The Kathy Griffin Debacle

I think we’re all at this point aware of the mess resulting from Kathy Griffin’s ill-thought-out joke involving holding a faux severed head of Donald Trump. I think all of us on both sides can agree that the joke was very distasteful and that she was right to apologize for it. CNN was also well within their rights to remove her from some of their programming. But, I have also seen a great number of people attempting to justify it by bringing up the atrocious things said and done in the name of free speech about President Obama, the effigies, the fake lynchings, etc. And yes, the far right has behaved in exactly the same manner as Griffin behaved, but that does NOT give us the excuse to behave in the same manner as they. Remember Michelle Obama’s quote: “When they go low, we go high.” Follow that. Call them out on their hypocrisy when it arises, but also remember to control yourself, and be willing to call out those on OUR side when they misbehave. Because, in the end,



If we don't police ourselves, who will?



It’s a short post, I’ll admit.


Until next time friends.

The Current GOP, and how it is destroying Conservatism

Let me start this off by stating that I am a centrist, which to me means that I have both conservative and liberal beliefs, depending on the issue at hand. I do not hate or scorn any conservatives, given that I agree with SOME of classic conservatism's viewpoints. But this mutated, infected Trumpian conservatism is proving to be a poison with which conservatism as a movement is being destroyed. I read an analytical piece of an excellent article on one of my home new sources, Kentucky.com, (which will be linked below), which stated, in it's ending paragraph, that, and I quote,

If the GOP really believes in the snake oil it has been selling us, it’s time to show it,” he writes.(addressing the GOP's seeming wish to run the country "like a business") “And if not, it’s well past the time for the GOP to stop its empty ranting, which as Shakespeare would have said, increasingly sounds like a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

This is a rather succinct description of the current GOP (as a party). A bunch of snake-oil salesmen. And they have simply used conservatism as a platform for that. Once it serves their purpose, they will abandon it for the next party they can manipulate. This is where the current GOP hierarchy have truly poisoned the movement. They have transformed it from a party of honor, in the days of Eisenhower and Lincoln, to a party that will manipulate anything and anyone they can to reach their Ayn-Randian Shangri-La. People like Paul Ryan would gladly throw all poor and disabled people under the bus to give tax breaks to himself and his wealthy friends, and don't even get me started on McConnell or Trump!

 These are a group of people who say what people want to hear, accept and give bribes, collude with anyone, and manipulate anyone, all to get elected, at which point they then ignore it all and do whatever they please. And we as a country keep falling for their shell game and reelecting them. I have nothing against civilian conservatives, but the GOP as a party, as far as the people in Washington go, are nothing more than a group of lying hucksters who want nothing more than to give tax breaks to themselves and their corporate buddies, at the cost of everyone else. The current set of politicians has poisoned the well, so to speak, of conservatism. There's no honor left, no sense of decency, nothing but the false sense of righteousness and a desire to destroy all of those "lazy welfare leeches" without realizing the hypocrisy of the fact that they themselves, in the form of corporate tax credits and loopholes, are bigger leeches than we poor people could ever dream of. The current set of "conservative" politicians, most of them anyways, are simply irredeemable. They won't be able to be rehabilitated, so to speak, they must simply be voted out. Conservatives, true conservatives, must rise and vote out the scoundrels who have stolen their party, and begin the process of rebuilding the trust and moral code that the Trumpian "conservatives" have squandered. It's a hard road, that's for sure, but...




For true conservatives, isn't it worth it?




Until next time, friends.





Article mentioned: http://www.kentucky.com/news/local/news-columns-blogs/tom-eblen/article152906944.html

I'm Back!

It's been a while folks, but the writing bug has finally returned!! New post incoming, and hopefully many more in the coming months!

On Trump Banning CNN and Others From Spicer meeting.

I don't know everyone's opinion of CNN, and frankly, I don't care. This is something bigger than that. Sometimes, in order to protect that which we love, we must defend that which we hate. I know most folks in Ky don't like or watch CNN, and that's your right, but, if we allow Trump to do this unmolested, what's to say the next Democrat President won't do the same to Fox? Or Breitbart? Everyone went up in arms when Obama tried to deny Fox press credentials, why not now? This is something that must be stopped now, for the good of everyone on both sides. The 1st Amendment cannot be infringed upon, and a free and independent press is a bulwark of that, whether you like what they say or not. And for the rest of the world outside Kentucky, the same idea applies to you, if this is allowed to happen to CNN and the rest, what's to say it won't happen to the news organizations that you read, that you frequent? The precedent will have been set, and once that's done, it's too late. As usual, I'm just a 

Rambling Redneck.

My Thoughts On The Silencing Of Elizabeth Warren.

Let me start off by saying, I'm a moderate, so I will gladly disagree with either side if I think they are wrong. In this case, the GOP was, and is, wrong. Senator McConnell made a drastic error in judgment, and in doing so, gave the Democrats the rallying cry they needed, and the GOP desperately needed to keep them from getting. And I will say so, and speak out against hypocrisy, if a Democrat did this last year, every Republican would be up in arms, yet, because the GOP is in control of Congress it's somehow okay? No, but some people act as though it is, and all that proves is that for them, and indeed, for most of the Republican Party upper echelons, it was never about "saving the country from Liberals”, or the “American Way”, or fixing any problem in the nation, or even getting America back to work, it was always just about exacting petty vengeance on someone they disagree with, the laws and the country be damned. And in the form of Donald J. Trump, they now have an instrument to attempt to exact their vengeance. But, funnily enough, now that they have the power, both in the White House and the halls of Congress, they seem, as a party, consumed by infighting and petty squabbles. When they could be trying to band together and get the legislation they desperately wanted to be approved, they content themselves with either fighting amongst each other, leaving little time to do anything, or trying to make themselves and the law of the land subservient to the sole will of Donald Trump, a man who has shown he has little or no concern for them, not while he can fight the REAL scourge of the USA, the eeeevvvilllll media, and then rant on Twitter when his grandstanding backfires somehow or someone challenges him in court. Between him and the deformed mess that is now the Republican Party, there is little left to recognize of the Party of Lincoln and Reagan, this seems to be another animal entirely.

But, then again, I’m just a

Rambling Redneck