.

There are those who insist, to this day, that both of the attacks on Pearl Harbor and on 9/11 might well have been avoided if we had done a better job of appeasing those who were bent on our ultimate destruction. There are also those who attempt to play a moral equivalency card- one that expresses the egregious lie that the attacks on Pearl Harbor and 9/11 were somehow justified from the perspective of those who perpetrated these acts. Such folly may sell in the cloistered world of academia and theological seminary, and may even persuade young and impressionable minds of their supposed enlightenment, to the point of advocacy and active protest. Yet, in the real world- the world where we unfortunately find ourselves living- putting into place national policy which espouses this fantasy can, and only will, lead to our own demise, and quite possibly, our own destruction.

It would be nice if, in the words of Rodney King, we could “all just get along”. Go try that one on a radical jihadist and see how long your head remains attached to your torso, if you are a man, and how long your virtue remains intact if you are a woman. Like the Japanese who beheaded our prisoners of war, and made wholesale rape a policy of occupation in China, Radical Islam, in the form of ISIS, is employing the very same stratagem.

Just as the Japanese “suddenly and deliberately” launched a pre-meditated attack on the United States in 1941, radical Islam “suddenly and deliberately” launched an attack on the United States sixty years later. Americans were united in their resolve to annihilate the Japanese Empire, as a result, and did so. It’s too bad that we lack such resolve, as a nation today, to destroy the evil that is radical Islam. Without such resolve, we will most certainly NOT “gain the inevitable victory, so help us God” and it is we the people who ultimately, ignobly, and finally, bear the responsibility of our own demise.

-Drew Nickell, 8 December 2014

© 2014, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

author of “Bending Your Ear- a Collection of Essays on the Issues of Our Times”

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Noshowbama

Noshowbama is not a city in Japan, but rather an approach to foreign policy by the current administration when it comes to world leadership or, rather, the lack thereof. While leaders of the free, and not-so-free, world united in clasped arms to march in support of peaceful expression and against extremist terrorism, word has it that our dear leader, Barack Obama, was taking in NFL playoff games in the privacy and comfort of his digs at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. The “company line”, as it were, is that the security requirements entailed for “His Arrogance” to participate, along with millions marching in Paris, were so great as to negatively impact the march itself which is a load of horse-hockey- and that’s saying something, given the fertilizer factory that is this administration.

Marching, not even ten feet apart from one another, were Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Leader Mahmoud Abbas, both of whom had the sense of noblesse oblige to join with other world leaders in a joint demonstration of the sentiment that “enough is enough” when it comes to Islamic extremism- something that the Obama administration cannot even vocalize at the end of the day. Attorney General Eric Holder was even in the same city, earlier that morning, but this Administration couldn’t even arrange for his representation in the parade, which says a lot about the priorities of Obama and his world view, which is basically this: “Disrespect your allies and kiss the hind-quarters of your enemy”.

Even the Russians – hardly the bastions of civil liberties- had the wherewithal to send their foreign minister, but the United States couldn’t manage to ante in a vice president (Biden), secretary of state (Kerry) or attorney general (Holder) when, in fact, our president (Obama) could and should have been there. For all world to see, by this absence, Obama has certified his own credentials to his oft-stated view that the United States is not exceptional, nor even classy.

This ranks right up (or, I should say down) there with his presentation to the Queen of England, in honor of her sixtieth jubilee as reigning monarch, an i-Pod containing a collection of his own speeches, along with a “take-this-bust-and- shove-it” 2010 return of Winston Churchill’s bust, which had been presented to former President Lyndon B. Johnson, forty-five years before.

If this is what passes for leadership in the free world, then the free world is as screwed as is ever can, or could, be. Here we have a sitting U. S. president who cares more about seeing who will make the NFL final four, than leading millions of men and women, and leaders across the globe, united to stand and march against totalitarianism and extremism.

It’s enough to make any real American barf up his/her bouillabaisse.

If there is anyone in the United States that still is under the complete and fantastic misconception that Barack Obama is a great leader in the free world, and a great president, than let such a person give him- or herself an overdue swirl-ee in their own toilet, and wake the hell up.

Obama is a coward, a miscreant and utterly unworthy of the office to which he was twice elected, and his exit cannot come quickly enough to a watching world who, at long last, has come to see the light of day- that we are at war with Islamic barbarism, and that the fate of civilization depends on its very outcome.

-Drew Nickell, 12 January 2015

© 2015, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Netanyahu

Not since January 17, 1952, when British Prime Minister Winston Churchill warned the United States of an Iron Curtain descending upon Europe, has there been a more important speech from a foreign dignitary to a joint session of the United States Congress. Yet, today, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed a joint session of Congress in a speech as far reaching as Churchill’s in 1952. In it, he implored the members of Congress to think long and hard about the consequences of lifting sanctions on the Islamic Republic of Iran, which would be part and parcel of an agreement that President Obama is desperately seeking with Iran, in an inane attempt to thwart Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

Specifically, Prime Minister Netanyahu took issue with two crucial elements of this nascent treaty, presently being negotiated in Geneva, Switzerland by Secretary of State John Kerry. The first, and by far the most important issue, is the “sunset clause” whereby Iran would only be held to its terms for a period of ten years, after which they would be free and clear to develop a stockpile of nuclear weapons. Secondly, Iran would retain its entire nuclear enrichment program and thus geometrically increase the amount of centrifuges designed to enrich uranium- a key component to the creation of atomic weapons. Quite rightly, Netanyahu warned the Congress that this treaty would not do anything to thwart Iran’s nuclear ambitions, but rather pave the way for Iran to become the latest member to the world’s nuclear club and, given the nature of a regime that has been in place for thirty–six years, thus create an existential threat to the survival of Israel, since it is this same regime that has publicly and repeatedly called for Israel’s annihilation.

Netanyahu documented the history of Iran’s hatred of Israel, recalling from ancient history the attempt by Persia’s Haman to destroy Israel- a plot that was thwarted by Esther, and to this day is observed in the feast of Purim. He recounted the history of Iran’s current regime since its inception in 1979 when the incumbent government, under Shah Reza Pahlavi, was overthrown by Islamic Radicals under the Ayatollah Khomeini- a regime that captured American diplomats and held them captive for 444 days in 1979-1980, and then a few years later was responsible for the death of 230 U.S. Marines in Beirut, Lebanon. He reminded the Congress that it is this Iranian regime that has extended its hegemony over four nations- Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Lebanon and that it seeks to expand its domination of the Middle East, vying only with ISIS for such control. Conversely, it is the Obama administration which naively believes that this rivalry with ISIS represents a signal of Iran’s willingness to take on ISIS as a pathway to friendlier relations with the Iranian regime, but it is indeed the exact opposite. As Netanyahu so succinctly put it, in this particular case, “the enemy of your enemy is your enemy”.

Asininely, fifty-four Democratic Representatives and eight Democratic Senators boycotted the address by the Israeli Prime Minister, in lockstep agreement with the Obama administration, who did not allow a single member of its team to attend the address by Netanyahu. All Americans must ask themselves the following question- “Why?”

Why is the Obama administration so resolutely opposed to Israel’s Prime Minister addressing our Congress?

Why is it more important for the Obama administration to so lamely and desperately seek such a bad deal with the Iranians- one that would imperil the survival of the world’s lone Jewish state?

Why would the President of the United States skip such an opportunity to sit down with Israel’s Prime Minister and discuss with him what he sees to be the advantages of such an agreement, when he will not even disclose to the American people the reasons he is pursuing this ill-begotten treaty, in the first place?

Is it because the narcissistic president is so consumed with his own legacy that he would wager the very survival of our closest ally in the Middle East just to be able to say, at the end of his presidency, “I got Iran to agree”?

We have seen the folly of such agreements in the past- most notably when Churchill’s predecessor, Neville Chamberlain boasted that he had negotiated “peace for our time” with Adolf Hitler, by wagering away a sovereign Czechoslovakia on Hitler’s promise not to invade eastern Europe- a promise broken when Germany invaded Poland less than a year later, touching off the Second World War. Twenty million lives later, the world learned the lesson of such folly, and why a bad deal is far, far worse than no deal, at all.

Or is it indeed the case that, in the long view of world history, we have forgotten this lesson?

-Drew Nickell, 3 March 2015

© 2015, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Why the GOP must not be succored into the Trap of Negotiation

With all of this talk concerning Republicans who, having recently won control of the Senate and broadening their control of the House, and how they should negotiate with President Obama, I am beginning to see a pattern here- a pattern of self-destruction, being promoted by the usual suspects in the media, based upon the supposed need for moderation on the part of the GOP, as though they should somehow be cowed by President Obama, and the illegal actions he has taken as president. They seemed to be almost psyched by his finaglings- as if Obama was the strongest president since FDR.

History has shown quite the opposite.   For instance, LBJ was far more effective at corralling bi-partisan support for his agenda, and so were his successors, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. All three of these presidents worked within, and not outside, the Constitution of the United States, and for the greater good.

Another problem is the inherent corruption of the Obama administration. Obama’s actions as president, and those on the part of his cabinet and administration are, by metes and bounds, far beyond anything, ANYTHING, that occurred during the Nixon administration- the only, ONLY difference being that Obama has had a complacent media covering for him, as opposed to Nixon having the media bound and determined to bring down his presidency.

This spirit of moderation and advocacy of cooperation that are presently being advocated, if so acted upon, are defeatist in the worst way- in effect having the GOP say, “We know the 2014 election was an anomaly and we know our positions on the issues are wrong, so we will just be placeholders and allow the Democrats to re-attain their rightful majority in 2016.”. This is the unintended effect of that for which these “pundits of moderation” are advocating- a go-along-with, get-along-with, restrained GOP which brought them to defeat with the nominations of Gerald Ford in 1976, Bob Dole in 1996, John McCain in 2008 and Mitt Romney in 2012- all of whom were GOP moderates who went down to defeat with their own respective, all-too-tempered tone. Unlike Obama, who knows that politics is war, what they and the voices of moderation within and outside the GOP advocate, was and is a soft-spoken, well-thought-out, and oh-so-temperate strategy that will only serve to make people question what the difference is between liberal Democrats and moderate Republicans, of which there is absolutely none- and one which will assure a Democratic trifecta in the next election.

In order for negotiation to work, both- not one, but both- sides must be pragmatic, and thereby willing to negotiate on a bilateral basis. Such bilateral negotiations can and do work, to wit:

LBJ effectively negotiated the Civil Rights Act of 1964 with Republicans, led by Everett Dirksen of Illinois. Ronald Reagan effectively negotiated the tax cuts of 1982 with Democrats, led by Dennis DeConcini of Arizona. Bill Clinton, once he lost both houses of Congress, effectively negotiated a balanced budget (in exchange of welfare reform) with Speaker Newt Gingrich in 1997. All three of these presidents were, at day’s end, pragmatists of the first order- hence they were able to negotiate effective governance with members of their respective opposite parties.

Obama, on the other hand, is incapable of negotiation as he is neither a pragmatist, nor is he interested in the “pursuit of the greater good”, as the predecessors I have listed. He is a dogmatic ideologue who can’t even manage to negotiate with the hapless members of his own party, much less the members of the GOP. Our allies abroad don’t trust him to keep his word, our enemies abroad don’t fear his resolve (for there is none to be feared) and he cannot be trusted to keep his word with anyone, save for Valerie Jarrett and Michelle Obama. In essence, caving to Obama and his political operatives will never work, because there is no spirit of “give and take” in Obama- only take, take, take, ad nauseam. No one will ever negotiate anything with Obama, so it is pointless to try.

What Republicans CAN do, on the other hand, is to restrain the president through controlling the all-important purse-strings. For instance, if Obama signs an executive order on immigration- they can withhold funding for its implementation. They can do the same with ObamaCare, which may end up being skewered in the Supreme Court, anyway, due to pending litigation, now in the works. Social issues, such as gay marriage, are facing similar scrutiny in pending litigation, and may end up being decided on a state-by-state basis, which is where it should be decided, anyway. In the end, negotiation and compromise only work if there is bi-lateral cooperation, and Obama has not yet shown any penchant for either- hence such a naïve, and well-meaning approach will not work, not with this president- not ever.

-Drew Nickell, 10 November 2014

© 2014, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Midterms of 2014

With the mid-term elections of 2014 a week away, and control of the United States Senate in play, much has been made about the prospects of a possible shift in the control of that chamber. A shift of six Democrat-held seats to Republicans would mean that Harry Reid, the stubborn and constipative block to all things legislative coming from the House of Representatives, would lose his position as Senate Majority Leader, and thereby transfer his diverticulative functions to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, where the President would rule by veto- as opposed to ruling by fiat, as he has done since being elected in 2008.

A harbinger of more and continued dysfunction in Washington? Admittedly, yes, and yet….

There are other, more far-reaching implications of a shift in the power structure of the United States Senate.

First, the president would no longer be unconstrained in his Chicago-style manipulation of regulatory control, as he has been with regards to the IRS, the Justice Department, the EPA and a host of governmental agencies that have become de facto extensions of his political machine. Republican control of both legislative chambers would necessarily constrain the continued abuse of power by this president and his operatives (Lois Lerner, anyone?)

Second, the Supreme Court would no longer be the inevitable heir to the Obama/Holder system of justice- a system where “equal justice under law” only applies to those in lock-step agreement with Barack Obama and his extra-Constitutional allies on the political left. A Republican Senate would surely keep the President from appointing judicial activists bent on curtailing free speech and tearing asunder the Bill of Rights that have served this country quite well for more than two centuries.

Lastly, a chastened Obama, if such a thing is indeed possible with regards to “His Arrogance”, would think twice before continuing his quest to “fundamentally transform the United States of America” a transformation that was neither needed, desired nor sought by a majority of Americans who were snookered by a complicit media in 2008- a media who, despite obvious political bias leaning left, really only wanted to harvest the news value associated with electing the first African-American to the nation’s highest office. This complicit attitude on the part of the media continued in 2012 (Remember Candy Crowley’s performance as …ahem…moderator…ahem in the decisive debate?) By the way, look for this same media to be “all in” for Hillary in 2016, who will no doubt drool at the prospect of electing the first woman to this same office.)

It never ceases to amaze me how many times Democrats will play the “let’s not play partisan politics” card whenever they find themselves in the unenviable position of having to defend the indefensible actions of their own party’s leadership. Here in Virginia, we hear the same old B.S. from Senator Mark Warner (D-VA) that our next-door neighbors to the south hear from Kay Hagan(D-NC): “that it’s time to reach across the aisle” despite the fact that both of these senators have voted lock-step with the President and Majority Leader Harry Reid 99% of the time. Surely, those who are in other states where incumbent Democrats are facing re-election are hearing the very same B.S. as we in the Old Dominion and Tar Heel states are hearing (note: PLEASE don’t believe a word of it.).

Meanwhile to our immediate north, there are stories that polling machines in divergent parts of Maryland are automatically changing Republican- cast ballots to Democrats in what officials are laughably blaming on “calibration issues”, which means that playoff losses by the Orioles and divisional losses by the Ravens aren’t the only thing plaguing voters in the Old Line state. This also begs the question “How is it that such machine malfunctions ALWAYS tend to favor Democratic candidates?” Answer?- the long line and standing tradition of Democratic political corruption going back to the days of Mayor Daley in Chicago and William Marcy Tweed (Tammany Hall) in New York City.

But, then again, that’s politics…

-Drew Nickell, 28 October 2014

© 2015, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Magna Carta Revisited

This coming June 15^th will mark the eight hundredth anniversary of what was to become the first attempt by the English to evoke the concept of equal justice under law. On the fields and plains of Runnymede, near Windsor, England, Magna Carta came into being when the Archbishop of Canterbury attempted to make peace with the vastly unpopular King John, and a small group of rebel barons, who opposed the monarch for what they saw as an infringement of their rights. It also marked the first attempt to subject the English crown to English law. Though later nullified by Pope Innocent III, it was reinstated by King John’s heir, Henry III, the following year and its eventual progeny was the Constitution of the United States, which assured the young nation that no man nor woman was above the law- no one.

It is indeed ironic that, eight hundred years later, we are still struggling with the concept of who is, and who isn’t, subject to the laws of the United States. It seems that certain politicians of a certain political party manage to skate above the law, time and time again.

In the summer of our youth, twice-elected President Richard Nixon was forced to resign his office, because he lied about having knowledge, AFTER THE FACT, of the Watergate break-in. It is a matter of historical record that a young lawyer investigating the Nixon Administration for the Watergate Select Committee was summarily discharged from her duties, due to ethics violations on her own part. Her name? …Hillary Rodham Clinton- the same Hillary Rodham Clinton who later became the First Lady of Arkansas, the First Lady of the United States, a Senator from New York, and, under President Barack Obama, Secretary of State.

Hillary Rodham Clinton, and her husband, the former President William Jefferson Clinton, have amassed such a dubious record of achievement, and such a lengthy list of crimes and ethical violations as to make William Marcy Tweed of Tammany Hall , President Warren Harding of the Teapot Dome Scandal and Richard Milhous Nixon look like comparative angels…and yet, they have managed to effectively lie and dance their way out of legal jeopardy through means that have, at times, even become violent, but nevertheless very much aided and abetted by a complicit mainstream media. President Barack Obama, no REAL friend of the Clintons by the way, has taken a page from their own playbook, and has managed to remain in office, despite having presided over, far and away, the most corrupt and criminal presidential administration in U.S. History. Obama has managed to do this through threats, intimidation, use of governmental agencies like the IRS and the Justice Department, again with the unabridged assistance from an all-admiring mainstream media. His administration’s list of scandals, some of which also touch the Clintons, is indeed mind boggling- and yet….there he sits.

The list of crimes perpetrated by both the Clintons and the Obamas have, and would, fill volumes but somehow they manage to escape intact, due largely to the political party of which they are a part- had they been Republicans they would have summarily been impeached and imprisoned for high crimes and misdemeanors, but instead, they manage to benefit from a double standard that sows the seeds of our own undoing, and one that places the concepts of representative government, individual liberty, constitutional freedom and equal justice under law in grave peril.

So it comes down to one thing…do we as a nation, give a damn?

-Drew Nickell, 11 March 2015

© 2015, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Killing the Beast

Revelations that the IRS has supposedly lost Lois Lerner’s e-mails, and that her hard drive allegedly crashed and then was disposed of (along with seven others who were also subject to Congressional inquiry), not to mention that these instances occurred one year before Congress was notified last week, will prove to be the smoking gun of corruption that is the sine qua non of the Obama presidency- far and away the most corrupt administration in US History. Obama succeeded where Nixon failed, in using the IRS to target his political opponents (remember the second article of Nixon’s impeachment, which he avoided by way of resigning his office, accused his administration of attempting to use the IRS in this manner, which the IRS rebuffed at the time) and it is clear that Lois Lerner notified other agencies outside the Treasury Department of confidential taxpayer information which launched separate inquisitions by OSHA, the FBI and others on private citizens….and this much is what we know so far…..

The time has come for Congress, vis-a-vis Speaker John Boehner, to appoint a special select committee on IRS abuse and a Special Prosecutor to subpoena her and others to testify regarding these abuses. That much is certain.

Having said this, and very much aside this particular scandal, the time has come for the complete elimination of the Federal Income Tax as we know it, to abolish the Internal Revenue Service, completely, and effectively repeal the 16^th Amendment to the United States Constitution. This will require, in order:

1. A Bill from the Republican-led House of Representatives to abolish the Internal Revenue Service in the Spring of 2015
2. A Republican-controlled Senate to approve the bill and send it to the President for signature on January 20, 2017
3. A Republican President to sign the bill on January 21, 2017

The Federal Income Tax Code, comprising all of 9,831 SECTIONS has become so inherently corrupt, so onerous, and so selective in its power to tax some and exempt others that the only real beneficiaries of these complex regulations are CPAs, tax attorneys and employees of the Internal Revenue Service, along with the lobbyists who fund the campaigns of politicians, to add to it every year.

This must end.

Since it is universally accepted that this country prefers to have a progressive tax system, where by the affluent pay more taxes than either the middle class who pay a substantial part of their income in taxes, and the poor who pay no income taxes, there is a very simple way to fund the federal government and that is to replace – not augment, but REPLACE the Federal Income Tax with a Consumption Tax (i.e. Sales Tax) on all products and services purchased. Since wealthy people spend more than middle class and the poor, taxing all consumption would necessarily mean that the rich would continue to pay more taxes because they spend more money…and the same would apply to businesses, as well. Hence, no more complicated tax code…… No more exemptions on anything….. No more write-offs… No more corruption and, by God, no more abuse by government employees at the direction of their President to use their power to harass political opponents.

Now it is clearly understood that such a measure would meet the ire of the CPA Lobby, the Tax Attorneys Lobby, and all such lobbyists who make their living by further complicating an already unworkable tax system. Let these lobbyists partner with their Democratic allies in the House and Senate to try and defeat this initiative, in the wake of the IRS Abuses taking place.

And PLEASE let the Republican Party- the same Republican Party that brought about the abolition of slavery 150 years ago- have the wisdom and the courage to say “no” to these special interests and become the Republican Party who will abolish the 16^th Amendment to the Constitution and scrap the tax code in its beastly entirety. Nothing else would assure their winning the US Senate in 2014, and the White House in 2016, more (what’s in it for them). Nothing else would jumpstart the economy more (what’s in it for us, with larger paychecks in the form of take-home pay). Nothing else would ensure that the Obama IRS abuses never ever happen again.

-Drew Nickell 23 June 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Israel

First, please consider the following three passages, in the context of today:

“And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will make Jerusalem a stone of burden for all the peoples; all that burden themselves with it shall be sore wounded; and all the nations of the earth shall be gathered together against it.” -Zechariah 12:3

“For behold, in those days and at that time, when I restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem, I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat. And I will enter into judgment with them there, on behalf of my people and my heritage Israel, because they have scattered them among the nations and have divided up my land” – Joel 3: 1-2

“See the fig tree, and all the trees. When they are already budding, you see it and know by your own selves that the summer is already near. Even so you also, when you see these things happening, know that the Kingdom of God is near. Most certainly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all things are accomplished. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will by no means pass away.”— Luke 21:29-33

The nation of Israel, with an area smaller than that of New Jersey, and a population less than that of Virginia, figures prominently in both the Old and New Testaments- particularly when it comes to Biblical eschatology. All of the Hebrew prophets, most all of the New Testament prophecies and, according to three of the gospels, Jesus himself, spoke of Israel in the last days. The first citation above refers to the nations of the earth coming against Israel, the second regards God’s judgment against these nations, and the third refers to Israel’s rebirth in 1948, indicating that the generation who was alive at that time to witness Israeli statehood, would not pass away, until all of these things had been consummated.

Sixty-six years later, what do we see? Israel, the sole democracy in the Middle East, surrounded on three sides by nations committed to its destruction, and who stands beside Israel? No one, not even the United States under its present regime, supports Israel’s right to defend itself against aggression from without. Israel, far and away, the only middle eastern country that truly has freedom of religion, representative democracy and embraces the concept of tolerance- a concept unheard of in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Egypt, Iraq (under ISIS), Syria and in the West Bank and Gaza strip, whose Palestinian authorities (Hamas) is unwilling to even acknowledge Israel’s very right to exist, and uses its own civilian women and children as human shields to protect the rockets that are used to bombard Israel.

Who gets the condemnation? Israel- from the United Nations, from the major media, and even our President and Secretary of State, who once again play the “Moral Equivalency” card, saying that peace must be attained by both sides, when knowing full well that one of those sides will not even acknowledge the other’s right to exist, and is wholly determined to annihilate the Jewish people.

While conservatives in the United States tend to back Israel and its efforts to survive aggression from all sides, liberals here, predictably, back the Palestinians and others who are dedicated to its destruction- liberals who pretend to be tolerant- except when it comes to Christianity anywhere and Judaism everywhere. Both of these two religions are under assault all over the Islamic world, but to even mention this is to bring on charges of Islamophobia- when, in fact, Islam is the most intolerant of the world’s monotheistic religions, which underscores liberal hypocrisy, yet again.

How much land will Israel have to cede to its enemies, once again, in pursuit of peace? Answer – “all of it”, say the Palestinians, who ironically are shunned even by their own Arab neighbors. Even then, if all of Israel were given to the Palestinians, the Jewish people of Israel would not have peace, but would instead have no homeland in which to exist. So, why should Israel cede a single acre to those bent on their destruction ? Why shouldn’t they invade the Gaza strip in order to destroy the tunnels with which Hamas smuggles its missiles and weaponry into Israel, to wreak havoc and destruction on Israeli civilians ?

More importantly, why should the nations of the world, including the United States under its current regime, condemn Israel for being committed to its own survival ? With anti-Semitism exploding all over Europe, once again, and the world aligning itself with those who seek the destruction of Israel, it seems that we are living out the script in a play written thousands of years ago- a play whose final act may only serve to bring about our own demise.

-Drew Nickell, 23 July 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Immigration Reform and Congress

Much has been made about the effect that his stance on Immigration Reform had on Eric Cantor’s failed primary bid, and the media’s drumbeat on how this issue is splitting the Republican Party in half. Wishful thinking on their (the media’s) part, but that alone is not splitting the Republican Party, nor does it mean that Democrats will somehow prevail in November. Immigration reform is, at best, a tactical diversion on the part of politicos to dodge the central issue of this fall’s campaign- namely a referendum on the Obama Administration and how Congress will address the growing scandals within that administration, going forward.

Presently, the investigations into scandals ranging from IRS to Benghazi to VA to Fast and Furious to the Bergdahl Exchange (and the list grows) can be summed up into four parts:

1. House Committees investigate these scandals with Republican members of the committees asking questions, as their Democratic counterparts attempt to de-legitimize these investigations by inserting partisan counterstrikes on the questioners and providing diversionary cover for the Administration.

2. Administration officials appear before these committees, and answer with the following strategies, in consecutive order:

a) I don’t recall
b) We are investigating and will get back to you
c) It will take a long time to turn over the documents (which, when turned   over prove to be largely redacted or substantially incomplete)
d) Indicate that they have already answered the questions
e) Label the investigation as phony scandal or partisan witch hunt

3. The Attorney General, Eric Holder, refuses to appoint a Special Prosecutor

4. The Senate, under the auspices of its Majority Leader, refuses to investigate, period.

Taken alone, it could be argued that ANY one of these scandals involve more serious crimes, loss of life, and Constitutional breach, than Watergate or Iran Contra or the Impeachment of President Clinton. Taken together, it can be equally argued that we are faced with corruption and lawlessness not seen in any administration in US history.

While his media allies hope, beyond hope, that Democrats retain control of the Senate, President Obama continues to slowly unravel the fabric of our country, here at home, across our borders, and around the world. His latest attempt to import juvenile illegals across our borders, and thus creating a humanitarian crisis unknown in the United States since the days of Native American relocation in the 18th and 19th centuries, in an attempt to force upon the American people, provisions of the Dream Act which have not been legislated or adjudicated- once again flaunting the Constitution and diverting attention away from the mounting scandals that grow with every week.

To be clear there is not a single solitary Republican in the House or the Senate that is, or ever was, “anti-Immigration”.

Having said this, there must be a distinction made between LEGAL and ILLEGAL immigration, the latter of which has many opponents within and outside Capitol Hill. This is where the real debate lies on immigration reform but, thanks to the Democratic Party, the Obama Administration, the enabling lapdogs within the mainstream media, and what we’ll call the “Go-along, Get-along establishment GOP”, most Americans will never know this distinction- which suits Obama and his allies just fine.

–Drew Nickell, 12 June 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Hillary

Last night, having watched Hillary Clinton’s interview with Bret Baier and Greta Van Susteren on Fox News, I thought a lot about what it could be that is driving support for her candidacy. To be charitable, I found Mrs. Clinton’s demeanor to be glib- that, to the extent she of her ability, she did her level best to be charming. There is no doubt that she is articulate, as well.

Yet, I was also shocked to see that, after all of these many months, she is STILL trying to force feed us into accepting an entirely false narrative that the September 2012 attacks on the US consulate in Benghazi were (now, she says, “in part”) due to a YouTube video about Mohammed, that Muslims found offensive. The very next morning following the attack, the president of Libya insisted that the attack had nothing, NOTHING to do with a video that was not even available to Libyans, at that time. Yet, the White House kept pushing that same false narrative for weeks, when they knew all along that it was nothing more than an attempt to deceive Americans, designed to lay credence to the fiction that Al Qaida “was on the run” and that Obama’s foreign policy was a success when, in fact, the opposite was true.

Since that time it has been discovered that, on the very night of the attack, political operatives in the White House frantically started to search the internet trying to find anything, ANYTHING on which they could lay blame for the attack, in an attempt to provide cover for the President and his campaign narrative. Never mind the fact that the Ambassador to Libya, Chris Stevens, repeatedly pleaded with the State Department to provide more security, and was repeatedly turned down by a State Department being run by Hillary Clinton. Amazingly, Hillary Clinton said, in one sentence, that she is responsible, but only to the extent that she feels the pain of their loss, and nothing more. Then, she had the audacity last night to once again plug the false narrative of a video as being partially responsible for the attack. Talk about delusional narcissism !

There can only be three explanations for her performance-

1. She is suffering from complete dementia (the least likely)
2. She is completely devoid of even a shred of honesty (more likely)
3. She will say anything, ANYTHING, to fend off any criticism, whatsoever, and ethics be damned in the process (most likely)

Is this what we want in our next President? Haven’t we, as a nation, had our nauseous fill of narcissistic and self-serving demagogy that is so very present in the current administration? More importantly, can’t even the most partisan and sycophantic supporters of the Clintons see through her deceptions, and own up to the fact that Hillary Clinton is most definitely not what the country needs in a successor to Obama?

I leave the answers to these questions to those who would support her candidacy, with a respectful request to explain just why they would continue to support her, aside from the fact that she is a woman, and aside from the fact that she is a Democrat. I suspect that many of these same supporters also supported Barack Obama, principally because he is African-American and also a Democrat.

A REAL president needs to be much more than a member of a sex or a race, or even a member of a political party. He/she needs to be a leader who believes in the things that sets our country apart (American Exceptionalism), is willing to defend the values of freedom and individual liberty wherever they may be threatened, and defend and uphold the Constitution, in its entirety. When we elect officials based solely on their own demographics, and not on these values, we endanger our country and the world in which we live.

Barack Obama is not such a President, and Hillary Rodham Clinton most certainly would not be, either.

-Drew Nickell, 18 June 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Ferguson

It’s an all-too-familiar story, and one we have heard many, many times since (at least) April of 1992. The legal process is followed in strict accordance with established standards of jurisprudence, a white officer(s) is exonerated of alleged crimes in the performance of duty, and the result is met with disproportionate rage, expressed in violent behavior by disenchanted blacks and others taking advantage of a specific situation, far removed from their own respective existence.

Four policemen, three of whom were white (along with one Hispanic), are acquitted in Los Angeles, of assault and excessive force in the beating of an intoxicated black driver who led police on a dangerous, high-speed chase. Rodney King survived the attack, but fifty-three people were killed and 2,000 people were injured in the riots that followed. Approximately 1,100 buildings were destroyed. 3,600 fires were lit, and countless businesses were looted- many of which were owned by businessmen of Korean and other Asian minorities, who seemed to be particularly targeted.

Fast forward twenty-two years. In Ferguson, Missouri, part of the greater St. Louis metropolis, an 18-year-old black man is shot by a white police officer six times. Supposed eye-witness accounts initially allege he was shot in the back, despite undeniable forensic evidence to the contrary. All hell breaks loose in Ferguson, and other places, immediately following the shooting. Two people are shot, others injured, and a bacchanalia of looting and vandalism takes place, destroying businesses and livelihoods, as a result. These riots, encouraged by well-practiced race-baiters like presidential advisor Al Sharpton, and perpetrated by malcontents in the form of the New Black Panther Party and the Revolutionary Communist Party USA, are particularly and precisely engineered to wreak havoc by organized groups who have absolutely no connection to the officer, Darren Wilson, nor to Michael Brown, the man who was shot and killed.

In strict accordance with Missouri law, a grand jury, comprising of nine whites and three blacks, spends three months painstakingly reviewing all evidence and eyewitness testimony in order to determine whether criminal charges be filed against the officer. The county’s District Attorney, spends twenty-five minutes on live television, explaining in copious detail the process, the findings and, ultimately, the determination by the grand jury, that no charges of criminal conduct would be filed against Officer Wilson….and what happens?

Demonstrations take place across major cities in the United States showing, in some cases, professionally pre-printed signs and well-organized gatherings that required much planning, and little regard, for the rule of law. Worse, Ferguson again erupts in violence, vandalism, looting and destructions of lives, livelihoods and property. Shots are fired, automobiles are set afire, and stores are looted by individuals taking sheer and perverse advantage of the discordant disarray that ensues.

Meanwhile, in Washington DC, a president who was purportedly elected to be “a uniter and not a divider” pulls out the moral equivalency card once again- equating the street rage with law enforcement, as though both are on the same altruistic level of moral authority. This same president, whose Attorney General, Eric Holder has been extremely and undeniably selective in the pursuit of cases where race is involved, ignoring cases where whites are victimized and exploiting cases where blacks are victimized, has done nothing but fan the flames of racial discord in this country- thus taking us back to a regrettable time where racial hatred was more the norm and less the exception. Once again, this country is being ripped apart because of certain, highly placed individuals who make their living off of the misfortune of others. But don’t tell this to the miscreants in Ferguson who broke into area liquor stores and availed themselves of free spirits- that would be racist, right?… Think about it… For the sake of our country and our world, for God’s sake, just think about it….

Oh, and Happy Thanksgiving.

-Drew Nickell, 25 November 2014

Ferguson (part II)

One of the missing elements in all of the hubris about what has taken place in Ferguson, Missouri is the cause- the root cause- of the death of Michael Brown, which prompted all of the protests, all of the violence, all of the looting, all of the unrest and, most recently, the shooting of two police officers there, and the shooting of police officers, elsewhere, as well.

There is no doubt that the likes of Al Sharpton- emboldened by his friends at the Justice Department, outgoing Attorney General Eric Holder, and the White House, President Barack Obama, incinerated a small fire into a conflagration. For their part, Holder and Obama have not helped ameliorate the all-too-incendiary atmosphere when it comes to Ferguson. In fact, they have exacerbated the situation and, through their grandstanding and postulations, and have nationalized an atmosphere of mistrust, resentment and tension. It is not a stretch to suggest that President Barack Obama- ironically, the first African-American to be elected President of the United States, has set race relations back more than fifty years- as if the days of Selma and of Montgomery and of dozens of towns across the South, and elsewhere, have been time-warped to 1964 when racial upheaval found its boiling point in the midst of a decade which saw multiple boiling points.

But even beyond all of that, the one thing that has not been discussed- the one element that has not been mentioned is the young man whose death proved to be the spark of this unrest- Michael Brown. As much as liberals would like to blame the white man, blame the cops, blame a “racist society” that placed him into a situation where he lost his life, the fault lies not elsewhere but rather in the way he was evidently raised, by a mother, one Leslie McSpadden, who had this to say, concerning the shooting of two policemen this week:

“F*** THEM 2 COPS..DON’T GOT NO SYMPATHY FOR THEM OR THEY FAMILIES…Ain’t no FUN when the Rabbit got the GUN.”

“If my FAM would-a got JUSTICE in August maybe those two comps wouldn’t have got shot LAST NIGHT…”

As much as human nature would drive us to otherwise sympathize with a mother who has lost her son, when this is the kind of thing she says, in writing and on Facebook, the true cause of Michael Brown’s death is really an environment which encourages an attitude of hip-hop, gang-bang, shoplifting “get even with whitey” and “it’s all ‘the man’s’ fault” attitude that is all too pervasive in America, today.

So all we can offer to those who want to take to the streets and cause unrest, is “clean up your own house and stop blaming others for your own shortcomings”

Until that happens, there will be more Michael Browns and more dead cops, and the problem will be repeated, over and over and over, again. What’s worse, a society that was once envisioned by Martin Luther King, Jr, will go down in flames, as a result.

-Drew Nickell, 13 March 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Rise and Fall of Eric Cantor-

The defeat of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in Virginia’s Republican Primary, at the hands of a relatively unknown Dave Brat, should serve as a wakeup call to all of the incumbent Republicans, in both Houses of Congress. Rep. Cantor came into office with the promise of conservative aspirations and had the strong backing of conservatives within his district. Yet, with each year, his conservative credentials started to fade in the wake of, presumably, his own ambitions to become a party leader, and this proved to be his eventual downfall.

What the so-called “GOP establishment” has long failed to realize, is the proper role of an opposition party. When Republicans try to moderate their message, they seem more and more like Democrats wearing Republican clothes, which is NOT why they were elected in the first place. The largely liberal media has shoved a false narrative down the throats of the Republican electorate: that they can only win by appearing moderate. This premise has repeatedly failed in the relatively-recent nominations of moderate Republicans to national office- Gerald Ford in 1976, George H. W. Bush in 1992, Bob Dole in 1996, John McCain in 2008 and Mitt Romney in 2012- all of whom lost in the general election. The only time that Republicans have won this election, since the 1970s, is when they have nominated true, unapologetic conservatives- Ronald Reagan in 1980 and 1984, and George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004.

If the Republican Party even hopes to gain the White House in 2016, they had better learn the lessons repeatedly taught to them and, instead, nominate true conservatives, simply because their base of support is NOT looking to elect those individuals who want to work with Democrats who, in turn, smugly laugh behind their backs and retain their power in the wake of such folly. The conservative electorate wants to elect those who will bring about substantive and lasting change- not by the moderation of a John Boehner or an Eric Cantor or a John McCain, but rather by the steadfast determination of conservative candidates who will not allow the stench of Washington to dilute their mission- and that mission is to undo more than sixty years of governmental largesse and return this country to the roots of its success- those being self-sufficiency, independence, and the pursuit of excellence in all things with determined and righteous indignation.

–Drew Nickell, 11 June 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Election 2014 and the Decline of the Democratic Party

While the final results of the 2014 Election are still yet to be determined, there is still one clear message that is inescapable- The Democratic Party is in decline and this is the direct result of, and attributable to, their own party’s pathetic leadership- President Barack Obama, Senator Harry Reid, Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi and DNC Chairman Debbie Wasserman Schultz. These four individuals have brought asunder their own party- albeit without much, if any, help from their Republican opponents.

In the three years since the midterm elections of 2010, the Democrats have lost (and the Republicans have thereby gained) a total of eleven seats in the United States Senate, fifty-five seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, and a net total of two gubernatorial offices- including Democratic bastions of Arkansas, Illinois, Maryland and Massachusetts, all of which elected Republican governors in 2014. In fact, Republicans were able to win eight of the nine contested gubernatorial elections in 2014, where they were already incumbent.

These results, when considered in the long view, are symptomatic of a Democrat party in decline, and bereft of fresh ideas- ideas which can benefit the citizenry which politicians are elected to serve. The Democrat’s strategy of dividing people along race, gender, and socio-economic strata has, at long last, failed miserably- and all indications are that people have said “enough is enough”. Enough of media manipulation, false polling, rigged elections, election fraud and faulty “calibration issues”, all of which always tends to favor Democrats.

Now, it is the Republicans who have their work cut out for them heading into the 2016 elections. The GOP has made great strides in attracting Hispanic, African American and female candidates who can win elections, across the country- even in former Confederate states like South Carolina, in blue collar states like West Virginia, and in western states like Utah. They must continue these trends if they wish to expand their voting demographic.

The GOP must discontinue the dubious strategy of reaching across the aisle to recalcitrant Democrats who have absolutely no intention of compromising in any way shape or form. This strategy of appeasement, which goes back to the late Ronald Reagan and Thomas P. “Tip” O’Neill, has always come back to bite Republicans in their collective keisters, and they have lost congressional, senatorial and even presidential elections, ad nauseam, by trying to cooperate with opponents bent on their destruction.

In short, for the next two years, Republicans must learn how to act like a party of opposition (to the president) and allow the arrogant and intransigent Barack Obama to paint himself into his own corner. Those of you who think that the president will reach across to Republicans in the spirit of cooperation, to effect beneficial governance are still slumbering in the dreamland that started with the concept of Barack Obama becoming a “uniter”, rather than the divider he has proved himself to be throughout his presidency.

Let the Democrats continue their politics of division, their supposed and fallacious “war on women” strategies, and their demagogy so that Republicans can make a clean sweep of it in 2016 and restore this once-great nation to its rightful position of pre-eminence in a world otherwise bent on ensuring our demise. Then, all of us can abide in the promise of that “shining city on a hill” that we were meant to be, rather than the “source of the world’s ills” as Obama, and his pathetic partisans have suggested we are, instead.

-Drew Nickell, 5 November 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Disinformation

A very close friend of mine, whose name, ethnicity, sexual persuasion, religion and gender will not be disclosed, is admittedly the polar opposite of me concerning all things political. A lifelong, committed liberal Democrat who is in lock-step agreement with all things left, this friend honestly believes:

• Hillary Clinton genuinely cares about the less fortunate
• Hillary Clinton is “one of us” whose life mission is to make our lives better, and has dedicated her life’s work to achieve these ends
• Barack Obama improved the United States’ reputation and standing in the world, and our relationships with foreign countries, when in 2008, he went around the world apologizing for all of the transgressions of George W. Bush, and that he deserved the Nobel Prize for doing so.
• That Michelle Obama is the most beautiful and graceful first lady who ever occupied the White House, and has done more for improving the lives of Americans than anyone else who has ever been first lady
• That the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, will ensure that all people will have unfettered access to health care, which should be an absolute right guaranteed by our government
• That anyone who is a member of the Tea Party should be silenced
• That the only bias in the news media is Fox News
• That George W. Bush, despite having both an BA in History from Yale and an MBA from Harvard, gained both degrees by having his father bribe both of these Ivy League universities and is, in fact, a demented individual with a sub-par IQ
• That anyone who favors any Republican running for office hates women, minorities and children
• That anyone who is a member of the NRA, or who stands for the preservation of the 2^nd Amendment, wants children to have unfettered access to automatic assault rifles
• That Richard M. Nixon, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney should have been sentenced to capital punishment for crimes against humanity

I could go on with a list of what my friend believes to be absolutely true, but you get the picture…this person has bought into each and every lie that has been thrust upon him/her by the likes of MSNBC, the major networks, the Democratic National Committee, Joy Behar, Rosie O’Donnell, Bill Maher, Stephen Colbert, Al Sharpton and Ben Affleck. All of which brings about the question of “Why?”

Why would this person, who is highly successful in their career, and who has benefitted from a good education, believe all of this to the extent that he/she does?

Answer- Propaganda.

History tells us that when propaganda is repeatedly thrust upon the otherwise uninformed- you know, the type that say they are not interested in politics- that eventually, it becomes an orthodoxy that cannot be questioned. The most notorious example of this fact is Adolph Hitler, whose Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels manipulated German newspapers, magazines, film-makers, and radio to spew Nazi lies to an extent unforeseen before- thus giving credence to the passage in Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” that “people will believe the big lie before they will believe the small one”.

The only difference between Germany in the 1930s, and America, today, is the message being proselytized- the means are precisely the same. The establishment news media, Hollywood, network television, newsprint and the entertainment industry were, and are, very much “in the tank” for Obama and will just as assuredly be “in the tank” for Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Warren, or anyone else who is the Democratic nominee in 2016. Based upon that fact alone, the GOP would have to nominate the very reincarnation of Ronald Reagan, in order to thwart such a collective onslaught of left-wing co-conspirators and thereby have any chance at actually being elected.

And in the face of such an onslaught of absolute disinformation, I can safely assume that my very close friend will not be swayed, otherwise, and it is this very fact that somehow bothers me, and should bother all of you, to no end.

-Drew Nickell, 9 October 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Demagoguery

It’s a story that has become all-too-familiar, and has its roots going all the way back to the 1964 Presidential Election, when incumbent Democrat Lyndon Johnson was running against Republican Barry Goldwater. Johnson, who had succeeded his predecessor when John F. Kennedy was assassinated the preceding November, really had this election “in the bag”. However, Johnson being Johnson would leave nothing to chance, and chose instead to paint Goldwater into a corner with an extremist brush. Those who are a certain age remember well the television advertisement of a little girl, picking daisies, chanting a familiar rhyme only to be interrupted by a juxtaposed video of a nuclear detonation- suggesting that Goldwater and the Republicans were war mongers who would bring about a nuclear apocalypse if elected, and so began the dubious tradition of Democratic candidates stooping to absolute lows in the quest for electoral victory.

Throughout the seventies and beyond, Democrats dined on the dish of demagoguery with absolutely no scruples or ethics in their quest to lie, cheat, and thereby, steal elections. We can remember 1980 when Jimmy Carter, whose presidency was the epitome of well-meaning incompetence, played the extremist card against Ronald Reagan- suggesting that the former two-term California governor was an amiable dunce and a war monger- neither of which were even close to being factual, as Reagan’s personal diaries have otherwise proved he was erudite, intellectual and quite cerebral in every major decision he made as president. So goes the career of the under-estimated, as Reagan pounded Jimmy Carter in both the popular and electoral balloting.

Fast forward to 2012 when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, while trying to assist Barack Obama’s re-election bid, outrageously and slanderously used his office and in-chamber senate immunity to falsely accuse Republican nominee Mitt Romney of paying no income tax for the preceding dozen years- an absolute and unequivocal lie, perpetuated by an abiding and complicit mainstream media. Romney, by any measure, was and is an honorable man, who nevertheless had to prove that he had in fact paid all of his taxes- and quite a lot, actually. Yet, the damage was done, and Reid knew it. When last week, he and the White House showed absolutely no remorse for the lie that they had perpetuated (Reid even boasted, “Romney lost, didn’t he?” with a smile on his face) in the pursuit of victory, it revealed to the nation a sickening and dastardly ethos that Democrats will do anything, say anything, truth-be-damned, that winning elections, as opposed to the noblesse oblige of public service and love of country, is what they are all about, which means Hillary Clinton is well-placed and supremely suited to carry the soiled banner of the party she represents, since her own ethical and legal lapses are well-documented and increasingly obvious.

Meanwhile, the all-too-compliant major media, in conjunction with the loony liberals of leftist leprosy are presently ginning up controversy about Indiana’s version of the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act ( a federal law signed by President Clinton) by suggesting that it amounts to wanton discrimination against the LGBT community when, in fact, it does not. Republican Governors Pence and Hutchinson from Indiana and Arkansas, respectively, have been cowed into amending and curtailing this legislation which exists in twenty-seven other states, because Republicans know full well that to do otherwise invites the narrative that they are nothing but extremist, bible-thumping bigots. The mass media rubber-stamps this narrative as absolute fact and a lazy and ill-informed electorate buys into the lie, just as they did in 1964 when they feared nuclear annihilation from a Goldwater presidency.

It will not matter who is the eventual Republican nominee, because whoever it is, will thus be labeled as an extremist- regardless of his positions on the issues of today. This is what the left does, all too well, but after all, they win, don’t they?

God help us, and a Happy Easter to all.

-Drew Nickell, 2 April 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Being Cool

For those of us who have attained a certain age, we well remember the definitive example of being cool. For my contemporaries in the mid-1970s, it was a television character ironically offered as a “greaser” from the late 1950s, named Arthur Fonzarelli, expertly portrayed by Henry Winkler. “The Fonz” as he was popularly known, was an Italian-American, leather-jacketed motorcyclist- quite ironic, considering that Henry Winkler, in real life, was a diminutive Jewish boy who, outside of his role as “the Fonz” was a soft-spoken, sensitive actor boasting a Master of Fine Arts from Yale. Conversely, the epitome of “cool” in the actual decade in which “Happy Days” was situated was another actor, James Dean, who made but three movies prior to his death in a 1955 automobile accident.

There were other examples of “cool” well outside of the acting profession. In sports, it was Johnny Unitas- the Baltimore Colts’ quarterback with ice water running in his veins, facing the eye of the storm in the 1958 NFL Championship leading his team down the field to put the Colts in “sudden death” overtime, which eventually the Colts won against the New York Giants, on another classic Unitas drive downfield. The Beatles redefined cool in the 1960s, dethroning popular music’s previous king of cool, Elvis Presley, who had taken that title from Frank Sinatra a decade before.

Politically, it was John F. Kennedy- not only cool in bearing and appearance, but in substance, as best substantiated in how his administration handled the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, thus averting what might have become an unthinkable nuclear war with the Soviet Union. Comically and pathetically, Richard Nixon tried to be cool, appearing on “Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In”, delivering the show’s tag line in question form: “Sock it to ME?” It didn’t work and history would show that, in his handling of the Watergate scandal, he socked it to himself and ended up resigning the presidency. Jimmy Carter tried to portray being cool, with a longer hairstyle evocative of the late 1970s, and walking from the Capitol to the White House with his daughter by his side following his own inauguration. His all-too-cool approach to the Iranian Hostage crisis of 1979 led to his downfall, however, when Americans realized that being cool without substance leads one to assume reckless detachment and incompetence. Bill Clinton revived the concept of a cool president, playing his saxophone wearing Ray Ban sunglasses, answering hip questions about his preference in underwear (“boxers or briefs”), which Monica Lewinsky came to know all about, first hand, and he was impeached for perjury and obstruction of justice, by playing it too cool in testimony in federal court…so much for being cool…

It has oft been said that much of the young voters’ attraction to Barack Obama is based upon his being cool. There is no doubt that Obama plays the cool front quite well- bounding up staircases in a jaunty jog, offering fist- and chest-bumps with much aplomb, and turning on the hip-hop rhetorical inflection, at will, whenever addressing young voters and ethnic supporters.

Substantively, there is nothing wrong with his playing the “cool card”, up to a point, that is, and now it appears that the President has reached and passed that point- a point of diminishing returns. A recent poll of voters, undertaken across the country, by CNN, has shown that a 53% majority of voters, given the chance to do it over again, say they would have voted for Mitt Romney, instead, by a landslide margin of nine percentage points- the equivalent of an electoral “buyers’ remorse”, if there ever was such a thing.

What does this all mean? It means that it’s okay to play it cool, if you have substance to back it up. However, given the president’s complete lack of leadership on a wide variety of fronts, his coolness comes across as detached aloofness- so symbolic of the man who worked so hard to attain the trappings of office, only to let them slip away in the apparent lack of interest in anything presidential, except raising funds for his Democratic Party allies. While virtually and substantively ignoring domestic and international flashpoints too numerous to count, Barack Obama has overplayed the cool card to the extent that, politically –speaking, he has now left himself out in the cold, and in so doing, created a vacuum of leadership, here at home, and around the world.

-Drew Nickell, 28 July 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

At What Price Obama ?

In the past few weeks, we have heard President Barack Obama tell us the following:

• That we as Americans should avoid getting on our high horse about ISIL, due to similar occurrences under Jim Crow and the crusades;
• That we should refrain from connecting their religious beliefs with ISIL because doing so constitutes a lie, despite the fact that everything they do is in the name of Allah;
• That the shooting of five Jews in Paris at a Kosher Delicatessen was just a random act of violence that had nothing to do with the victim’s nationality or creed;
• That it is the duty of all Americans to defend Islam whenever it is slandered (conveniently omitting Judaism or Christianity);
• The we, as a nation, are not a Judeo-Christian nation, but rather one whose greatness originates with Islam, going back to our nation’s founding;
• That we need to be more understanding of the legitimate grievances of Muslims, here at home and around the world- (again, conveniently omitting such grievances on the part of Christians and Jews);
• That we need to put more treasure into countries where ISIL is gaining power, so that an enhanced standard of living and increased job opportunities will dissuade young Muslims from joining ISIL and becoming radicalized;
• That the beheadings of Coptic Christians in Libya by ISIS terrorists was an act perpetrated by bad people, having nothing to do or say about the religion of either the perpetrators or the victims;
• That a three-day White House symposium on extremism, which omitted both military assets and representatives of the Christian and Jewish religions, but replete with Muslims both “moderate” and radical, including one man who blamed 9/11 on the Israelis, was in order…;

and this is just part of what President Obama has done JUST on the subject of the very subject he won’t name- that being Radical Islam…

Then, we hear that, despite all of the evidence pointing to the contrary, that his departing Attorney General Eric Holder, in his last act as AG, is now suing the Ferguson, Missouri Police Department for racism in the shooting death of Michael Brown (by the way, no mention of race baiting on his part, on the part of his boss, or their buddy, Al Sharpton which encouraged the rioting and looting that followed).

The former mayor of New York, Rudy Giuliani, was roundly excoriated for suggesting that this president lacks love for his country, in a way that no other president has done- based largely on the president’s constant criticism of America, reaching back to the days before he became president, and the comments Obama has made since, as referenced above.   If anything, Giuliani is far from being a dyed-in-the-wool conservative Republican, and even liberal Democrats are now calling to question Obama’s reticence in labeling Radical Islam for what it really is, and are expressing vocal skepticism on his approach to dealing with Iran as well as ISIL. The president has even lost MSNBC’s Chris Matthews – the same guy who suffered chills up his leg during Obama’s keynote address to the 2004 Democratic National Convention…

So, at what price must we continue to be led by such a man as Barack Obama?   Is he worth the increasing polarization of our country’s citizens to a degree not seen since the 1850s?   Is he worth the growing threat of Islamist terrorism both here at home and around the world?   Is he worth the continued alienation of our allies in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East? Is he worth the continued strengthening of America’s enemies, including countries who have expressed their goal to destroy the United States and Israel?

In short, is Barack Hussein Obama worth it?

-Drew Nickell. 20 February 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Asleep at the Wheel

Thirty years ago, when I was a District Sales Manager for a manufacturer of safety equipment based in Reading, Pennsylvania, the territory I managed comprised of seven states, which I had to cover by car. In order to do this effectively, I averaged driving about 1,700 miles per week, in addition to riding with my distributor representatives in their automobiles. Needless to say, I was either driving, or riding in, an automobile eleven hours a day. My biggest fear in those days was falling asleep at the wheel. To have done so would have surely brought about my own demise, and might well have resulted in the death of others, as well. Fortunately, between listening to talk radio and feebly practicing impersonations, I managed to stay awake during the years I had such a demanding schedule. Yet, the fear of falling asleep at the wheel has remained with me, even though my road trips have diminished considerably in recent years.

Just as falling asleep behind the wheel of a motor vehicle presents potentially disastrous consequences, particularly for those who must make their living on the road, falling asleep behind the wheel of state has the potential of bringing down a presidency, as well as a nation, in this day and age. With crises brewing around a hostile world, it is indeed unfortunate, not to mention potentially perilous, that the President of the United States seems to be asleep at the helm of our nation.

Russia is flexing their muscles to a greater degree than at any time since the 1980’s, as evidenced by the assault on the Ukraine which has already resulted in the annexation of Crimea, and continued military operations against the Ukrainian Republic. At one point, Russian President Vladimir Putin recently reminded the west that Russia is a nuclear nation- something that a Russian leader has not done since Nikita Khrushchev in the early 1960’s, when he deployed intermediate range ballistic missiles in Cuba. e did thisPutin did this in the full knowledge that Putin did this knowing full well that Obama’s response would be feckless, tepid or non-existent, which is exactly what happened. Putin would never had been so bold with Ronald Reagan or, for that matter, either George Bush (father and son) or Bill Clinton, which differentiates Barack Obama from his (count ‘em) four immediate predecessors in a way no real American would ever want their commander-in-chief so differentiated. It is even arguable that Jimmy Carter, as feckless and incompetent as he most certainly was, would not have appeared as weak and as vapid in the international arena as Barack Obama appears to our friends, and our foes, alike.

And then there is ISIS, or ISIL, if you prefer. Regardless of what label you want to put on these murderous bastards, they pose a far greater threat than Al Quada ever did. In the wake of Obama’s retreat from Iraq- a conflict that was surely won as the result of the surge during the closing years of the Bush administration, the void that Obama left behind was just as surely filled by Islamic radicals the likes of which we have never seen before. Equipped with military hardware that we left behind for the run-away Iraqi military, and funding from Islamic organizations the world over that dwarfs any resources that Osama bin Laden had at his own disposal, ISIS has exponentially expanded its grip on the eastern half of Syria to the northern third of Iraq and has done so largely without response from Iraq’s military, NATO, Turkey, nor the United States, itself. Its members routinely rape children, abduct and rape women, murder religious minorities to a degree not seen since the Nazi holocaust, sever the heads of western journalists, and are the fearsome front line of radical Islam’s war on the West- a war that we refuse to call by name, or even acknowledge that it so exists, while our president attends fund-raiser after fund-raiser, improves his game on the links, and spends his political capital assaulting Republicans as if the GOP was the real enemy of the United States, instead. He has yet to formulate a cohesive strategy to deal with such threats as ISIS and Russia present, and in the vacuum of such non-existent leadership, allows bad actors to dominate the world’s stage, instead.

In essence, Barack Obama remains asleep at the wheel of our nation, and in doing so, imperils us to a far greater degree than even the months leading up to the attacks on September 11, 2001. Regardless of whether one agrees or disagrees with Obama’s domestic agenda, failing to defend our nation in the face of such threats, renders such a domestic agenda pointless, when our worst fears may well soon be realized. So I ask, “Is this really what we want in a president?”

-Drew Nickell, 3 September 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Apathy and How It Will Destroy Us

Prior to my current position supporting indirect agents selling wireline services for a major telecommunications carrier, I made my living as a sales representative for seventeen years. Having met, in the tens of thousands of potential customers in those years, I came to understand that the most difficult prospects were the apathetic customers- the ones who just didn’t care. I learned that it was far easier to overcome the objections of a hostile prospect, meeting their discrepancies head on, than it was dealing with a prospect that couldn’t care less either way.

Whether politics is a microcosm of, or an extension of, life in general, it surely is bedeviled by the very same phenomena of apathy. All of us know countless others who say, “I’m just not interested in politics”, or “I just don’t know the issues”, or “My vote doesn’t matter” or “One’s just as bad as the other so why bother?”

Looking around the world, it has always irritated me immensely that in countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan, where voting is potentially and truly, a life-threatening enterprise, voter turnout as a percentage of the enfranchised electorate is actually much higher than here in the United States where, save for a precinct or two in Philadelphia, voters can cast their ballots without any harassment, whatsoever. This is symptomatic of an electorate that just doesn’t seem to care, and that, ladies and gentlemen, is the thing upon which our future as a free and independent nation lies in grave peril.

Save for a few momentary spikes, voter participation in the United States has been very much a declining enterprise over the past decades- which amazes me, given the struggles, over the course of two centuries, we encountered to bring suffrage to, in chronological order, first, white males who did not own land, then black and native American males, then women, then people who refused to pay a poll tax or could not pass a proficiency test, and finally, people between the ages of eighteen and twenty-one. For reasons I cannot begin to surmise, each and every time the United States expanded suffrage, the percentage of eligible voters actually voting has eventually declined.

Now, it is true that when a particular voting sector has an external stimulus to be so motivated, electoral outcomes can be affected and the inevitable results often reflect this. The Great Depression of 1929 moved voters to elect Franklin Roosevelt in 1932, when millions of unemployed were motivated to make a change perceived to be in their favor. In 1960, a very handsome young Senator from Massachusetts motivated women to come out, as never before, and pull the lever for Jack Kennedy. The first post-World War II baby boomer to lead a presidential ticket motivated baby boomers to pull the lever for Bill Clinton in 1992, in what turned out to be, a battle of a younger generation opposing a candidate of their parents’ generation. There is no question that the presence of the very first African American on a major party ticket motivated African Americans to come out to the polls in record numbers to elect Barack Obama president. Rest assured that it is entirely possible that the nomination of a woman to lead the ticket of a major party would motivate many women, who might not otherwise do so, to vote in 2016….or so Hillary hopes…

In other words, a motivated electorate can and will affect the outcome of an election even if, retrospectively, as with the case of our current president, the choice proves to be a bad one. That is the inherent problem of identity politics. For example when a voter votes against someone, solely because of their race, they are labeled “racist”. Yet, when someone votes for someone, solely because of their race, isn’t that just as racist? And wouldn’t the same be true when it comes to a candidate’s sex? Throw in media manipulation and their inherent partisan bias, and that’s where things can become truly murky. Say that Republicans were to nominate an African American woman, like Condoleezza Rice, to head the GOP ticket in 2016. I largely doubt that the media would advocate for her, as they did for Obama or potentially would for Hillary, despite the fact that Ms. Rice is vastly more qualified, more intelligent and more independently accomplished than either Mr. Obama, or Mrs. Clinton.

With all of these cross currents, it is no wonder that voters can and do become averse to participating in a broken political process. Yet it remains just as true that, given the wreckage America has suffered here at home, across our borders, and around the world, the election of 2016 is perhaps the most important election in the history of our country, because it will largely determine whether we reverse the failures of these last seven years, or continue down the road to our own demise, and that is where apathy can, and will, destroy the nation as we know it.

-Drew Nickell, 17 June 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

American Dystopia – Obama’s Demolition of America

nation- (nay-shuhn) – n. 1) a large body of people, associated with a particular territory, that is sufficiently conscious of its unity, to seek or to possess a government, peculiarly its own; 2) the territory or country itself, separated by borders.

Last night, at 8:00 pm EST, the President of the United States, Barack Hussein Obama, announced that he is going to sign an executive order which begins the unravelling of our nation. Despite his dubious and pejorative claims as to presidential precedence, it is the first time in our nation’s history that a chief executive has taken it upon himself to declare that a law no longer exists, without supporting legislation to do so. In effect, he has unilaterally decided that he will cease and desist with the deportation of over one-third of the aliens who have entered this country illegally, and he has done so without regards to Congress, the electorate and the wishes of the American people.

He has done this in spite of all of the aliens who have entered this country legally, and all of the immigrants who have played by the rules in the hope of attaining full citizenship in the United States.

In a word, he has done this with complete contempt, and total disregard, for the American people.

In effect, he has opened the floodgates of even more illegal entry than ever before, along with its resulting humanitarian crises and, in so doing, he has effectively eliminated the national sovereignty of the United States of America.

We should not be surprised by any of this.

After all, he was elected, and re-elected, largely by margins made up of illegal and multiple voting (remember ACORN?) He has done this in the hopes of geometrically expanding a voting bloc which he has deigned to broaden legislative control by his own Democratic Party. He has done this as a cynical stunt to goad the GOP into a possible governmental shutdown and/or impeachment proceedings- knowing full well that such moves would largely serve to encourage further resentment of the Republican legislators, in spite of the recent and nationwide Republican landslides in the last two mid-term elections. In effect, he has raised his middle finger to the Republicans, in general, and a majority of those who voted in 2014, specifically.

Why?

Barack Obama is part of an effete and elitist cadre of academics who, having been indoctrinated in radical ideology, disdain the concept of national identity. These radicals, who have infected college and university campuses across the country, inherently believe:

1. That the United States is the source of most, if not all, of the world’s ills;
2. That anyone should be allowed to cast a ballot, without regards to citizenship;
3. That the borders of the United States should be open, and that anyone and everyone should be allowed to enter this country and avail themselves of all of our government’s largesse- be it welfare, healthcare and education (both of which they believe should be free for all);
4. and, by effect, that the United States should be marginalized to the level of a third-world nation, as punishment for its perceived sins of the past.
5. Everything this president has done in office is completely and irrefutively commensurate with this twisted, albeit, prevalent mindset which has taken over academia, and is now meandering its way down to the elementary and secondary schools, as well. One look at the Common Core curriculum of today, juxtaposed against the curriculum that prior generations were taught, bears out this fact, in due course.

Left unchecked, the end result of these endeavors, by the President of the United States and his academic allies, will surely bring about the utter demolition of the United States as we know it, and usher in an era of American Dystopia- a society in which no sane person would ever wish to inhabit, and thus subject the watching world into an abyss from which there will be no one capable of extricating mankind, as a result.

-Drew Nickell, 21 November 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

An Extremely “Foreign” Policy

Last week’s missile attack on Malaysia Flight 17, near the Russian-Ukrainian border which caused the death of 298 innocent and unsuspecting people, was part and parcel of the proxy war that Russia has been conducting, in efforts to reincarnate the Soviet Union. Vladimir Putin, well-schooled in the clandestine arts when he was an agent with the KGB, plays a deadly game of wit and parry, using separatists to lay siege to a sovereign Ukrainian nation, fully arming these separatists, providing enhanced training and, allegedly, also providing Russian troops and equipment, conveniently devoid of any Russian military insignia on either.

Keep in mind that while not a full-fledged member of NATO, Ukraine has been a fully-fledged member of NATO’s Partnership for Peace, having signed the NATO-Ukraine Action Plan in 2002, which essentially obligates NATO to treat Ukraine as a de facto partner in the event of outside aggression.

When Russia essentially annexed the Crimean peninsula in February 2014, Ukraine’s most southern and strategically-important region, NATO responded, vis-à-vis the United States (nothing happens in NATO without the United States taking the lead), responded by providing MREs – Meals Ready to Eat- and nothing else. On face value this is, at best, a feckless initiative on the part of the Obama administration to tacitly show support for Ukrainian sovereignty. In fact, however, Vladimir Putin has nothing to fear from NATO with Obama as president of its strongest member, when this is the only support we are willing to provide.

Why is the relevant? Well first of all, it brings to mind a comment made by Barack Obama to then- outgoing Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, in March of 2012, not realizing that the microphone was still turned on, where he said, “This is my last election. After my election I have more flexibility.”

To this, Medvedev replied, “I understand. I will transmit this information to Vladimir,” presumably referring to then-incoming Russian president Vladimir Putin.

Now to any observer, this would suggest that Barack Obama was, in effect, telling his Russian counterpart that, following the 2012 Election, he would be in a better position to go along with what has turned out to be a nefarious design on the part of Putin, to take a more-aggressive stance in Eastern Europe, which is exactly what happened, beginning with Russia’s annexation of Crimea in March of this year.

Now, we have a situation where a civilian airliner, en route from the Netherlands to Malaysia is shot down out of the sky by an extremely sophisticated Russian SAM (surface-to-air missile) and Obama’s response screams in its tepidness and lack of moral outrage. Even his UN ambassador, Samantha Power, hardly anything but a pacifist herself, expressed an admirable level of outrage in demanding Russia to “end this war”, while on the very same afternoon, Obama played his oft-used moral equivalency card saying it was up to Russia, the separatists and the Ukrainians to come to the table and seek an agreement to end the hostilities- in other words intoning that all were equally to blame, which is a lie, plain and simple.

Compare, for a moment, Obama’s response and his insistence to follow through on attending yet another fundraiser in New York, to President Ronald Reagan’s response to Russia’s downing of Korea Air Lines Flight 007 in 1983, and it is easy to see the difference between political expediency and fecklessness on the part of Barack Obama, as opposed to Reagan’s moral clarity and righteous determination to call out Russian aggression for what it is.

In short, if this is what Obama meant, promising “more flexibility” to Medvedev and Putin, back in 2012, then it is certainly not a stretch to say that this is an extremely “foreign” policy- foreign to the American tradition of righteousness and moral clarity. By its effects, the Obama administration is thereby complicit in its tolerance of the reincarnation of the evil empire whose demise President Reagan worked so hard to achieve, and it is to our peril that Obama so dithers.

-Drew Nickell, 21 July 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

2015- The Look Ahead

The holidays have now passed and we have returned to the realm of five-day workweeks, dietary come-uppances, weather that bites, and epidemic influenza- all attesting to the cruelty that is, and always has been, the month of January, God help us.

Congress has returned to the nation’s capital. Speaker John Boehner has survived a nominal challenge to his leadership, while Former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has suffered an electoral blow that must have felt very much like the actual blows he received as a result of his exercise equipment, whose resistance band knocked him for quite a blow, as well. He’ll still be in the Senate, but without the power to obstruct legislation that is sent from the House. This means that President Obama will be tasked with the onus of either:

1. signing Republican bills, many of which will have some Democrat support, such as Keystone Pipeline and ACA Medical Device Tax Elimination;

(or)

2. vetoing such legislation that will expose him to charges of obstructionism that he hasn’t ever had to face, before.

Well, Mr. President, it’s time for you to “man-up” and stop hiding behind the skirts of Harry Reid, who won’t be in a position to cover for you, going forward.

The Republicans are in a position to actually govern, BUT they will have to “man up” as well. Doing so means that they will have to defund the President’s recent executive order which effectively legalized illegal immigration- and there is no doubt this will require the kind of political courage not seen in recent decades. The same goes for (Supreme Court rulings notwithstanding) replacing or amending the Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare), to alleviate the most economically-onerous parts of the bill that legislators, many even on the Democrat sides of the aisles, wish they hadn’t passed, after all. Republicans might even have to resort to pulling on the President’s purse strings (again, something that hasn’t been done in memory) in order to keep the excesses of this all-too-excessive president in check.

The major media will continue its Quixote-like quest to make Obama out to be a great president, in spite of the fact that he isn’t, or ever will be, a great, or even a good president. Nevertheless, they’ll stay in the tank for their “dear leader”, if for no other reason, to facilitate their entry into “Tank Hillary”, soon to open in a campaign near you. Allegations that her husband is still philandering around (this time with minors) won’t have any more ill-effect on her campaign than her refusal to comply with Rep. Trey Gowdy’s subpoena for her Benghazi documents, because the major media has already decided they’re in for Hillary, both to be nominated and elected- so much for what passes for journalism in these United States.

We will hear much about so-called “moderate Democrats” having to stave off the efforts of “extremist Republicans” because that is what the media keeps shoveling at us and we, for the most part, aren’t so up on things as to determine that which is being shoveled- the very same, in substance, to that which is shoveled out of the stables at Pimlico. That’s what happens when an electorate stops voting their heads, and votes their hearts, instead, as they have done in every election since 2008, save for the most recent which took place last November. The media let the 2014 election get by them- but they won’t risk it next time around, to be sure. Whoever the Republicans nominate in 2016, he or she will be labeled an “extremist” by a mainstream media who amazingly proffers New York Mayor Bill de Blasio and Senator Elizabeth Warren as moderates. Such is the state of our fourth estate.

Sadly, the situations a-brewing overseas will continue to grow worse- much worse- partially due to an effete, nuanced and altogether feckless foreign policy that Professor Obama espouses- he’ll go to his grave thinking that America is not exceptional, after all, and he has spent all of his presidency attempting to ensure just that. As the result of his selective approach to law enforcement, and his commentary regarding same, there will unfortunately be a continuation of racial unrest, here at home, not seen since the late 1960’s- ironic that the nation’s first African-American president and his Attorney General have only served to inflame racial hatreds that most of us had thought were put to bed two generations ago.

That said, Happy New Year to one, and all…

-Drew Nickell, 6 January 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Borders

Border- \ˈbȯr-dər\ n.

Border-  1. the part or edge of a surface or area that forms its outer boundary; 2. the line that separates one country, state, province, etc., from another; frontier line: i.e. One cannot cross the border without a visa; 3. the district or region that lies along the boundary line of another; 4. the frontier of civilization; 5. the border: i.e. the border between the U.S. and Mexico, especially along the Rio Grande     (source dictionary.com)

It is often said that America is a nation of immigrants. Even Native Americans migrated from Asia, to the land that eventually became the United States, centuries before Europeans first arrived. America has always been the place to which people come- and all for the same reason.

Exactly twenty years prior to the very day my mother was born, my grandfather arrived on Ellis Island in 1901, having immigrated to this country from a small village in Sicily, at the age of ten, with exactly twenty-five cents in his pocket. He was accompanied only by his older brother (who was twelve years old), as an “installment”. In those days, the father would come over with the eldest son, work here in America to save up enough money for the second installment, of his family, and then the third, and so on, until at last my great grandmother came with this youngest member of their family- a process that took eight years to complete. Their story was repeated millions of times during the years 1892- 1954, by people from all parts of the world, who came here in search of a better life than they had experienced in the places they left behind. They worked hard, learned to speak English and assimilated into a new and emerging American culture, leaving the trappings of their old country behind. Every single individual who was admitted through this port of entry did so legally.

“Legally”- that is the real issue of immigration. A country without borders is NOT a country, plain and simple, as the definition above clearly states. Politicizing the issue of immigration is nothing new. The “copperheads” of the 1850’s did their level best to discourage Irish immigration (including my father’s maternal grandparents). Then as my mother’s father was immigrating, there were all types of concerns regarding immigrants from southern and eastern Europe. Politicians have also exploited the new arrivals, promising all sorts of jobs and benefits in exchange for votes which kept them in office (i.e. Tammany Hall). History substantiates the fact that such exploitation has been the exclusive purview of the Democratic Party going back well into the 19^th Century.

Today, we have many politicians from the very same Democratic Party wishing to exploit immigrants from our southern borders, in the very same manner… “come here, we’ll take care of you, we’ll give you low paying jobs, and medical care and education for your children…all to a greater degree than you will get from your homes in Mexico and Central America” seems to be the mantra from far too many of these leftist opportunists who really don’t give a damn about their country, just their precious office seats, instead. The difference nowadays is that these politicians couldn’t care less whether these immigrants come here within, or outside, the law. They smugly know that somehow, these poor people will eventually become voters, citizenship not necessary, not really, not eventually- their precinct cronies will see to that. If they bring communicable diseases, “so what? …we have got the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) that’ll handle it…” Meanwhile, the humanitarian crisis taking place in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas continues on at an accelerated place “but don’t blame Obama – it’s George Bush’s fault.” George Bush’s fault for signing legislation passed by both Houses of Congress (at the time, both houses in the control of Democrats) as a means to stop child sex trafficking. Never underestimate the power of liberals to play the part of that hockey goalie, which fends off every shot and blames it on the GOP.

And yet…. While the problem festers in the real world, a world created by Barack Obama and his continued refusal to enforce immigration law, thus turning our US Border Patrol into a vast day-care center, the President couldn’t give enough of a damn to even visit the beleaguered border, opting instead to raise money for his party in Texas on this very day. He is exploiting this crisis, and the unfortunate children pouring across the border, in an effort to secure more money from Congress without bothering to include in his request funding necessary to better secure the border- all because he didn’t get the “Dream Act” he wanted, and all because he hasn’t gotten the immigration reforms that he wants- the kind of reforms that will only ensure more voter registrants to Democratic party, borders be damned. In essence, our borders will never be secure until such time as the “boarders” at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue have relocated, thus ending another example of how President Barrack Hussein Obama is in direct violation of his oath of office by refusing to uphold the Constitution, the laws of his country, and common decency.

-Drew Nickell, 9 July 2014

© 2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Selective Disservice

Let us begin with the concept of law. We have oft heard it said that we are a “Nation of Laws” and not a “Nation of Men”. According to our Constitution, the legislative branch enacts our laws, through a designedly complicated process, the executive branch upholds and enforces our laws, and the judiciary interprets our laws- the perfect balance in an imperfect process- that is what America is supposed to be about- not only in design and theory, but also in practice, as well. It has stood the test of time, albeit with bumps in the road, for two hundred twenty-five years. Whenever one branch of government has fallen short of its duties, there have always been two other branches to counter the shortfall, and so we have thus survived, both as a nation and as a form of representative government. To ensure this continuity, there has also been the “fourth estate”- essentially, a free press to keep the people informed of what is taking place with regards to our government- the operative word being “our”.

Then, again…

Today, we have arrived upon a circumstance where this delicate balance is breaking down with such a velocity, either by incompetence or nefarious intent, which truly boggles the mind. Stymied by partisanship and what I will refer to as “all-too-precious incumbency”, Congress is at a standoff between a Republican-led House of Representatives who propose laws and a Democrat-led Senate who refuses to take under consideration. Then, we have an administration which has shown a propensity to re-write laws (i.e. Affordable Care Act- a.k.a. ObamaCare) , ignore laws (i.e. Defense of Marriage Act) with which it disagrees, and misappropriate laws (i.e. William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act – intended to deal with human trafficking and contains a section that deals with children arriving in the U.S. illegally, unaccompanied by an adult, from Central America) in order to pressure Congress into enacting dubious legislation that will do nothing to ameliorate the border crisis so well underway. We have an attorney general who selectively enforces the laws, and then selectively ignores those same laws, based solely on his own political and racial prejudices which apply to the situation. For instance, Attorney General Holder launched a thorough investigation into the Trevon Martin case, and has summarily refused to investigate what has become an epidemic “knockout game” in cities across America, which is primarily a black-on-white crime spree. Recently, he has also launched an investigation into an outhouse float in a Nebraska parade which mocked a would-be future Obama presidential library, but refuses to seriously pursue IRS targeting of conservative political groups, and the resulting felonious destruction of evidence by those subject to investigation. He has shown a propensity to investigate voting district realignments all over the country, duly enacted through state legislatures, but ignored voter fraud which took place in both the 2008 and 2012 elections, as well as videotaped voter intimidation in Philadelphia by the new Black Panther organization.

On sixteen (as of the last count) occasions thus far, the United States Supreme Court has ruled on several different attempts by the Obama Administration to either re-write or summarily create laws, and improperly appoint officials without Senate confirmation. Our foreign policy is at best, a mish-mash of incongruous and feeble attempts to address increasingly volatile and incendiary situations all over the world. The economy is in a shambles, subject to repeated ex post facto revisions of rosy quarterly reports that suggest the opposite, despite the fact that fifty million are on EBT assistance, and the unemployed and under-employed rate is approaching 25%- when those who have dropped off the statistical counting rosters are included. And that’s just the beginning….

Where is the press? Aside from Fox News and only a handful of newspapers around the country, we remain virtually uninformed of what is taking place in the halls of Washington, in cities and towns across America, at our borders, and beyond. What used to be a free press has largely become a propaganda machine for the Obama administration- most notably evidenced when one weighs the amount of coverage of “Bridge-gate” as it compares to the amount of coverage given to the IRS scandal, Fast and Furious, Benghazi, COMBINED….

In short, there is plenty of blame to go around, no doubt, but we recall what Shakespeare once wrote in Act I, Scene 2 of “Julius Caesar” when Cassius says to Brutus:

“The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, But in ourselves, that we are underlings..”

Unless and until we ourselves hold our elected officials accountable, for both their actions and inactions, nothing, nothing will change and it is to our own peril that we stay silent, uninformed, and disinterested, thus rendering a disservice to ourselves and our posterity.

-Drew Nickell, 17 July 2014

©2014 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Seeds of Impeachment

Every mighty tree that ever grew began as a seed, which buried in the soil sprouted a tap root that began to spread into branches of that tap root. Then, its sprout penetrated upward, the ground’s surface, and likewise began to grow into a trunk which sprouted branches, until the tree dwarfed the seed of its origin.

In a similar matter, every time in our history that the “tree” of impeachment, or a potential of impeachment grew, it started as a “seed”, covered up in dirt and began to sprout the roots of discontent, and the branches of dishonesty bore the fruit of impeachment.

Forty years ago, a 1972 burglary of the Democratic National Committee grew into a scandal of cover-up that caused Richard Nixon to resign his presidency. The articles of impeachment that had been drawn up had nothing to do with the actual break-in, and everything to do with the lengths to which Nixon and members of his administration to cover up, and obstruct the investigation appertaining thereto.

Sixteen years ago, Bill Clinton was impeached, on two counts of perjury, and one count each of abuse of power and obstruction of justice, which grew out of the seeds of the Whitewater real estate investment scandals, sexual harassment of Paula Jones, and ultimately, fellatio performed on the President in the Oval Office by Monica Lewinsky. The actual articles of impeachment had nothing to do with semen on Lewinsky’s dress, and everything to do with the fact that Clinton perjured himself in a deposition to a grand jury and he attempted to obstruct justice in the investigation of Whitewater.

By comparison to Nixon’s Watergate break-in, and Clinton’s Whitewater investment scandal/ sexual peccadillos- comparatively small seeds in terms of their effects on the American public, the Obama administration has engaged in the process of planting numerous, much larger seeds that are just beginning to sprout tap roots in what might well grow into a veritable grove of impeachment trees.

The Veterans Health Administration, in their false record keeping and delays of services, those being systematically covered up, that have caused and continue to cause actual deaths of veterans awaiting medical services, is but one of these trees.

The ATF gun walking scandal, also known as Fast and Furious, which resulted in the death of US Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, has already resulted in formal charges of contempt for Obama’s Attorney General, Eric Holder, by the House of Representatives, for failing to provide Congress with subpoenaed documents.

Then there is the Benghazi Raid, and the failure of Hillary Clinton’s State Department to provide adequate security to the consulate in Libya, that resulted in the deaths of our Ambassador, Christopher Stevens and three others, and the attempt to fabricate a false narrative of a video to hide both the President’s and Secretary’s culpability in their refusal to provide adequate security before the raid, and rescue operations during the raid, all because Obama was in the midst of a re-election campaign whose narrative was that the “Arab spring was a success and Al-Quada is on the run”, both of which were not true. These three scandals, unlike Nixon’s and Clinton’s scandals, have actually resulted in the deaths of Americans.

And then there is the IRS targeting of conservative organizations applying for 501(c)(4) tax exemptions, originally and falsely blamed on rogue operatives in the IRA Cincinnati office, which have now been traced to the IRS Headquarters in Washington. The former Commissioner of the IRS, Doug Shulman, went to the White House 138 times during his tenure- when the targeting was going on but, in Congressional testimony, said that he could only recall an Easter egg hunt as the reason for one of these visits- and could not remember why he went there on the other 137 occasions. Then two years after Lois Lerner’s e-mails were subpoenaed by Congress, these e-mails suddenly have vanished into thin air, due to a hard drive crash, and the subsequent disposal of the computer’s hard drive conveniently waylaying and preventing investigation into e-mails the Lerner had sent to government entities outside the Treasury Department- e-mails which might otherwise have revealed IRS communication to other government entities, like OSHA and the FBI, which also launched investigations into businesses run by taxpayers who supported these same conservative organizations. Also noteworthy was the fact that seven other IRS officials, being tied to the IRS abuse scandals, also somehow had the ‘misfortune” of hard drive crashes and lost e-mails. All the while, Obama insists that there is not smidgen of corruption in this arena.

Despite the fact that the major media has refused to acknowledge these scandals as anything but phony scandals and Republican partisan witch hunts, and despite the efforts of Democratic House members who toe the same line for the Obama administration, these scandals are very real, in some cases deadly, and, in the case of the IRS, affect thousands of Americans, both in and outside our government. Worse yet, there are other instances of either incompetence or outright dishonesty, that are threatening the ability of President Obama to lead our nation in very troubled times, both here and around the world. Even some of Obama’s supporters in the media, cognizant of his declining approval numbers, are beginning to see that his ability to lead the country has all but ended. Such a diminishment of his moral authority, left unchecked, will ultimately result in public outcry for further investigations and impeachment, which can be accelerated with a Republican takeover of the U.S. Senate in November.

As these scandals grow branches, and begin to bear ill fruit, coupled with the stagnant economy and troubles abroad, Obama is unwittingly and steadily fertilizing the seeds of his own demise, and the danger is that all of us will be forced to dine upon the fruits of his own design.

-Drew Nickell, 20 June 2014

©2014, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Taxation

In “Julius Caesar”, Act I, Scene 1, William Shakespeare wrote “Beware the Ides of March…”, but it is the “ides” of April which terrorize and traumatize taxpayers across the country. April 15^th, the day Federal Tax Returns are due, is a day in which no tax-paying citizen can cherish. We should know. All told, we paid just under $39,000 in income and income-based taxes, and we only earn in the five figures, which means that, taken together- Federal, Social Security, State, Medicare, etc., almost 49% of what we earned got gobbled up by the government, at one level or another- and that does not include the sales taxes we pay when we purchase anything, or the real estate taxes on our home, or the personal property taxes on our automobile. Is that fair? If you say yes, then you are either an idiotic socialist who believes we did not earn that money, despite the fact that we have been working our fat keister off since we were a teenager, or you believe that we are merely a slave to the government, and not an individual who is guaranteed the pursuit of happiness, as stated in the Declaration of Independence.

Okay- enough of our personal rant, except to say that we, as a nation, are over-taxed…WAAAAYYYY over-taxed. When one considers the tens of thousands of pages of tax code that exists here in the United States, such an enormous kluster-phuck of confiscatory and, in some cases, exculpatory tax code is, by definition, inherently corrupt. Were it not so complex, it would not be corrupt, either.

The various lobbies- in particular the CPA lobby, the ABA lobby, the tax attorney lobby are what is getting in the way of tax reform. Why? They want it to be as complex, corrupt and kluster-phucked as possible because the more complex, corrupt and kluster-phucked it is, the more business they can generate, as a result of it being so.

The fact that the average American needs professional help, in preparing his/her tax return, bears witness to this inherent corruption. It should be as easy as reporting one’s income, reporting one’s withheld taxes, indicating the tax actually owed from a table, and either sending or receiving a check to make up the difference- all on the back of a postcard, BUT that would endanger the livelihoods of CPAs, attorneys (particularly tax attorneys) and their continued greasing of the hands of politicians in Washington will ensure evermore complication and kluster-phuck with every passing tax year- that is, unless REAL change is made.

Then, again, there is the IRS targeting of conservative organizations applying for 501(c)(4) tax exemptions, originally and falsely blamed on rogue operatives in the IRA Cincinnati office, which have now been traced to the IRS Headquarters in Washington. The former Commissioner of the IRS, Doug Shulman, went to the White House 138 times during his tenure- when the targeting was going on but, in Congressional testimony, said that he could only recall an Easter egg hunt as the reason for one of these visits- and could not remember why he went there on the other 137 occasions. Then two years after Lois Lerner’s e-mails were subpoenaed by Congress, these e-mails suddenly have vanished into thin air, due to a hard drive crash, and the subsequent disposal of the computer’s hard drive conveniently waylaying and preventing investigation into e-mails the Lerner had sent to government entities outside the Treasury Department- e-mails which might otherwise have revealed IRS communication to other government entities, like OSHA and the FBI, which also launched investigations into businesses run by taxpayers who supported these same conservative organizations. Also noteworthy was the fact that seven other IRS officials, being tied to the IRS abuse scandals, also somehow had the ‘misfortune” of hard drive crashes and lost e-mails. All the while, Obama insists that there is “not smidgen of corruption” in this arena. Well, this wouldn’t be the first time President Obama has played fast and loose with the truth and it won’t be the last, either.

So what to do? Eliminate all income taxes. Eliminate all estate taxes (which fall particularly hard on family businesses and family farms). Eliminate entirely the corporate tax which, at its current level, is the world’s highest (which is why so much of our wealth is disappearing overseas). Eliminate all forms of taxes, as they exist today, and replace them all with consumption taxes. The rich will pay more taxes, because the rich buy more products and services, and tax consumption at every level so that there is no exemption and no way of getting around the consumption taxes. If the rich choose to try to circumvent this consumption tax by purchasing their products overseas, then they can also pay the import duties when they bring these goods back to the United States. This would, by design, ensure that everyone, EVERYONE pays “their fair share” and would also ensure that a progressive tax system (meaning the rich pay more) applies to everyone, with no exceptions, no loopholes, no deductions and, at long last, no tax return preparation….and NO IRS (as we know it, today).

The candidate and the party who espouses this will have our vote in 2016. And we hope that such a candidate and party has your vote, too.

-Drew Nickell, 17 April 2015

©2015, by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Baltimore (coming to a city near you- part II)

WARNING- What you’re about to read may arouse anger- please read carefully, to the end, prior to jumping to conclusions.

When all is said and done, and when all (God willing) tempers cool, the fact of the matter is that we will never KNOW whether Freddie Gray injured himself, on purpose or accidentally, or whether his injuries were as a result of the way he was handled by the Baltimore Police Department. Those who believe that Freddie Gray was a victim of police brutality will continue to believe this, despite any or all evidence to the contrary. Those who believe that Freddie Gray injured himself, accidentally, or on purpose as a means to achieve whatever he may have wanted to achieve, will continue to believe this, despite any or all evidence to the contrary. Nothing will sway either position in the minds of those who have made up their minds- any and all evidence be damned.

And, at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter.

What DOES matter- the thing that really sticks out- is how we are going to proceed from here.

No amount of protests, no amount of marching, no amount of screaming, no amount of looting, nor assaults on police officers, nor fires, nor arrests, nor speaking in platitudes, is going to bring Freddie Gray back to life, nor will it calm a troubled city, nor will it achieve law and order, nor social justice, nor anything of value to society as a whole. No amount of spending public funds will help people better their lot in life. No politically-motivated study group will arrive at an answer on how to cure that which ails us, and no amount of political rhetoric is going to change people of all races, in the way that they need to be changed- None.

What is needed in Baltimore, what is needed in America, or for that matter, the world, itself, cannot and will not be purchased, nor legislated, nor forced through political correctness, nor force of arms, nor bullying by others. What is needed, quite simply, will not come from without, but rather from within, which is why the solution to that which ails us is so evasive, so delicate, so nuanced and yet, so damned simple that it is tragic in its simplicity.

Each of us, all of us, this writer included, need to reach deep inside and ask ourselves “how?”. How are we going to get along with one another? How are we going to make our communities safe? How are we ever going to arrive upon that which has eluded humanity since Cain slew Abel? How are we going to make the world around us a better place for all of God’s children?

This much is certain. If we as individuals, if we as a community, if we as a nation and as a world, fail to search within ourselves, and seek the light within all of the darkness, seek truth within the clamor of garish noise, seek peace within ourselves, and with those with whom we encounter, then we are doomed as a people, and as a nation, and as a world, whose most intelligent form of life is otherwise going to extinguish itself.

-Drew Nickell. 30 April 2015

©2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Baltimore (coming to a city near you)

“I’ve made it very clear that I work with the police and instructed them to do everything that they could to make sure that the protesters were able to exercise their right to free speech. It’s a very delicate balancing act, because while we tried to make sure that they were protected from the cars and the other things that were going on, we also gave those who wished to destroy space to do that as well.”   -Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, Mayor of the City of Baltimore, 25 April 2015

Angry mobs and rioting are nothing new to Baltimore.

The first bloodshed of the American Civil War took place on Pratt Street, in April of 1861, when local sympathizers to the Southern cause, pelted the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment with cobblestones, while marching from the President Street Station in East Baltimore to Camden Station in West Baltimore, prompting the death of sixteen men and injuring thirty-six others, when the soldiers opened fire on what were locally known as the “Punk Uglies”. As a result, newly elected President Abraham Lincoln ordered cannon be placed atop Federal Hill, overlooking the city’s downtown, with orders to “level” the city in the event of further disturbances. This bloodshed, and Lincoln’s reaction to it, prompted the writing of Maryland’s State song, “Maryland, my Maryland”, by James Randall, as a rallying cry for Marylanders to join the Confederacy. Lincoln summarily jailed pro-Southern legislators, suspending habeas corpus, and thus prevented Maryland’s secession.

Fast forward precisely one hundred seven years later when in April, 1968, rioting erupted in Baltimore, following the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. For seven days, blacks rioted in the streets of Baltimore, setting 1,200 fires, looting thousands of local businesses, and terrorizing a city already struggling with race relations. Six people died, and seven hundred others were injured, resulting in 5,800 arrests and $ 12 million in property damages- the worst taking place in the US during that troubled year.

Fast forward, once more, forty-seven years. It is April, 2015, and the injury and subsequent death of a twenty-five year old black man, Freddie Gray, in the custody of the Baltimore Police, prompted demonstrations which began peacefully, but quickly turned violent on Saturday, April 25^th, just outside Oriole Park at Camden Yards, when marching demonstrators attacked white fans, outside a nearby pub, and the police were nowhere to be found. Two days later, in northwest Baltimore, high school kids, prompted by social media, begin pelting police officers with bricks and stones, setting patrol cars on fire and sending fifteen officers to area hospitals, in what was a textbook example of that which happens when local law enforcement officers are ordered by their superiors to give leeway in the face of assault, and stand down on orders of the Baltimore powers-that-be. Baltimore Police had advanced warning of a “verifiable threat” when three black gangs, known as the Black Guerilla Family, the Crips, and the Bloods announced that they would join together, in concerted effort, to kill white cops, and the mayor of this city does basically nothing to stop what was to follow, until far too late. Later denying what she had said two days before, about “giving space to those who want to destroy”, she was also late in calling on Maryland Governor Larry Hogan to bring out the National Guard and, incredulously, announcing a city-wide curfew beginning TONIGHT, when she should have made it effective, LAST night. Mayor Blake, who is also secretary of the Democratic National Committee, reportedly consulted with President Barack Obama, who advised both herself and the Maryland Governor, to “show restraint” in dealing with the protestors and to give them leeway in their increasingly-violent expressions of anger.

Welcome to Obama’s America, where rioters and looters are labeled “victims of oppression”, and anarchy reigns. We are quite familiar with this section of Baltimore, where our mother grew up a half dozen blocks from the CVS pharmacy that was looted by the “oppressed”, and summarily set afire. Firefighters, attempting to put out the fire, were thwarted by other “oppressed” citizens, who used switch-blades to render their fire hoses inoperable. The assault on the police officers, by black high school students being incited to “purge” and thus create havoc, did so at an intersection where our father once worked at a gasoline station to support his family during the Great Depression. His family lacked what these “oppressed” people are given (welfare, food stamps, assistance) freely, showing the ugly reality of “dogs biting the very hands that feed them”. The looting continued- liquor stores, wig shops, all types of locally owned businesses were looted by more of the “oppressed” who, in reality, couldn’t have picked out Freddie Gray in a lineup of three people if they had to do so. A City Councilman, who was watching a liquor store being looted, ordered the police to retreat and allow the looting to continue, and then told a reporter that the looting was the result of “decades-long oppression and insensitivity to the needs of the poor people who needed community investment, jobs, and leniency from the police”. My father, back in the day, must have missed the memo which says, “it’s okay to loot a nearby business if you are poor”, but this is the reality of what has become of a once-great American city- the city of William Donald Schaeffer, urban homesteading, inner-city revitalization projects like Harborplace, and new baseball and football stadiums. That Baltimore died last night. No one in their right mind would bring much-needed businesses to a city whose police are ordered not to protect the very businesses on which a community depends for jobs and economic opportunity.

Weep not for Baltimore, for what has taken place there is coming to a city near you, thanks to the lack of leadership at the highest levels of government- including the Mayor, the City Council and yes, even the President of the United States.

-Drew Nickell, 28 April 2015

©2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Is Martial Law Coming to America?

The temptation for the reader will doubtlessly be to assume that this writer is some kind of “conspiracy theory kook”, or words to that effect, but this is being written based upon personal experience.

For the fifth consecutive year, training exercises are being held at Camp Pendleton in Virginia Beach, Virginia, as this is being written. Camp Pendleton, not to be confused with the US Marines Corps Base in California, is a Virginia National Guard Training Base, located about one mile south of the boardwalk in Virginia Beach, Virginia. It is also right across the street from where we live. For the past few years, it has also been used by the Joint Forces Command of the military and naval bases located nearby for what appears to be secret training operations- secret because there is absolutely no news about these exercises- none at all. Inquiries about what is going on are not answered, nor are these exercises even being acknowledged that they are even taking place. Local news (newspaper/television) makes no mention of what is going on, either, and there is nothing on the internet concerning this and yet…

In the afternoons, in the early evenings, and late at night, large military helicopters approach from the southwest towards the base, flying very low- over our house, no less, low enough to rattle the house and sway nearby trees. They come in groups of three or four, land in a field across from our driveway, remain running for several minutes and take off again. These are the large helicopters that resemble the “Black Hawk” or “HH-60G Pave Hawk” type of helicopters that are used in tactical theaters overseas, and when they approach, they are extremely loud and quite alarming. These helicopters are not the type used by the National Guard in cases of emergency, but rather the type of helicopters utilized in combat operations. These exercises go on for several weeks at a time, on a nightly basis, and when the weather is commensurate to such operations – never in heavy rain, for instance, but when the weather is more enabling. These exercises occur about three times per year, and the scope of these exercises has been increasing since they began about five years ago, or so.

The fact that they are taking place, especially late at night (i.e. 11:30 pm EST/EDT, or later) and that there is absolutely no news about this nor even acknowledgement that they are even occurring, makes us wonder just what the hell is going on. We have been reading much about exercises in the western part of the US, such as “Jade Helm 15”, but there is no news about any of these exercises taking place, here…. none.

This brings us to a conclusion that when these activities are taking place in secret, such as those which are occurring over our very heads, literally, perhaps there is something to these “crazy conspiracy theories” about the possibility of the military imposing martial law at the behest of the president. These exercises didn’t occur during his predecessor’s term in office, but nevertheless have been taking place during Barack Obama’s term in office, and have been increasing in both size and scope, since his re-election in 2012.

The fact of the matter is that we don’t know what is taking place, cannot know what is taking place, and not knowing, and not being able to know, is the most disconcerting and frightening thing of all.

Given this secrecy, is it so far-fetched to wonder if, indeed, martial law is on the near horizon, here in the United States?   Well, is it?

-Drew Nickell, 6 May 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Today’s Youth, Tomorrow’s Nightmare

Last weekend while visiting Las Vegas to attend a niece’s wedding, we managed to catch a glimpse of the twenty-somethings who will one day be running the remains of what used to be the country of our own youth. Needless to say, we came away less than encouraged by that which we saw.

Generational fears of generational progeny are nothing new. Our grandparents doubtlessly shook their heads when watching their children jitterbug to the sounds of Tommy Dorsey. Then we watched as our father was convinced, on the night of February 9^th, 1964, that the entire world was “going to hell” because of four “mop-tops”, clad in suits and ties, mind you, who were preforming on “the Ed Sullivan Show”. Later on, we shook our own heads when our own children began “Keeping up with the Kardashians”, and we thought to ourselves, “What the f—?” These are all cultural phenomena, stretched across four generations, but this is not what we are referring to when discussing what it is that we fear from these twenty-somethings, today….no, not by a long shot.

We took the opportunity to go to breakfast at 5:00 AM, PDT- largely because we were still operating on east coast time and we usually eat breakfast around 8:00 AM, EDT, and hadn’t made the adjustment. In the hotel’s restaurant, a place called the Hash House, we noticed bunches of twenty-somethings staggering in, some of whom (the girls) were dressed up like “hoes” and some of whom (the guys) were dressed up as “gangstas”- but, again, it wasn’t their dress, nor their excessive use of cosmetics, nor their elongated beards, nor their baggy clothing that we found so disturbing- it was their behavior. They acted precisely the way they dressed- staggering into the restaurant, pouring liquor out of their own bottles into paper cups, dropping the f-bombs loudly and with such frequency as to outnumber all of the other words spoken in between, and falling out of their chairs where they sat, or attempted to sit.

Mind you, these were not the poor, unwashed unfortunates that one might find on city streets, all over the country, but young adults staying at a pricey Las Vegas hotel, presumably on their parents’ dime, celebrating the end of their spring semesters in college. Just listening to their conversations conveyed that these were not educated college students exploring the world of adulthood, but rather indoctrinated narcissists pushing the limits, as if doing so were the veritable ends in, and of, themselves. Many of these (forgive the term) kids, sported a king’s ransom in ink, on their skin, and a pharaoh’s treasure of all sorts of implements piercing their faces, as one might pierce a pin cushion. The thought occurred to us that once out of school, these kids would stand about as much of a chance getting a decent job, as we would in making the Baltimore Ravens’ active roster in our mid-fifties.

These are the kids that have come of age believing they are entitled to all that life has to offer, by sheer virtue of their having been born. They have cruised through schools, without having learned. They have slid through college, without having been tested, and they have done so as the result of student loans, for which they fully expect to be excused, and/or their parents’ largesse for which they are unappreciative. Work? Hell, they have never done hard work, and don’t expect to, either. Patriotism? That’s an idea that is now out of date, politically incorrect, and something associated with white racists, and senile old people of all races. Responsibility? Yeah, right. Respect? They call each other “niggah” and “bitch” with no regard to those who stand and sit in immediate proximity.

In other words, in their world, others do not matter, and when society has sunk to a place where others do not matter, then society has sunk to a point of no return, which is why we find trouble sleeping at night, for fear of all that tomorrow might well bring.

In short, we as a society are imperiled from our own excess- and the lack of responsibility we should have otherwise imparted onto the children we raised.

-Drew Nickell, 21 May 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Presidential Self-Esteem

“There is no limit to what a man can do, or where he can go, if he doesn’t mind who gets the credit.” – Ronald Wilson Reagan, Fortieth President of the United States

One of the intangible qualities that separate the great presidents from the rest of our presidents is an abiding sense of humility- the idea that whatever a president (or, for that matter, any leader) achieves, is the result of long hours and hard work, done by others, in pursuit of the greater good. Ronald Reagan had it. George Washington had it. Abraham Lincoln had it. Even George W. Bush and his father, George H. W. Bush, though certainly not great presidents, per se, still had an abiding sense of humility in the way they approached their respective tenures as president.

Barack Obama, quite simply, does not, which is the principal reason why he will never achieve greatness, period.

Certainly, there have been other presidents (actually, most presidents) who have missed the mark of greatness, largely as the result of either: grave misfortune (i.e. John F. Kennedy), perjury (i.e. Bill Clinton), impeachment (i.e. Bill Clinton and Andrew Johnson), incompetence (i.e. Jimmy Carter), dishonesty (i.e. Richard Nixon), bad timing (i.e. Herbert Hoover), or, even in some cases, outright corruption (i.e. Warren Harding). Yet, when it comes to the absolute avoidance of greatness, nothing ensures lack of greatness like an over-abundance of self-esteem, in which history is replete with examples, going back millennia.

Barack Obama is nothing, if not arrogantly egotistical to the point of pathos.

It’s not entirely his fault, however. After all,

• When a young man is awarded academic honors, befitting far more deserving students who actually display academic promise, it’s no wonder that such a man begins to believe that he is the smartest thing on two legs. Anyone who has experience working with Obama will tell you that he acts like he is the smartest one in the room.

• When a man is elected to the nation’s highest office, without having achieved anything tangible to merit such a political victory, it’ s not a stretch to understand that such a man begins to believe that his sense of greatness is self-evident. Obama is awash in his own sense of greatness.

• When a man is awarded, for instance, a Nobel Prize for Peace, for having done nothing (other than to besmirch his own country on a post-election “apology” international speaking tour) to earn such distinction, it’s not surprising that than the man’s head might swell up a bit, or in Obama’s case, a lot.

• When a man is re-elected to that highest office, with the assistance of a fawning mass media who works, along with his campaign, to marginalize and discredit his opposition, and to gloss over any shortcomings (and there were many) during the incumbent’s first term, it’s no surprise that such a man begins to take on the trappings of a celebrity teen idol- and let’s be honest about this… Barack Obama is so saturated with adoration all around him, it’s no wonder he acts like an older version of Justin Bieber…..

So, even if Barack Obama achieved something… anything… of substance while in office, his own self-adoration would take away from such achievement. Even if the policies which he advocates were deemed to be truly beneficial to the United States, or even tangibly contributed to the peace and security of the free world, his ego would belittle such advocacy.

So it is with these thoughts in mind that we should consider his statement that he alone has “improved the Unites States’ standing in the world” and that American prestige and respect in the world “is at an all-time high”, when quite the opposite is true. Such statements are the sad utterings of an uber-narcissist, completely divorced from any sense of reality.

Our friends do not trust us, our enemies do not fear us and, Barack Obama, in six short years, has in fact, “fundamentally transformed the United States of America” from Reagan’s “Shining City on a Hill” to the international equivalent of “Comedy Central”, whose audience includes Russia, China, Iran, Syria, ISIS and host of other bad actors who are rolling in the aisles of Obama’s pathetic theater- the “Theater of the Absurd”. Send in the clowns, folks, be it Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders or Martin O’Malley. After all, what else is left for us to lose?

-Drew Nickell, 3 June 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Religious Indoctrination in Our Public Schools

It sounds so un-American, but it is happening in every state of the union- religious indoctrination being forced, yes forced, upon our children and grandchildren, in public schools across the country. Not since the landmark Supreme Court decisions in 1962 (Engel v. Vitale) and 1963 (Murray v. Curlett), has religious proselytizing been officially permitted in public schools, when these cases brought an end to school prayer and Bible reading, respectively. Yet, in the last decade, religious indoctrination has been taking place in public schools across the country.

The religion being force-fed upon our youth is not Catholicism (which isn’t even “force fed”, per se, in Catholic schools). Nor is it any form of Protestantism, nor any other form of Christianity, nor Judaism, nor even any form of Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, nor even agnosticism nor atheism. None of these monotheistic, nor polytheistic, nor antitheistic religions is being taught in our public schools… none.

Nevertheless, a growing religious doctrine is not only being taught, but also being proselytized and forcibly being indoctrinated upon our youth today, and any heresy being spoken, or written, or even being otherwise mentioned is responded to with disciplinary action, censure and even failing grades.

This is the religion of manmade climate change, formerly known as the religion of man-made global warming, most notably being advanced by former Vice President Al Gore and international so-called scientists who advance their dubious theories in a disingenuous effort to acquire government funding for their continued research, and their insidious and clandestine efforts to destroy western capitalism as we know it.

The tenants of this religion, which are being forced-fed-as-fact upon our youth, include dubious data about global warming (not proved), man-made climate change (unsubstantiated) and the proposition that the United States is the principal culprit, when it is clearly obvious that Russia, China, India and other countries are far more polluting than the United States, where regulations concerning atmospheric output are far more stringent than the other countries listed. Once again, the loony liberal left is first to blame America, and American capitalism, than pointing their fabricated fingers at the real culprits, who regularly spew atmospheric pollutants in the globe’s eastern hemisphere. (Funny how it is always the United States which liberals always like to blame, first). In reality, those who advocate extreme measures concerning carbon footprints and related and onerous corporate taxation, based upon these theories, really only seek the imposition of global socialism- they just don’t want you to know it.

The fact is that the climate IS changing, but it has absolutely nothing to do with the United States, nor human activity, in any country, for that matter. The worldwide climate has gone through many eons of warming and cooling, for millennia, long before primal man discovered how to warm himself, and cook his food, and harden and sharpen his spears, with fire. Even since man’s arrival, the world has experienced a multitude of ice ages and periods of global warming, just as the ocean tides ebb and flow. To suggest that man can cause any of this, is egotistical at best, and pure fantasy at worst, and yet there are those who say that “climate change deniers” should be silenced, censured and even imprisoned, which shows the real and tangible hypocrisy that only liberals can truly evoke, in their quest to indoctrinate the generation who follows us into adulthood. Unbelievable?…Just try and suggest that these supposed “facts” of man-made climate change are merely theories that have not been empirically proved, to a high school or college student today, and they will reply as though you have just told them that the earth is flat, or that the sun revolves around the earth.

Certainly, mankind, being the most intelligent species on earth (some of these loons would even argue that point, by the way), has a custodial responsibility to practice good housekeeping with regards to our planet, but to take this to the extreme of destroying wholesale economies and food supplies in order to pacify the dictates of environmental extremists in government, academia and the world politick is patently suicidal, immoral and without justification, period.

Heresy, you say?…so be it…Go ahead and burn me at the stake, if you will, but watch that carbon footprint, if you do….

-Drew Nickell, 29 May 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Pondering the Impossible (thank God) if I were President….

Many of my liberal friends would produce a considerable amount of emesis, were yours truly ever elected President of the United States….change that…many of my conservative AND liberal friends would…..change that….ALL of my friends would produce a considerable amount of emesis were yours truly ever elected President of the United States….

Because it will never happen, relax sports fans….

But what if…what would I do during my term of office….

First, I would send to Congress a bill that would, in effect, outlaw lobbying of all public officials who have been elected to federal office. It’s very difficult to clean up a brothel, if you don’t rid the establishment of the whores as well as their johns…and the time has come to put public service back into public service.

Second, I would send a bill to Congress that would limit service in the U.S. House of Representatives to three consecutive terms, limit service in the U.S. Senate to two consecutive terms, and limit appointments to the U.S. Supreme Court to twenty years. This would put an end to the “same old, same old”…

Third, I would send a bill to Congress, effectively ending all foreign aid and investment to any country which does not guarantee freedom of religion, universal suffrage and due process of law. You want our money, then adopt our freedoms, period.

Fourth, I would send a bill to Congress, effectively ending all aid and financial support to the United Nations OR limit such aid and support to a dollar amount equal to the average aid and support given to the UN by all of the remaining countries who are members of the UN. We shouldn’t be paying the lion’s share of a club that treats us as though we were non-members.

Fifth, I would send a bill to Congress, effectively announcing a comprehensive trade embargo on the nations of Iran, North Korea, Syria and any other nation who violates the international nuclear proliferation accords, and cease and desist from financially aiding and investing in any nation who would continue to trade with these countries. You are either with us or against us, and we put money where our interests are well served, period.

Sixth, I would send a bill to Congress, effectively ending all individual, corporate and estate taxes, entirely, and replace this with a consumption tax at all levels of commerce, instead. Attached to this bill would be funding for the tax attorneys and certified public accounts who would find themselves out of work as a result of this legislation, because to have a system requiring their assistance is in, and of, itself, inherently corrupt.

Seventh, I would send a bill to Congress eliminating the Departments of Commerce, Education, Energy, Health and Human Services, Veterans Affairs, Agriculture, Interior, Labor, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, and Homeland Security as well as the EPA. As part of this legislation, I would turn all of these departmental functions over to the several states and, if not practicable, over to the remaining departments of Defense, State, Treasury, and Justice. A vastly smaller and manageable federal government is far more efficient and far less costly than the obesity of government that exists today.

Eighth, I would send a bill to Congress effectively putting the elimination of ISIS and Radical Islamic extremism into the well qualified hands of the Department of Defense, with an admonition they can and must do whatever it takes to rid the entire world of this menace. I would also give them one year to complete this mission, or find other work to do if they cannot. If one is going to get rid of a “cancer”, we should start by removing the “cancerous cells”, and we need to leave this up to the experts who know far more about military strategy than the rest of us.

Ninth, I would send a bill to Congress, that would, first, build an impenetrable wall along our southern border, from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico, second, put an embargo against all immigration for a period of no less than five years, and require anyone who has entered this country illegally to either, a) apply for US citizenship (which would entail taking mandatory classes in and passing English literacy tests as well as tests in the U.S. Constitution, government and citizenship), or b) be declared ineligible for employment in any trade or career. Those not wishing to do so would be deported to the countries of their origin. My Italian grandfather arrived here with twenty-five cents in his pocket and a third grade education. He learned to speak seven languages and had to pass a citizenship test in order to remain here. If he could do this, then anyone else should be able to do what this legislation proposes.

Tenth, once all of the above are enacted into law, and put into place, I would send a bill to Congress requesting that they impeach their president because, after getting all the above accomplished, I would be so tired and exhausted that I would not be able to effectively function as President of the United States, any longer.

-Drew Nickell, 9 June 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Flag Day

Sunday, June 14^th, is Flag Day- a day set aside to honor the Flag of the United States. Without any sense of clairvoyance, we can easily close our eyes and see, almost word-for-word, the news stories in print and on television, for the following day, Monday, June 15th. Some group of university students will exercise their Supreme Court-sanctioned right to tromp on, stomp on, burn and otherwise desecrate the American Flag, while another group of students- students not sanctioned by their respective faculties and administrations, will attempt to counter-protest by waving the American Flag (which on some campuses now constitutes “hate speech”, believe it or not) and tussling with the faculty-and-administration-approved flag burners. Believe it, for it is as predictable as the daily sunrise.

Why?

It can be universally assumed, by both the right and the left, that the Stars and Stripes- constructed of red, white and blue fibers- is something more than a mere piece of cloth or nylon. It is a symbol, albeit loved or loathed, of Americanism- the idea of freedom, independence and self-determination, as well as the cost of that freedom, paid several times over, in both national treasure and the blood of our soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen. Generally speaking, it is these values that are as loved by the right as they are scorned by the left, in the constant war of words exchanged between the two.

Elitists in academia, having been well-schooled in the religion (and, yes, it has become a religion) of anti-Americanism from the 1960’s radicals who flocked to academia in the 1970s, now wantonly encourage their students to view America as something to be scorned, hated and vilified, and give tacit as well as enthusiastic approval to desecration of the flag, as an expression of this anti-Americanism. In reality, these young minds who do this, will robotically recite a litany of all of the supposed sins of America’s past and present, while being willfully ignorant of all of the great things America has given and continues to give to the world. While these students bemoan America’s supposed “imperialism”, they blithely ignore American generosity- individual, governmental and, yes, corporate generosity which tangibly aids other countries in times of disaster, and ironically funds their dubious academic studies, to a degree that no other nation in the world can approach.

Talk about dogs biting the very hands that feed them!

Just once, would we like these imbeciles and their mentors to face the reality of what would occur, if the largesse of government and the wealthy patrons who they so despise suddenly dried up.

Just once, would we like to see these indoctrinated idiots, now in the third generation of anti-Americanism in the ivied lecture halls of universities across the land, see how free they would be to march in protest and burn the national flag, in many of the countries they admire- countries which guarantee none of the rights to do so. In reality, they would face long terms of imprisonment, forced labor or, worse, the gallows, a firing squad or beheading by the very same governments they so admire, because of an imaginary social justice they foolishly believe exists in those places.

Just once, would we like to see these effete elitists, tour a veterans hospital, and explain to those hospitalized there, just why it is that their missing arms and legs were supposedly sacrificed for naught, or worse.

No one, who would so easily stomp on, tromp on, or otherwise desecrate or destroy the flag they despise, would dare face any of the above scenarios, for they lack the intestinal fortitude of their own corrosive convictions to do so.

Essentially, these malcontents are nothing more than narcissistic ne’er-do-wells who only express themselves- not so much to trash a piece of cloth or nylon, but rather to shove their hatred of America down the throats of those who think otherwise. Regard them as the pathetic cowards they are, and pity them for their delusions, for by and large, they know not whence they come, nor where they would take us, if given the power to do so.

On Sunday, June 14^th, we’ll celebrate Flag Day by flying the Star-Spangled Banner outside our doorstep. As an advisory to anyone who would exercise their freedom of expression to take it down and desecrate it, we want them to know that we will, in turn, be expressing our freedom to protect our home, and our flag, by summarily opening a can of good ole’ American whoop-ass should they try to do so. This is not a threat, by the way- this is privileged information, so we hope they consider themselves duly privileged.

Happy Flag Day.

-Drew Nickell, 12 June 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Slippery Slope of Unintended Consequences

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” – First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, 1789.

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people” –Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, 1789.

Anyone familiar with the Constitution of the United States is doubtlessly aware of the Bill of Rights- a set of ten amendments whose purpose was to limit the power of government in the lives of people. The first of these amendments, as referenced above, in essence, guarantees the freedom of thought as well as the freedom to express such thought. While we cannot delve into the mindset of the founding fathers who believed this first amendment to be of primary importance (those that followed were set down in the order of importance), it is noteworthy that the freedom OF religion (NOT the freedom FROM religion as is often stated by contemporary “liberals”, especially those opposed to organized religion) was and is listed first and foremost, before the freedoms of speech, press, assembly and petition that follow.

Elsewhere in the constitution lies the framework of our federal government- essentially a three-part institution, with a delicate balance of powers shared by the three branches: a legislative branch (i.e. the House and the Senate) which enacts laws, an administrative branch (i.e. The President and the Cabinet) that enforces laws, and a judiciary branch (i.e. The Supreme Court) which rules on the constitutionality of laws- at least that’s the way it’s supposed to be.

With regards to the latter branch of government, specifically, it is the job of the Supreme Court to determine the constitutionality of laws, but not to violate the Constitution’s delegated powers (Tenth Amendment) and enumerated powers (Article 1, Section 8) by writing laws that do not exist. Nor does the constitution allow the Federal Government to enact laws reserved for the States. Yet, when the judiciary takes on the trappings of the legislative, then justice is the first casualty in a democracy. The second casualty is the rule of law, and the third casualty is the will of the people.

Nowhere in the Constitution, does it authorize the Supreme Court to change the meaning of specific laws as they are explicitly stated. (i.e. the Affordable Care Act, which specifically refers to “exchanges established by the States” meaning the fifty states, and NOT the state, meaning a general reference to government) . Nowhere in the Constitution does it authorize the federal government to determine what marriage is, or what constitutes marriage and, alas, who may or may not marry. Such “delegated powers” are reserved to the States in accordance with the tenth amendment.

Last week, the Supreme Court effectively overturned the Tenth Amendment by usurping these powers away from the several States, in its two rulings on ACA (ObamaCare) and on gay marriage. Some of the States have set up exchanges, some have not, and the Supreme Court has essentially said “it doesn’t matter- we will force this on all the states to operate as though the exchanges are set up”.

Likewise, some of the States have enacted laws providing for legal marriage between members of the same sex, while other States have enacted laws saying that marriage is defined as one man, one woman ( just as President Clinton’s “Defense of Marriage Act” says). Last week, the Supreme Court has effectively disintegrated the DOMA, while also taking the power away from the States (who by the way, issue marriage licenses) to make this determination- all without the constitutional authority to do so.

In the case of the latter ruling, those who support the Supreme Court’s decision cite the Fourteenth Amendment, Section One, which states:

“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

Such an argument is fallacious and specious, because marriage is not a right, but rather a licensed enterprise, like the license to drive, or to own a pet, or to practice law or medicine, and the States hold the right to determine the requirements for licensure- not the federal government.

Worse, in doing this the Supreme Court has now opened the door for those who wish to make these same claims, as have lesbians and homosexuals, to demand marital rights for bigamists or polygamists. We are already hearing calls to force churches and synagogues, under the threats of tax exemption revocation, to either permit gays to marry, or to lose these financially imperative tax exemptions. Such moves will effectively destroy the first freedom in the First Amendment- the freedom of religion, which would be just fine with atheists and agnostics, but would trample upon the rights of believers to practice their religion as they deem fit. This is the slippery slope of unintended consequences which imperils all of us, and lays credence to the belief that we have arrived upon the dreaded point in time where our most precious and sacred rights are under attack by the special interests of the few, who would gladly take these rights away from us, and then laugh all of the way to the perdition they seek.

-Drew Nickell, 29 June 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Symbolism over Substance

In the frenzy to remove and/or deface all things Confederate, be they flags, statues, memorials and yes, even headstones, much more is lost, than won, over these vacuous gestures. Listening to the talking heads as they bloviate through their all-too-predictable mantras, one might be led to believe the lie that were it not for the Confederate battle flag flying on the South Carolina capital grounds in Columbia, Dylann Roof would not have perpetrated the murder of nine innocent people on the evening of June 17^th , in Charleston…. Yeah, right.

Turn back the clock a fortnight ago, when no one…NO ONE…was talking about the Confederate flag….or what they THINK is the Confederate flag.

The familiar banner, known during the Civil War as the Confederate Battle Flag is not, nor ever was, the flag of the Confederacy. What is erroneously referred to as the stars and bars was not that, either. The “stars and bars” was actually a flag that was based on the American flag. It had three very broad stripes, two red and one white (the bars) with a field of blue in its upper left hand corner with seven stars in a circular pattern- representing the original seven states (the stars) of the Confederacy. This flag was the original and first flag of the Confederate States of America. Show a picture of this flag to the talking heads who are most opposed to the display of the Confederate flag, and damned few of these imbeciles would raise any ruckus about it, which only goes to show that the loudest of mouths are frequently in close proximity to the smallest of brains.

Because from a distance, the original Confederate flag looked too much like the American flag (often causing friendly fire, on both sides, during the early years of the Civil War), the more familiar Battle Flag of the Confederacy with its pattern of thirteen stars arranged in a blue “x” on a red field was adopted for the purposes of battlefield identification. This pattern, set in the upper left hand corner of subsequent Confederate flags, became the second, third, and fourth official flags of the Confederacy- not unlike the state flag of Mississippi, which is still flown today in the Magnolia State.

It is altogether understandable why the Battle Flag of the Confederacy is offensive to some- particularly black Americans whose distant ancestors were slaves. It might even be understandable (this is a stretch) why the same flag is offensive to some white Americans, whose ancestors fought for the Union during the Civil War. What is not particularly so understandable is why this flag is so offensive to those who can claim neither connection- slavery nor service.

Liberals, in particular, love to “Monday morning quarterback” and thereby “second guess” the motives of people who are now long since dead- trying to apply current sensitivities of political correctness and contemporary ideas of moral right and wrong to those who struggled with divisive issues one hundred fifty years ago. They will tell you the big lie that every Confederate soldier taking up arms against the Union did so because he inherently believed in, and was willing to die for, the institution of slavery. This lie- and it’s a whopper- conveniently dismisses the fact that only one percent of those fighting for the Confederacy were slaveholders, and also conveniently dismisses the fact that thousands of black southerners fought for the South. Perhaps it is conjecture to believe that a majority of these men, too poor to own slaves, would risk their lives for an institution that did not benefit them in the least, but we seriously doubt it. Never mind explaining that to a liberal- their minds are made up that the Confederate army was the nineteenth century equivalent of the twentieth century Nazis.

It is said that history of all wars is written by the victors, and that the passage of time tends to divorce history from that which actually took place. Nevertheless it is a matter of historical record that the Civil War did not become the “war to free slaves” until January, 1863, when Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation (which, by the way, exempted the border states of Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri) was set forth. Until then, the war was about national unity versus states’ rights (the right to secede) and even the songs soldiers on both sides sang lay credence to this all but forgotten reality.

It is also amazing that so many politicos, who once celebrated Confederate flags and monuments (Mrs. Clinton, anyone?), now find it politically expedient and contemporarily convenient to jump on the “take down the flag” bandwagon. Yet, in the final analysis, people seem to forget that flags, like guns, do not and cannot kill- only evil people of all races and political persuasions can, and all-too-often do, kill- with absolutely no thought to any flag.

Today, we see that Confederate flags and Confederate monuments are coming down and being defaced, respectively. So, what is next?

Well, on many campuses across the country, academic elitists are now sounding a similar clarion call to haul down Old Glory, because they and the students they indoctrinate with prevarications and revisionist history, find that the flag of the United States is offensive- that it symbolizes American imperialism and American atrocities, and other such tommyrot as they would have us believe. They have actively encouraged desecration of the American flag and have petitioned to have it hauled down so as not to offend the all-so-precious sensitivities of those who do not respect the flag or what it stands for.

So, to all of you who wish to see a flag from the past taken down, would you be so willing to see your country’s flag, Old Glory, also taken down, because some people find that it is also offensive?

My, the crickets are chirping aloud this June, aren’t they?

-Drew Nickell. 24 June 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Massacre in Charleston

Every once in a while, we learn of a crime so horrific, so absolutely and undeniably detestable in its perpetration, that mere words cannot begin to balance the totality of its impact- not only upon its victims and their families, but on the greater society, as a whole.

Such is the massacre which took place Wednesday night, the 17^th of June, 2015.

A deranged racist, one Dylann Roof, who had a history of arrests and drug use, attended a Bible study group in the basement of Mother Emmanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, participated in the study group for about an hour, and then summarily arose, and thus killed nine innocent people, starting with its pastor and State Senator Clementa Pinckney. The perpetrator of this heinous crime was a known user of the drug Suboxone, a powerful narcotic analgesic, one that is known to bring about sudden violent outbursts if used in excess of prescribed dosages. He was also a nascent white supremacist, who was involving himself in the ideology of neo-Nazi, skinhead and other racist ideologies who spew the same kind of hatred that other such groups are known to disseminate.

The fact that this malcontented miscreant chose to thrust his hatred upon a group of people, who gathered in the basement of a church to read and pray and worship, all the while pretending to be part of this group, makes his deadly assault especially repugnant. This was not merely a crime of passion, nor even a crime of unbridled racism. This was a crime of absolute and unadulterated evil- the satanic nature of which cannot and must not be overlooked.

It will be some time before we know all that was coursing through the twisted mind of this evil young man. Yet, at the end of the day, it is hardly a stretch to say that his motivations went far beyond racism, far beyond the twisted philosophy of white supremacism, far beyond the glorification of apartheid, as evidenced by an earlier photograph of Roof wearing a jacket adorned with the flags of apartheid South Africa and Rhodesia. When all of the dust has settled, it will become a self-evident truth that what really motivated this twenty-one-year-old, to kill such innocent people in the way he killed them- in the place and circumstance of their killing- was the presence of evil so invested into the soul of such a man, which can only and possibly be rooted in something far more sinister than sociology and pathology. Its root is in the evil incarnate and all-consuming perdition of Satan, himself.

It is, indeed, no surprise that certain politicians, namely the President and the former Secretary of State, took the occasion to exploit this tragedy for political purposes, by renewing calls for gun control legislation- exposing the depravity of their political aspirations by revealing how they would use the sacrifice of nine lives to suit their own agendas. Other politicians chose to suspend their campaign activities out of decency and respect for those whose lives were lost Wednesday night- but this is a topic for another day and another time.

Today, all of us must re-consider and duly recognize the fact that there is, indeed, absolute evil which exists in the world today- an evil which cannot be politicized, cannot be socialized, cannot be legislated away. It is an evil as old as mankind, as old as Cain and Abel, and as old and ruthless as the unabashed hatred with which it is commingled, and one in which we can only pray and hope and aspire to rid within our society and within the world at large.

-Drew Nickell, 19 June 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Why We Need a True Independence Day

July 4^th, 2015 will mark the 239^th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia. To commemorate America’s birthday, there will be the customary parades and fireworks displays and bar-b-ques and picnics all across the land, just as there should be. Americans- the TRUE Americans who are not swept up in the anti-Americanism that seems to be the “cause celebre du jour” that has taken hold of many on the left- will no doubt celebrate America’s birthday and all for which it has stood, and still stands, today.

This is the Independence Day which most of us revere, and which most of us are familiar.

However, there is a grievous need for another type of Independence Day- a TRUE Independence Day- the type of Independence Day which will reaffirm all that has made us independent, and thereby, has guaranteed the freedoms that we all-too-often take for granted. In essence, we need an Independence Day which will revive the slumbering spirit of independence, before we finally lose this spirit.

The spirit of independence has little to do with governmental largesse. In fact, it is this same sense of governmental largesse that has come to threaten our very freedoms and sense of independence as we know it.

This spirit of independence is thwarted by the demands for welfare and the transition to a welfare state. This spirit of independence evaporates with every new user added to the growing rolls of public assistance- EBT, extended unemployment benefits, pre-retirement social security distributions attributable to growing and specious disability payments, aid for dependent mothers, and other such programs, all of which have grown exponentially in the last decade. For every person thus put on the public dole, there is one less person who is independent, and one more person who, albeit unintentionally, weakens our nation.

This spirit of independence is threatened by the growing clarion calls for universal (meaning government-provided) cradle-to-grave health care- as though good health were something that should be not only guaranteed as a right, but provided for, by right, when such an ideology does more than anything else to increase the burden on healthcare providers and take ever more earnings from those who still work for a living, by transferring their wealth to those who refuse to work for a living.

This spirit of independence is under attack by those who favor open borders, to those who believe that suffrage (the right to vote) should be extended to non-citizens who increase dependency on social programs, the cost of which is already spinning well out of control. The costs of uncontrolled and illegal immigration, when measured in terms of the crimes being perpetrated by many entering illegally through our porous southern borders, are enormous- and exponentially growing, year by year.

The spirit of independence is assaulted by those who believe that post high school education should be “free”- meaning that it should be paid for by increased corporate taxation, despite the very fact that the United States already has the very highest corporate tax rate in the entire world. The strains that this ideology places upon those who pay their own tuition, and those who must borrow money to pay for their own tuition does more than anything else, to astronomically increase the cost of education to ridiculously high levels. These costs are increasing at such an a alarming rate that we are quickly approaching the day that we will see the margins of diminishing returns apply to the demand for college education- in essence, a college education will be deemed not worthy of the costs of acquiring a college education.

It has been said that a nation in which people depend upon government for everything is a nation of servants- that to depend upon government for everything will produce a system where the people are subject to the loss of personal freedom…in essence, we become enslaved to our masters in government, who would seek to control all aspects of our lives, in exchange for the largesse they provide.

This dependence is NOT that upon which our forefathers risked their lives, their property and their sacred honor, as stated in the Declaration of Independence. They did not fight a war with Great Britain to create a nation of “suckling pigs” permanently attached to the teats of a massive “sow” that is government largesse. No, these patriots were the very expression of self-sufficiency and independence that once made this nation the greatest in the world. Yet now, those very things that made us so strong and independent are threatened, to the point of extinction, by the ever-increasing dependence on the state for everything we want, and determine to be our entitlement.

On this, the 239^th anniversary of American independence, let us resolve to reincarnate a spirit of TRUE independence. Let us endeavor to revive the spirit of self-sufficiency, and reacquire the can-do determination to make for ourselves a more perfect union, without having to depend upon someone else to do this for us. Let us, as a nation, once again project a righteous indignation to persevere on, without having to depend upon a state that would seek to further enslave and constrain our desire to pursue our birthright for this day, and for all time.

-Drew Nickell, 2 July 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Election of 2016 that Wasn’t

On March 28, 2013, President Barack Obama signed the following Executive Order, which established his authority, among other things, to control and even indefinitely postpone, as outlined in section 3a, part x, a Presidential Election. Essentially, by declaring a “National Emergency”, President Barack Obama can use such an emergency to remain in office on January 21, 2017, and thereafter. This Executive Order reads as follows:

“Executive Order — Establishment of the Presidential Commission of Election Administration

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and in order to promote the efficient administration of Federal elections and to improve the experience of all voters, it is hereby ordered as follows:

Section 1. Establishment.

There is established the Presidential Commission on Election Administration (Commission).

Sec. 2. Membership.

1. The Commission shall be composed of not more than nine members appointed by the President. The members shall be drawn from among distinguished individuals with knowledge about or experience in the administration of State or local elections, as well as representatives of successful customer service-oriented businesses, and any other individuals with knowledge or experience determined by the President to be of value to the Commission.
2. The President shall designate two members of the Commission to serve as Co-Chairs.

Sec. 3. Mission.

1. The Commission shall identify best practices and otherwise make recommendations to promote the efficient administration of elections in order to ensure that all eligible voters have the opportunity to cast their ballots without undue delay, and to improve the experience of voters facing other obstacles in casting their ballots, such as members of the military, overseas voters, voters with disabilities, and voters with limited English proficiency. In doing so, the Commission shall consider as appropriate:

(i) the number, location, management, operation, and design of polling places; (ii) the training, recruitment, and number of poll workers; (iii) voting accessibility for uniformed and overseas voters; (iv) the efficient management of voter rolls and poll books; (v) voting machine capacity and technology; (vi) ballot simplicity and voter education; (vii) voting accessibility for individuals with disabilities, limited English proficiency, and other special needs; (viii) management of issuing and processing provisional ballots in the polling place on Election Day; (ix) the issues presented by the administration of absentee ballot programs; (x) the adequacy of contingency plans for natural disasters and other emergencies that may disrupt elections; and (xi) other issues related to the efficient administration of elections that the Co-Chairs agree are necessary and appropriate to the Commission’s work.

(b) The Commission shall be advisory in nature and shall submit a final report to the President within 6 months of the date of the Commission’s first public meeting.

Sec. 4. Administration.

(a) The Commission shall hold public meetings and engage with Federal, State, and local officials, technical advisers, and nongovernmental organizations, as necessary to carry out its mission.

(b) In carrying out its mission, the Commission shall be informed by, and shall strive to avoid duplicating, the efforts of other governmental entities.

(c) The Commission shall have a staff, which shall provide support for the functions of the Commission.

Sec. 5. Termination.

The Commission shall terminate 30 days after it presents its final report to the President.

Sec. 6. General Provisions.

(a) To the extent permitted by law, and subject to the availability of appropriations, the General Services Administration shall provide the Commission with such administrative services, funds, facilities, staff, equipment, and other support services as may be necessary to carry out its mission on a reimbursable basis.

(b) Insofar as the Federal Advisory Committee Act, as amended (5 U.S.C. App.) (the “Act”), may apply to the Commission, any functions of the President under that Act, except for those in section 6 of the Act, shall be performed by the Administrator of General Services.

(c) Members of the Commission shall serve without any additional compensation for their work on the Commission, but shall be allowed travel expenses, including per diem in lieu of subsistence, to the extent permitted by law for persons serving intermittently in the Government service (5 U.S.C. 5701-5707).

(d) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:

(i) the authority granted by law to a department, agency, or the head thereof; or (ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.

(e) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

(signed) BARACK OBAMA”

(source wh.gov )

Do not even begin to think that it cannot happen, for it will not take much for President Obama- a president who is quite adept at ignoring the Constitution, to indefinitely postpone the 2016 election under the guise of a “national emergency”. Do not make a fool’s mistake of believing that such a move is not beyond this president- no, not for a second.

-Drew Nickell, 8 July 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

Dealing with the Devil

This morning we awoke to news that, after months and months of negotiations, President Obama announced that we have struck a deal with Iran concerning their nuclear enrichment activities and their pursuit of nuclear weapons. The same regime in Tehran- which held hostage our diplomats for 444 days in 1979-1980, and which has funded, promoted and facilitated terrorist activities throughout the Middle East and around the world, ever since, and which has as its mantra “Death to Israel and Death to the Great Satan (meaning the United States)”- this same regime is now to be trusted with its promise to export 80% of its enriched uranium and refrain from developing nuclear weapons for ten, fifteen, twenty five years (take your pick), or forever (according to Secretary of States John Kerry) because “we have a deal”….. (pfffft!)

Well let’s consider this little troublesome fact. The whole premise of “the deal” depends upon the ability of the International Atomic Energy Agency to inspect SOME (but NOT all) of Iran’s enrichment facilities…with (get this) two weeks advanced notice. In exchange of this ability, the economic sanctions which purportedly brought the Iranians to the negotiations, in the first place, would be lifted in stages….and if they are found to have violated the deal, such sanctions (which are difficult, if not impossible, to be imposed) would suddenly (get that) be “snapped back”.   Unbelievable !

Imagine, for a moment, a teenager’s mom telling her teenage son that she will be periodically inspecting the top drawer of his dresser for marijuana, AND will give him a fortnight’s notice of such an inspection, each time she feels the need to inspect it… and, then, if she DOES find marijuana, after said notice, he will lose his set of keys to the family car. What pot-smoking teenager would not accept THAT deal?

There is absolutely no difference between this scenario and “the deal” that the Obama administration has struck with Iran…none.

Except for one thing…we are not talking about the dangers of a teenager smoking some joints here…we are talking about an existential threat to one of our closest allies (Israel) and, given the fact that Iran is also developing Inter-continental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs), a national security threat to the United States of America.

This is the net result of electing a inexperienced, idealistic, naive community organizer to the most powerful position in the world, one whose Secretary of State, John Kerry, an anti-war protester, who lied to Congress in the 1970s, slandering his fellow war veterans with unsubstantiated tales of US servicemen beheading enemy combatants in order to advance a narrative, is negotiating Israel’s survival and our own national security with the most evil regime in the last thirty-six years….Can we all say a collective “WTF”?

It is this same president who has asked Israel to give up its defensive nuclear arsenal and is also insisting that Israel share its protective dome with the Palestinian State- a state which advocates Israel’s destruction.

Meanwhile, Kerry’s predecessor- one Hillary Rodham Clinton- has approved the deal’s “key elements”, which should only serve to give us and Israel much pause as to the possibility of her being elected the next president of the United States.

Stepping back to the scenario of the mom and her teenage son, we know what he is smoking. The question should be “What are Obama, Kerry and Mrs. Clinton smoking?”

-Drew Nickell, 14 July 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Proper Role of the Republican Party

In all of the kerfuffle of the ill-considered way that Donald Trump assailed John McCain this past week, what has been lost is the great divide within the Republican Party- a divide which has cost them five presidential elections in the last forty years (’76, ’92 ‘96, ’08, ’12) and control of both houses of Congress during much of this time. Unlike the Democrats who are always, ALWAYS united during presidential elections, Republicans have not been so united since the re-election of Ronald Reagan in 1984- and that election was the first time Democrats confronted a truly unified Republican Party since Dwight Eisenhower ran for re-election in 1956.

In looking at the divide within the GOP, a broad generalization would find that this divide exists between the GOP moderates (a.k.a. the Establishment Republicans), as personified by Nelson Rockefeller, Richard Nixon , Gerald Ford, George H. W. Bush, Bob Dole, John McCain, Mitt Romney, John Boehner, Mitch McConnell, etc. and GOP conservatives, as personified by Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, Newt Gingrich, Trey Gowdy, Jason Chavitz, etc. (For the purposes of this discussion we have omitted any of the now sixteen candidates running for the 2016 Republican Nomination).

While Democrats have a pre-disposition to rally around their party’s nominee, be they moderately liberal or extremely liberal, Republicans have a unfortunate tendency to hold out for the “right” candidate, meaning that moderate Republicans refuse to support conservative Republicans, and conservative Republicans refuse to support moderate Republicans- all of which more than delights their Democrat adversaries, as well as the de facto running mates of Democrat nominees, also commonly known as the mainstream media.

Conservative Republicans find this tendency most distasteful, for the simple reason that it allows Democrats and their allies in the mainstream media to fracture what would otherwise be a united Republican front. It also allows the Democrats and their mainstream media allies to paint ALL Republicans as right wing extremists, regardless of whether they are moderate or conservative. One look at the past ten presidential elections, and all ten of the Republican nominees were labeled as “extreme” even though, in reality, only one of them has been a true conservative (Reagan) and the other has been a semi-conservative (George W. Bush). What is the message? Regardless of who the Republicans nominate in 2016, that person will quickly find himself/herself so labeled as a right-wing extremist, regardless of their position on any issue, for the simple reason that it will be a signal to all of the identity constituencies- blacks, Latinos, gays, pro-abortionists, union members, and those on the dole- to queue up and vote for the same Democratic politicians who have managed to keep them in the fold, and in the harness, since the 1940s. It’s not that conservative Republicans, in particular, have ignored any of these specific constituencies, but rather they have, in fact, offered non-governmental alternatives to those governmental solutions, which the Democrats are so famous for offering…

The folly of moderate Republicans is that they have an unfortunate tendency to imitate, if not duplicate, the programs and platforms of the Democrat Party…which begs the question “why have two parties if they are the same?”

This is precisely what far-too-many Republicans, especially establishment Republicans, have failed to grasp- especially when they find that the keys to the White House are in possession of their Democratic opponents. In their efforts to be comparatively bi-partisan, the “go-along, get-along” cabal of establishment Republicans have ceded far-too-much ground in the over-arching political debate, even before the “battle” is joined. If the Republican Party is ever going to “get back in the game”, as it were, they must differentiate themselves from the Democrats, and stop trying to imitate, much less duplicate, the Democrat Party’s platform positions. Otherwise, all one is left with effectively, is a one-party state not unlike that which exists in Russia.

It is indeed unfortunate that the resultant graying of lines between supposed-conservatives and liberals have left this country a bickering, albeit sickening, mass of gelatin between two parties that, in the final analysis, are almost identical in their pursuit of ever-expansive government and political stasis. What this country needs, really, is a true election between two distinct political philosophies, i.e. a contest, say, between a Bernie Sanders and a Ted Cruz, so that this country at long last can settle the abiding issue of what type of country it wants to be…a socialist country which provides all things to all people, like the ones we would find in Europe, or a free-market economic powerhouse that would elevate all people to their fullest potential with the inherent virtues of self-sufficiency, individual liberty, and the unfettered pursuit of happiness and prosperity that once made this country the envy of the world.

Yet, if this election turns out to be, as the pundits would have us believe, a contest between Hillary and Jeb, the can will once again be kicked down the proverbial path of pathetic posturing that sees the greatness of this country slip further and further into the dustbin of history. So, while we argue as to whether or not “the Donald” owes an apology for his inartfully-stated characterization of Senator McCain, let us resolve to keep our eyes on the prize of national renewal and the destiny of this nation that, in the last seven years, has lost its way.

-Drew Nickell, 21 July 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Call of the Trump(-et)

Love him, like him, admire him, or hate him as you will, but there be no doubt that when Donald Trump does something, he does it in a in a big way. Whether he is opening a golf course, a hotel/casino, or even a presidential campaign, he is a whiz at garnering attention. While that, in and of itself, can be a double-edged sword in the world of politics, there are more than a dozen of his rivals for the Republican presidential nomination who absolutely and undeniably covet the attention that he is commanding in this summer before the convention summer of 2016… and he is not backing down…not anytime soon.

His advantages are obvious. He has the requisite wealth to pursue his quest without having to kowtow to donors, hat in hand, begging them for the cash necessary to mount a serious national campaign. When he speaks, he commands attention and he does so without consulting pollsters and advisors who all-too-often bind a candidate from saying anything that carries any meaning, whatsoever. He is honest when he voices his opinion, albeit perhaps to a fault, but honest, nevertheless. Above all else, he lacks the fear to do so that is so sickeningly obvious in so many other politicos, right and left. He carries the bombastic delivery of a Theodore Roosevelt, the self-confidence of a Ronald Reagan, and the fighting spirit of an Andrew Jackson. When he is lambasted or insulted, he has the cajones to reply in kind, and with the artful modus operandi of a prizefighter, as most recently displayed when he “served” South Carolina Senator Lindsay Graham, after Graham called him a jackass…by forcing the Senator to go through the inconvenience of having to change his wireless phone number…that is absolutely priceless in a world saturated with enough sensitivity and political correctness to make even “Miss Manners” gag on the saccharine soliloquy of acceptable social intercourse that is politics. Senator Graham will no doubt think twice the next time he wants to start a scrape with “the Donald”.

His disadvantages are equally obvious. He has no political experience, per se, aside from donating to multiple candidates over the years, from both parties. His brazenness- part schmaltz, part shtick, with a heavy dose of New York City guile turns off a lot of people in the hinterlands- particularly in the South and the Midwest, where abrasiveness is not so tolerable due to regional social norms which exists, by and large, in those areas. His generally ritzy bearing, in all manners of dress and style, makes him seem incapable of relating to the “average joe”, much the same as Hillary Clinton’s icy seclusion makes her seem out of touch in the same manner. Seemingly devoid of any sense of humility, he has a tendency to sing the song of a braggadocio, which only serves to fuel the disdain that such behavior elicits. Most importantly, he often lacks restraint in what he says which, when he says something corrosive, makes political observers take pause in what otherwise would be the efficacy of a populist campaign.

As things stand now, in this all-too-early presidential campaign, it remains to be seen whether “the Donald” can master his foibles while continuing to capitalize on his considerable gifts of showmanship. Republicans will rightfully fear the possibility of his pulling a “Perot”, and running as a third party candidate, should he be locked out or denied the nomination. Democrats will just as rightfully fear what he would do, facing Hillary, in a debate. For the time being…and it’s damned early…the nomination appears to be his to lose, but there is absolutely no doubt that he has drawn a tremendous amount of interest during a time that usually draws little interest, and left unchallenged, makes him a formidable and viable candidate by any measure. It just depends on whether this Trump (-et) plays “charge” or “taps” at the end of the day…

-Drew Nickell, 22 July 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Cancer of Division

Take heed of the symbol of a dismembered serpent. For those familiar with American history, it is recognized as an emblem associated with the early days of the American Revolution. It represents eleven of the thirteen colonies, omitting Georgia and Delaware, (Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Connecticut amalgamated into “N.E.” as in New England). The message was as clear, then, as it is today… “Join or Die” or, in other words, “United We Stand, Divided We Fall”, and just as prescient today, perhaps even more so…

Today, we live in a divided America- perhaps more divided than at any time since the 1860s, when this country was ripped apart by the bloodiest war ever to take place in the Western Hemisphere- the American Civil War. Much of the blame, perhaps all of the blame, for this division rests at the feet of those who we elect to serve in Washington DC- particularly with a president who spent both of his campaigns, and all of his presidency, dividing Americans and pitting them against one another in an ignoble attempt to divide, and thus conquer, a country whose exceptionalism he derides and whose greatness he denies…. Black against white, poor against rich, union against management, gay against straight, women against men, Muslim against Christian, agnostic against religious, pro-abortion against pro-life, immigrant against native-born…and the list goes on, and on, ad nauseam….Barack Obama did not invent these divisions, but instead of ameliorating these divisions, he has instead accelerated them, just as an arsonist would accelerate a small fire into a conflagration with the addition of gasoline. He did so with a purpose of camouflaging his real intent…to “fundamentally transform the United States of America”, just as he promised on the night of his election in 2008. In actuality, this is code for bringing the greatest country in the history of the word, down into the depths of mediocrity, and ultimately, destruction.

And yet…

There is another, less corrosive but equally destructive cancer of division taking place within the Republican Party. For many election cycles, going back to 1964, Republicans have gone at one another in the quest to nominate the “perfect candidate”, and each time have ended up with the nominee’s supporters being elated, and the rest of the GOP disgruntled…so disgruntled, at times, to the extent that these disgruntled Republicans have sat out elections, easily giving the presidency to a united Democrat Party, as best evidenced by the elections of Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.

Today, it is happening again in the G.O.P. True conservatives, (Ted Cruz, Rick Santorum, Scott Walker), moderates (Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, Lindsay Graham), moderate conservatives (Rand Paul, Rick Perry, Marco Rubio), outsiders (Ben Carson, Carly Fiorina, Donald Trump), and (forgive the term) wannabes (Mike Huckabee, Bobby Jindal, John Kasich, George Pataki) are all having what amounts to a sophomoric food fight with one another, in an effort to gain a point or two in polls which are wildly premature. Even the candidates who are/were senators (Cruz, Graham, Paul, Perry, Rubio, Santorum), are having a go with candidates who are/were governors (Bush, Christie, Huckabee, Jindal, Kasich, Pataki, Walker) and those who have never been elected to any office (Carson, Fiorina, Trump), trying to say that their current/former occupation is more suited to being president than the others’….and all to the delight and pleasure of Democrats and their oh-so-partisan allies in the media.

Some of these candidates, most notably Ted Cruz, have been magnanimous in reaching out to other candidates, welcoming them into the fray, or joining together with them in discussions, as evidenced by the meetings between Cruz and Trump, and the Independence Day get together with Rubio and Christie at the home of 2012 Nominee Mitt Romney. While these get-togethers are a positive sign, this much remains certain….a divided Republican Party, not to mention a third party run by ANY of them, will ensure that the next president will have a “D” after their name and, as things stand now, that president will be a former first lady and Secretary of State. Worse, these intra-party spats are pitting Republican voters against one another- a trend that is virtually orgasmic to Democrats who will unite behind their nominee, regardless.

Since Republicans cannot do anything to heal the divisions that are the perverse progeny of Barack Obama, for so long as he remains president, they would be wise, instead, to resolve to unite as a Republican Party. They should call on ALL of their candidates to stop trashing one another (including Donald Trump, along with his own trashing of the others), and remember “the Gipper’s” eleventh commandment: “Thou shalt not insult another Republican”. Each of the candidates must resolve to support whoever the nominee is, regardless, because ANY one of them would be a far better president than ANY of the Democrats running today. Instead, they need heap their vitreous on Obama and Hillary and keep pounding away, day after day.

To do otherwise is to metastasize the cancer of division- one of their own making- and will ultimately lead them, and their country, to peril.

-Drew Nickell, 23 July 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved

The Bitter Harvest (-ing)

Perhaps the most difficult of lingering issues which politicians are loathe to discuss, due to the extremes of emotions associated with both sides of the debate, the legacy of Roe v Wade bedevils all of us, forty-two years hence. For Americans who argue either side of the issue there is little room for equivocation because it is, in the final analysis, a life and death issue- not so much for the mother in most cases, but for that of the unborn child.

Those who favor unrestricted access to abortion can and do euphemistically dismiss their advocacy of abortion as “pro-choice”, even though the most grievously-affected person, whose very life is terminated, is denied such choice. Referring the unborn child as “a fetus”, while clinically sound, is merely another way of objectifying a human being in an attempt to dismiss the central argument of life, itself- an absolute right to life that is specifically listed in this country’s founding document, the Declaration of Independence. Juvenile attempts to justify all instances of abortion, due to the comparatively rare cases of “rape and incest”, are also a convenient dodge since such cases are merely a fraction of one percent of all abortions performed in the United States. Similar attempts at such justification, based on vague concepts of the mother’s health, are merely rationalizations of the procedure, which are all-too-easily contrived by doctors performing the procedures, rather than empirical medical realities. An expectant mother, whose life or health is truly endangered by her pregnancy, is by far the rare exception- as opposed to the oft-cited frequency (still a vast minority) of instances so contrived by doctors who have a financial incentive to do so. In the end, it is an inescapable and undeniable conclusion that well over 95% of abortions are merely elective procedures, purely based upon convenience and economics, rather than medical realities. But don’t tell this to a “pro-choicer”, lest you be labeled as engaging in a war on women…

Regardless of the position one takes on the issue of abortion, the recent videos of officials of Planned Parenthood, dismissively discussing the marketing of organs harvested from aborted babies should make everyone step back from the central issue of abortion, and consider the ghoulish implications associated with such callous dialogues. Planned Parenthood, taxpayer-funded to the tune of $ 500 million per year, is the largest provider of abortions in the United States and, despite what proponents say about the other services this organization provides, Planned Parenthood derives the lion’s share of their revenue by performing abortions. The mere fact that taxpayers, the majority of whom are opposed to unrestricted abortion, pay to prop up this business is ludicrous enough, but the fact that such funds support an entity which would harvest infantile organs for re-sale on the open market is monstrous to an extent not seen in decades. Those doctors, one of whom is seen sipping wine and casually discussing such marketing, along with brainstorming ideas of how to make such procedures “less crunchy” so as to preserve the viability of such harvested organs, are nothing more than the modern day equivalent of Nazi Dr. Josef Mengele. Ironically, when President Obama recently praised such activities of Planned Parenthood, as “performing God’s work”, reminds us all that the Nazis once used those precise words to justify the slaughter of millions in concentration camps across eastern Europe.

Setting aside, for the moment, the primary issue of terminating lives of many millions of babies who are denied their right to live, do we really, as freedom-loving and life-respecting Americans, want to continue to support and abide the monstrous and bitter harvesting of body parts by any organization- particularly one so endowed with government largesse? For those of you who would say “yes” to this question, I challenge you to look at these videos and answer to yourself, alone, as to whether or not this is truly a good thing- regardless of whether or not you would say so, publicly. While you are doing so, consider your own humanity and how precious you view your own life, and then decide for yourself if you, or anyone else, truly have the right to determine whether or not another person has the opportunity to live, when such a person is not afforded to be party to such an existential decision.

-Drew Nickell, 30 July 2015

© 2015 by Drew Nickell, all rights reserved