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Report from Louisiana: Advent and Waiting on Christmas

Posted: November 28, 2022 by Pat Austin in Uncategorized
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By: Pat Austin

SHREVEPORT – I am a one-holiday-at-a-time sort of person; don’t talk to me about Christmas until Thanksgiving is over!

But…Thanksgiving is now over; my neighbors were out this weekend hanging lights on their homes and posting pictures of their Christmas trees on social media. On our Christian calendar it is Advent season. The hangings on the altar change color and the Advent wreath appears.

This time of year we are counting the days until Christmas. Our schedules are filled with parties, shopping, finding the perfect gift. The kids pen letters to Santa while adults wrap gifts, plan menus, and hide presents. The children are filled with expectation and energy. As adults we may feel some pressure, some sentimentality, and maybe some stress.

The word “advent” is derived from a Latin word that means “coming.” Yes, Christmas, (and Santa) is coming; the nativity of our Lord is coming, but we also know that Christ is coming again, and we wait for that.

I’ll be honest; I love Christmas, but I’m always glad when it is done. I put up a live tree and I take it down on December 26. I’m one of those people who finds the whole thing stressful. I never have enough money to buy what I want to for people, and I feel a self-imposed pressure about that. I decorate my house, put up a tree, and do the baking because it is expected. I love a pretty tree, but who sees it? We have a very small family, and they all live in another state. My parents are gone, and we no longer have a family Christmas party. It’s all just rather sad and sentimental to me.

So this year I make a vow: I will make a solid effort to enjoy everything that is good about the season. I will attend events at my church, enjoy the children’s Nativity Pageant; I will look at the pretty lights in the neighborhood and I will put up a dang tree.

Years ago, we had a maiden aunt in the family who was on a teacher’s pension and didn’t ever have much money. She purchased what she could for those on her gift list; we called them “Aunt Maude presents.” She would give you a pair of socks. Or a coffee mug. A bottle of maple syrup with a big red bow. A package of hair barrettes. Each gift was thoughtfully selected with love. If she ever felt pressure to spend beyond her budget it never showed.

I might be purchasing Aunt Maude Gifts this year, and I’ll probably still be glad when the season is over, but I am going to make every effort to enjoy the spirit of the season and the true reason for the season!

And a Merry Christmas to you all!

Dave Portnoy puts out The Most Important Tweet You Will Read Today or likely for the rest of this year:

Posted: November 28, 2022 by datechguy in Uncategorized

Note carefully the timeframe involved here

You should always presume any person working for the MSM is a dishonest and dishonorable, that any statements they make to you are dishonest and/or dishonorable and the motive for any attempt to contact you is dishonest and dishonorable.

All that is a start but most important of all as I have said many times NEVER TALK TO THE MSM UNLESS YOU HAVE A CAMERA RUNNING FILMING THE EXCHANGE WHILE YOU DO SO!

Closing thought: I suspect six months ago that tweet would have been flagged for disinformation.

Pray for the Walmart employees

Posted: November 26, 2022 by navygrade36bureaucrat in Uncategorized
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Imagine my surprise to wake up and see a news headline talking about a shooting in Virginia, and then to realize it was at a Walmart I often shop at!

The Chesapeake Walmart off Battlefield Boulevard is not the closest Walmart to me, but I do shop there often enough in my travels that I know the store layout. It’s a very busy Walmart, and its in a nicer part of town. As of now, it seems the shooter was a night shift manager that did not like the people he was working with, was angry at his treatment and wanted to get revenge. More data is coming out as the FBI and local police continue their investigation.

Considering that the shooter is black and doesn’t wear a MAGA hat, I don’t expect the national media to care too much in another week or two. The shooting does bring up a bigger point about bullying though. We associate bullying with children, forgetting that it happens all too often in adults. A few years back, my wife was a volunteer for one of our kid’s PTAs when she returned from a board meeting in a pissed off mood. I found out that the President of the board was a raging jerk that regularly put her down for some of her fundraising suggestions. After a tense exchange and an open meeting, where I watched the school principal not say anything, she eventually quit, prompting a bunch of other volunteers to quit and the PTA to eventually dissolve due to lack of volunteers.

The lack of a spinal cord on the part of the principal is something we’re going to continue seeing. I have to wonder how many people watched this Walmart manager get picked on time after time. Didn’t anyone have the guts to say “Hey, maybe we ought to remind him we still care?” Did nobody notice this? Did anybody care?

It doesn’t excuse his actions, not by a long shot. He still chose to murder people, and ultimately he’ll face judgement of some kind over his actions. But we just celebrated Thanksgiving, where we give thanks for the people around us. This includes the people we work with, not just our families.

I ask that you pray for the victims of this horrible crime and their families. But I also ask that on Monday, when most of you go back to work, that you tell the people around you that you care about them. Even if that co-worker is an annoying Karen, it doesn’t give anyone license to push someone to the breaking point. Especially after years of government-induced COVID lockdowns and isolation, we should be trying to heal those around us and make our little part of the world better.

This post represents the views of the author and not those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Navy, or any other government agency. Please pray for the victims of the Chesapeake Walmart shooting.

Giorgia Meloni takes Sir Humphrey’s advice

Posted: November 25, 2022 by datechguy in Uncategorized

I’ve often quoted the spectacular TV comedies “Yes Minister” and “Yes Prime Minister” on this site because of the continued relevance of it’s portrayal of: “The political will vs the bureaucratic won’t” which apparently has not changed in the nearly 40 years since the last episode was broadcast.

In that final episode titled titled “The Tangled Web” A there is a clash between Prime Minister James Hacker (Paul Eddington) and secretary of the Cabinet and head of the Civil Service Sir Humphrey Appleby (Nigel Hawthorne) over the PM categorically denying the bugging of a MP before parliament that he was not made aware of. Sir Humphrey refuses to back up this false statement in an upcoming appearance before the privileges committee. But before that appearance comes up Humphrey in an obscure interview not realizing a microphone is still live when the interview is done states that the you can half unemployment in a week by cutting off benefits to any person who refuses two job offers saying “they’ll be off the register before you can say parasite”. While the BBC had no intention of using the post interview remarks the PM gets ahold of a the master tape and Humphrey agrees to back up the PM’s previous denial before the committee to get his hands on the tape.

Well it’s 34 years later and we’ve finally found a pol willing to do something about this in Italy:

Ms Meloni had vowed to abolish the expanded welfare programme altogether during the campaign, arguing that it encouraged people to stay on welfare when they could work and was abused by fraudsters.

The changes announced on Tuesday would knock eligible workers out of the system after eight months or after they refuse a job offer, and requires recipients to actually live in Italy.

Where is this money going? Well it’s going to help Italy, a country with one of the lowest birthrates in the world make more babies:

To encourage families to have more children, Ms Meloni announced a 50 percent increase in the “baby bonus” checks parents receive the first year after the birth of a child and a 50% increase for three years for families with more than three children.

Women who choose to extend maternity leave beyond five months for an extra month can do so on 80 percent of their salary rather than 30 percent. Meloni, Italy’s first woman premier, also announced a reduced tax on feminine hygiene products and items for newborns.

The future belongs to those who show up and Ms Meloni is determined that those who own the future in Italy will be Italians who have a job.

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